(Sharecast News) - International Airlines Group (IAG) has struck a deal to equip its aircraft with high speed wi-fi supplied by Starlink, with the service expected to start on long and short-haul routes next year.

IAG said it expects to equip 500 planes across Aer Lingus, British Airways, Iberia, LEVEL and Vueling covering short-haul journeys in Europe as well as all the group's long-haul transatlantic and global routes.

"This will allow customers to stay connected in the skies with download and upload speeds as good or better than home connectivity, enabling fast downloads, streaming and online gaming for customers on IAG airlines," the company said on Thursday.

Starlink offers download speeds of up to 150-450 Mb per second and upload speeds of 20-70 Mb per second. A download speed of 150Mb per second would allow an HD movie of approximately 4 to 5 GB to be downloaded in around five minutes, it added.

Reporting by Frank Prenesti for Sharecast.com

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