Lasers vs Radio: Inside the Laser Satellite Communication Revolution (2025)
NASA’s TBIRD CubeSat achieved a 200 Gbps laser downlink in 2023, transmitting 4.8 terabytes in under five minutes. SpaceX’s Starlink had over 4,000 satellites in orbit by early 2024, with inter-satellite laser links moving about 42 petabytes per day (roughly 5.6 terabits per second). Amazon’s Project Kuiper demonstrated 100 Gbps inter-satellite laser links in late 2023 over distances of about 1,000 km, with production satellites planned to launch in 2025 and each carrying multiple laser terminals. Europe’s European Data Relay System (SpaceDataHighway) uses Tesat laser terminals on two GEO satellites, delivering up to 1.8 Gbps links and as much as
