What changed
In June 2026 Starlink moved new Residential customers to renting the dish and router for $10 a month (see our June post). By Jul 20, 2026, satelliteinternet.com reported that the rental fee had been removed in select US areas with spare network capacity, after being in place for “a little more than a month”.
The same report gives the conditions it saw: a $20 shipping fee for a Standard kit, a $349 charge if the rented kit isn’t returned in acceptable condition within 30 days of cancelling, and an option to buy the kit outright for $349 through a support request after it arrives.
When
Reported Jul 20, 2026. Starlink didn’t publish a date for the change, so we treat it as approximate. Rental terms can differ by address and over time; a later pricing round-up we saw in September still described $10 rental “where rental is offered”.
Who is affected
New US Residential customers whose address is in an area Starlink is trying to fill. Existing customers and referrers aren’t directly affected.
What it means for you
Free rental lowers what a new customer pays upfront, but it doesn’t change what the referral gives them: one month of service credit on the second bill, never money off the kit or rental. A friend who sees $0 kit rental at their address still gets the free month only if they order with the link on starlink.com.
One referral rule matters more with rentals. The new customer must stay on a high-speed plan for two full billing cycles. The press coverage of the June rental model also says customers who rent can’t pause service, and Standby Mode doesn’t count as a high-speed plan for the referral anyway.
What to do now
If a friend is comparing offers, tell them to enter their address on starlink.com: the rental fee, shipping and plan price shown there are what apply to them. Then open your link on the same device they’ll order on.
What stays the same
Referral reward, free month, two-billing-cycle stay and the rule that store or reseller kits don’t qualify.
What we don’t know yet
Which US areas get free rental, how long it lasts, and whether the $10 fee applies everywhere else. We have one press source for the change and have not confirmed it on Starlink’s own pages.
How to check it yourself
Enter the friend’s exact service address on starlink.com and step through the order to the summary before paying. The summary shows the monthly kit fee (or none), shipping and the plan price that apply to that address on that day. That page is the authority, not a press report or a national price list. Take a screenshot of the summary if you want a record.