Hello Live From Virgin Australia’s First Wifi Fitted Aircraft!

Good morning everyone! I’m currently flying to Canberra from Brisbane onboard Virgin Australia’s first wifi fitted aircraft and let’s just say, the results are pretty damn impressive.

I’ve talked a little bit about VA’s wifi in previous posts and it’s fantastic to try it first hand and put the wifi through its paces.

• Virgin Australia Unveil In-flight Wifi Details

As the post says above, the airline has partnered with Gogo and it’s 2ku connectivity. As a comparison, Qantas uses NBN and the Skymuster satellite. Funnily enough, Qantas is supposed to have a faster speed onboard but Virgin is giving them a run for their money.

Below is where the actual switches are for the wifi:

Virgin Australia Wifi

Obviously, when the light is green it means the wifi is available.

Virgin Australia Wifi

Connecting to the wifi is very simple and fast. All you have to do is connect to the ‘VirginAustralia’ network and it will prompt you to connect to the network. It’s the same network that you use for inflight entertainment.

While the trial is running the wifi is free and it’s not yet known how much it will cost once it gets fully integrated.

So what are the speeds like?

What’s impressing me the most about the wifi is how consistent the speed is. This is what the speeds were like on the ground taxiing in Brisbane:

These were the speeds on takeoff and climb out:

And these are the speeds while we are at our cruising altitude of 38,000 feet:

I was also able to stream Suits on Netflix and watch youtube videos in HD.

As an added test I also tried a facebook call and was trying to be discreet as possible. The connection was strong and I could hear the person on the other end of the line very clearly.

I’ll be in Canberra for about 3 hours then I’m back to Brisbane on the same aircraft to try it again!