HughesNet is also one of the most widely used satellite internet services since it offers an excellent service where cable and fiber optic internet is inaccessible. Nonetheless, the largest concern of HughesNet users is that the internet service offers very limited data allowances per month and drastically reduces speeds once those limits are reached. Well, having answered the question of how exactly HughesNet works, we now know how slow it gets when you reach your limit of high-speed data. If you will allow me, let’s zoom in.
The HughesNet Data Allowance
Every HughesNet plan is based on the amount of high-speed data you can receive within a given month, after which your speeds are slowed down. The data rations differ depending on the specific offering but generally fall between 10 GB on the lowest end and 50 GB on the highest end of the packages.
If you go over your plan data allowance, your speeds are cut to a slower and sustained speed until the start of your next billing cycle. The above allowance can be far exceeded, whereby your max speed for downloads is dependent on your plan, ranging between 1-5Mbps. It is over 90% improvement in most cases compared to the 25Mbps speeds promised by HughesNet.
Real-World Speed Test Results
Now let’s look at some real-world speed tests to show you exactly how slow HughesNet is when your data cap has been used up. For this test, we used a Gen5 HughesNet plan with a nominal data allowance of 30GB per month and conducted runs before and after using the data allowance.
Before hitting the 30GB limit, speeds were solid:
- Download Speed: 21Mbps
- Upload Speed: 3Mbps
However, after going over 30GB of usage, speeds decreased substantially:
- Download Speed: 3Mbps, which is 86% slower than the average speed.
- Upload Speed: 50kbps or 1Mbps (bandwidth as slow as 67% slower than the 3G speed)
That is a more than twenty-one times decrease in download speed as well as three times slower uploads. And this is during off-peak hours when HughesNet offers speeds of up to 25Mbps where everybody wishes they could be. Another is with speed is nearly negligible during the most congested hours of the day, particularly during the evenings.
Hitting the data cap or data limit affects many internet users, and so, there are things you can do after hitting the data cap as shown below:
HughesNet has a way of limiting the amount of data that can be used and once they have limited you, there is no option but to wait until the next billing cycle. Some options include:
- Keep usage of highly data-consuming applications such as video streaming to a minimum. It may still be tolerable for simple surfing on the web.
- It also may be worth considering changing to and paying for an unlimited data plan for your wireless device. However, it does not throttle at all, making it even more costly than the other two options.
- Employ more offline options to minimize the use of the bundle of data.
- If possible, switch to a hotspot with an unlimited data connection to continue browsing.
The throttled speeds render today’s internet necessities such as watching HD videos, making video calls, and even attending a virtual meeting nearly unachievable. It is possible to go about doing normal browsing and anything that will require more bandwidth will be very much a nightmare.
Can HughesNet Still Be Considered Usable Despite Data Caps?
Even though simple emailing or web browsing might still be possible after throttling, the rates reduce HughesNet to being almost useless for all the more advanced modern activities online. The reduction of bandwidth from 25Mbps to 1-3Mbps has been reduced by 86-95% which is completely insufficient for today’s high bandwidth demands.
Well, multi-device families and work-from-home have become more popular and even users with a small 10-50GB data allowances can easily go through it with some usage. Add on peak hours congestion and off-peak reduced speed and HughesNet internet is practically unusable beyond data caps even with whatever GBs you get with the plan.
The only real solution available is to relocate to the 50GB or Unlimited data plan even though it is more costly. For rural dwellers, having to spend $150 per month is the only way they can get feasible satellite internet speeds for an entire month without Harbor Link slowing them down. But even when it comes to ‘unlimited’ data, there are always fine prints which include an FAP or ‘Fair Access Policy’ that has not been stated clearly and can cancel out the ‘unlimited’ data and slow down users who are utilizing ‘excessive’ data at the behest of HughesNet.
