You’ve never been one to enjoy feeling nickle-and-dimed. You’re already paying over a grand a night, so it would be nice if you received a complimentary croissant in the morning. Quite frankly, you’d feel better if they increased your nightly nut by the $50 for breakfast than see it show up on your bill. The same applies to flights, where prices have skyrocketed to all-time highs. These days, you often pay to pick your seat, bring extra baggage, and enjoy the Wi-Fi. Who wants to go cross-country without access to group chats and TikTok? Well, one airline is taking the bold move to keep you connected for free on flights. Yes, free internet on flights is happening. These are the details.
Overview
Delta Air Lines, one of the three largest carriers in the world, will start to provide free internet on flights beginning in early 2023. Currently the plan is to offer free Wi-Fi on domestic flights, to be expanded to the rest of its fleet later in the year. That’s good even if you don’t fly Delta. By offering free Wi-Fi on flights, the airline is likely to bring out the competition from rival airlines. Delta isn’t just doing this out of pure goodness though. The goal of offering free Internet on flights is to help establish its place as an upscale airline. With the perk, Delta hopes to attract more high-end leisure and corporate fliers.
This isn’t the first time Delta passengers have had free internet on flights. It was offered for the first time in 2019 with a two-week test run. The pilot (ha!) was done on dozens of domestic flights, and obviously went over very well with customers. Since then, Delta has experimented with free Wi-Fi services for select regular fliers on certain domestic routes.
The mandate for free internet on flights comes from the top: Delta Chief Executive Ed Bastian. Bastian believes that in-flight Internet should be fast and free. There were technical issues to overcome before free Wi-Fi was a reality. But now it looks like Delta has worked out the glitches. The service will be offered by Delta’s current provider, Viasat Inc.
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