The UK’s patchy train WiFi is getting a Starlink-style upgrade by 2030
Key Points
- Rail minister Keir Mather has confirmed every UK mainline train will get low earth orbit satellite WiFi by 2030
- The funding was secured through the 2025 Spending Review and LNER will work with the Department for Transport Operator to deliver it
- £41 million is earmarked for the satellite rollout under the National Infrastructure Strategy
- A separate scheme, Project Reach, will install 1,000 kilometres of fibre and tackle 57 tunnel blackspots on the East Coast, West Coast and Great Western main lines
- The 2030 target replaces a 2017 pledge to deliver 1Gbps WiFi across UK mainline routes by 2025 that was missed
The UK government has committed to installing low-earth-orbit satellite WiFi on every mainline train by 2030.
“Wi-Fi connectivity across the rail network has historically been patchy,” said Keir Mather, Minister for Rail at the Department for Transport, in a written answer to parliament on 22 May.
The funding has been secured through the 2025 Spending Review, with London North Eastern Railway working alongside the Department for Transport Operator to deliver the rollout.
The intervention follows years of passenger complaints about the onboard Internet that drops out for long stretches of major intercity routes.
The disclosure came in response to a question from Conservative MP Jerome Mayhew, who pressed the Department for Transport on what it was doing to fix LNER WiFi and how it rated the service’s performance over the past three years.
Mather did not provide a performance assessment in his reply, instead pointing to the satellite rollout and a separate connectivity programme already underway.
The satellite plan sits alongside Project Reach, a public-private partnership signed in June 2025 between Network Rail, Neos Networks and Freshwave to eliminate mobile signal blackspots on the East Coast Main Line, West Coast Main Line and Great Western Main Line.
The deal will see 1,000 kilometres of ultra-fast fibre optic cable installed along those routes, with an ambition to extend beyond 5,000 kilometres.
Freshwave will also tackle signal dead zones in 57 tunnels covering almost 50 kilometres, including the 4-kilometre Chipping Sodbury tunnel near Bristol.
Mobile network operators are separately investing in new 4G and 5G infrastructure at 12 of the country’s busiest stations under the same programme, including King’s Cross, Euston, Paddington, Waterloo, Manchester Piccadilly, Birmingham New Street, Edinburgh Waverley and Glasgow Central.
The Department for Transport estimates Project Reach will save taxpayers around £300 million compared with a purely publicly funded model.
A separate £41 million has been confirmed in the government’s National Infrastructure Strategy specifically for the satellite connectivity programme.
The 2030 deadline is the latest in a series of UK rail connectivity targets.
The previous government pledged in December 2017 to deliver uninterrupted WiFi and 5G mobile speeds of up to 1Gbps across all mainline train routes by 2025, a deadline that passed without delivery.
The current satellite-led programme replaces that pledge with a fresh target set five years further out.
