By the end of 2025, more than 14,000 active satellites from countries around the world were orbiting Earth. Roughly one-third of those will be shifted to lower orbital heights soon.
SpaceX, which operates the largest satellite network in orbit, will carry out the adjustments. Approximately 4,400 of its Starlink Internet satellites are scheduled to descend from about 341 miles (550 kilometers) to 298 miles (480 kilometers) during 2026, Michael Nicolls, SpaceX’s vice president of Starlink engineering, said.
“Starlink is beginning a significant reconfiguration of its satellite constellation focused on increasing space safety,” Nicolls wrote Thursday in a post on X.
The adjustments, achieved using the Starlink satellites’ plasma thrusters, will be performed slowly, but they will concentrate a sizable portion of orbital traffic into lower layers. Counterintuitively, that clustering should lower the chance of collisions among satellites streaking through near-Earth space at nearly 5 miles per second. Nicolls said the move will “increase space safety in several ways.”
Why now?
There is less debris at the reduced altitude, and although the Starlink craft will be closer together, they will follow coordinated tracks arranged in many orbital lanes. “The number of debris objects and planned satellite constellations is significantly lower below 500 km, reducing the aggregate likelihood of collision,” Nicolls wrote.
The roughly 4,400 satellites being lowered represent nearly half of SpaceX’s Starlink inventory. At the close of 2025, SpaceX had almost 9,400 active satellites in orbit, including over 8,000 Starlinks providing service and several hundred more in testing or commissioning.
Another natural factor motivating the reconfiguration is the Sun’s waning activity. The Sun is beginning to quiet down after peaking in the 11-year solar cycle in 2024. Reduced solar activity decreases air density in the uppermost atmosphere, an important consideration for planning operations in low-Earth orbit.
As the solar minimum approaches, Starlink satellites at their current altitude will face less atmospheric drag. In the uncommon case of a satellite failure, SpaceX counts on that drag to pull Starlinks down to burn up on reentry. Lowering the satellites will let them naturally reenter and disintegrate within months. At solar minimum, drag could take more than four years to deorbit satellites from 550 kilometers, Nicolls said; at the reduced altitude, it would take only a few months.
