Budget airline carrier Ryanair has ruled out installing Starlink's in-flight WiFi on its aircraft.

In an interview with Reuters this week, Ryanair CEO Michael O'Leary said it doesn't make sense to equip Ryanair's fleet with the service.

The Irish airline typically operates short-haul routes, mainly across Europe.

"You need to put antenna on fuselage it comes with a two percent fuel penalty because of the weight and drag," Ryanair CEO Michael O'Leary told Reuters. "We don't think our passengers are willing to pay for WiFi for an average 1-hour flight."

His comments come amid a flurry of airline carriers signing deals with Elon Musk's SpaceX subsidiary to provide in-flight Internet services.

At present, Starlink has around 8,900 satellites in orbit. Starlink claims that its in-flight WiFi offers latency of less than 99ms, and speeds of up to 500Mbps.

SpaceX set up a dedicated division for its in-flight connectivity service in 2022 called Starlink Aviation.

Starlink already has in-flight connectivity agreements in place, including with British Airways, United Airlines, Alaska Airlines, and Air France. The company is also nearing a deal to provide its in-flight Internet service for Saudi Airlines.

Several other airlines, including airBaltic, Zipair Tokyo, and JSX, have also chosen Starlink Aviation. JSX’s entire Embraer ERJ fleet is already fitted with the system.