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There are indications that satellite company, SpaceX’s Starlink has halted sales of its roaming plans in all African countries. Some members of a South African community on Facebook first noticed the company had removed African countries from its&nbsp;<a href="https://www.starlink.com/roam" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">roaming subscription options</a>&nbsp;on Friday, 25 October 2024. 
“I’m not sure if this is a glitch on my side, but when I go onto the Starlink website and try to order the roaming package, there aren’t any African countries listed in the dropdown,” one user said. 
A brief check on the site shows that African countries where the satellite internet company has formally announced its presence such as Nigeria, Botswana, Zimbabwe and Kenya are visibly missing from the list of locations from where potential users can order. 
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However, an unofficial Starlink kit importer in South Africa, IcasaSePush had told South African publication, <a href="https://mybroadband.co.za/news/broadband/567879-bad-news-for-new-starlink-users-in-south-africa.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Mybroadband</a> that this had previously happened for a few hours after an update, so it hoped this was just a temporary bug. However, more than a week later, roaming subscriptions are unavailable in Africa. 
The service is currently marked as “Sold Out” for new residential customers in large cities, including Harare in Zimbabwe, Lusaka in Zambia, Nairobi in Kenya, and Lagos in Nigeria. Customers in these locations have also reported download speeds averaging in the low double-digit Mbps, far below Starlink’s advertised speeds. 
Similar: <a href="https://technext24.com/2024/11/04/starlink-suspends-subscriptions-in-kenya/">Starlink suspends new subscriptions in Kenya citing network overload</a> 
<h4 id="possible-reason-for-starlinks-service-shutdown-across-africa" class="wp-block-heading">Possible reason for Starlink’s service shutdown across Africa</h4> 
One possible reason for the roaming crackdown in Africa is that users in countries without official support are saturating logistics capacity and stock in areas where Starlink demand is already high. 
Recall that we reported earlier that the internet company has suspended subscriptions in parts of Kenya. These include the capital, Nairobi and six other counties. According to the company, the reason for the suspension was due to a network overload as too many users were trying to access the service and there wasn’t enough space. 
“Nairobi and neighbouring areas are currently at network capacity. This means that too many users are trying to access the Starlink service within Nairobi and there isn’t enough bandwidth to support additional residential or roaming customers at this time,” the company said in a mail to its customers. 
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The network overload has also led to service disruptions in the affected areas which also include Thika, Kajiado, Kiambu, parts of Murang’a, Naivasha, Ngong, Machakos and sections of Narok County. 
According to Stellar Systems, an authorised Starlink retailer in Zambia, the “misuse” of the roam plans by users in unofficially supported countries may lead to the permanent shutdown of the roaming feature. “We can only hope this is not the case and will update you as soon as we get some feedback from Starlink regarding this,” the company said. 
YouTube channel Starlink Hardware also suspects the company has suspended new roaming activations to prevent people from using its service. “They’ve kind of gotten into trouble over it with some governments. They have tried to increase some prices and done some other things to prevent the workaround. This could just be their final step,” he said. 
The company has yet to comment on the apparent roaming shutdown in Africa. 
But in an email to users, Starlink assured that its team is working to restore services in affected areas and that users will get notifications once the service comes back on. “No roaming plans are available in Kenya at this time. Starlink is working to restore service in the disrupted are<a href="https://thekenyatimes.com/latest-kenya-times-news/ruto-breaks-silence-on-safaricom-vs-starlink-competition/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">as</a>&nbsp;and a notification will be sent once the residential plan is back,” Starlink added. 
Read also: <a href="https://technext24.com/2024/10/25/starlink-halts-price-hike-temporarily/">Starlink suspends subscription price hike “temporarily” over regulatory constraints</a>
The post <a href="https://technext24.com/2024/11/04/starlink-halts-roaming-across-africa/">Starlink halts roaming service across Africa amid tremendous growth</a> first appeared on <a href="https://technext24.com">Technext</a>.

Starlink halts roaming service across Africa amid tremendous growth

Technext.ng

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