We’re still in the early days of satellite-based mobile phone connectivity, and T-Mobile is pushing forward with its Starlink-powered T-Satellite service.
T-Mobile and SpaceX announced plans to work together on the initiative years ago, but the service was only officially revealed during the Super Bowl at the start of this year.
Since then, T-Mobile rolled out its T-Satellite service as a free beta for iPhone users with any carrier before officially launching T-Satellite as a paid product.
T-Satellite has steadily expanded to support more functionality. For example, last month six built-in iPhone apps were added to the list of compatible software: Compass, Fitness, Maps, Messages, Music, and Weather.
As promised, T-Mobile has announced T-Satellite support for more third-party apps on iPhone and Android. From their announcement today:
T-Life: The center of the T-Mobile customer experience now includes T-Satellite support. Customers can see and launch satellite-ready apps; share their location via SMS and can even chat live with a built-in helper to answer T-Satellite questions. T-Life puts the best of T-Mobile at customers’ fingertips.
AllTrails: Find your next hike with the world’s most popular app for outdoor exploration. Discover and experience the perfect trail for you, from park strolls to mountain summits. Navigate and share your location in real-time. Join a community of more than 90 million trail-goers who hike, bike, and run more than 500,000 trails around the world. T-Satellite is currently supported for Android.
AccuWeather: Never get caught unprepared. AccuWeather gives you hyper-local forecasts down to the minute, plus real-time storm alerts for your exact location. Track severe weather better, check the UV index and monitor air quality, so you can be better prepared and make the best weather-informed decisions, even with the slightest change in conditions.
CalTopo: For the planners and explorers — CalTopo lets you build custom maps for your next hike, ski trip, or climb. Plot your route, track your location in real time, and stay safer with features like slope angle shading and wildfire activity layers. Share your maps with friends to keep your whole group on the same page.
onX: Choose your adventure with onX’s suite of apps — onX Backcountry, onX Hunt, onX Offroad, and onX Fish. Discover hiking trails, powder stashes, camp sites, public and private property boundaries, two-track and single track, and lakes teeming with fish. Explore the unknown with confidence, and be able to adapt on the fly, even when far away from cell service, with real-time weather conditions, weather forecasts and animal movement predictions, powered by T-Satellite connectivity.
X: Stay in the loop even in remote locations. With X, you can scroll trending topics, share updates, and join conversations from virtually anywhere. Post text, photos, GIFs, or videos — and even control when high-res media loads so you don’t waste data but still see all the moments that matter.
WhatsApp: With WhatsApp on T-Satellite, you can send messages including sending voice notes, sharing photos or even calling your entire group chat. Whether you’re on a mountaintop, out in the desert, or stuck in a random dead zone at your kid’s soccer game, you can still see faces, hear voices, and share updates securely. For emergency services, the best way is to text-to-911 via your device’s native messaging service.
For T-Satellite with Data for Business subscribers, T-Mobile says support now extends to Dialpad, FLORIAN, MultiLine, and T-Mobile Direct Connect.
T-Satellite also works with messaging, location sharing, mapping, and text-to-911. Voice and video calling is currently limited to WhatsApp for now.
X works via Starlink Direct to Cell on T-Mobile and iPhone 17 Pro, 26.1
It seems you need 3 bars for data.
Tested next to possibly Amazon Kuiper ground station on WA20, where cell reception is zero 🤣 pic.twitter.com/x20W3Bst1v — Anemll (@anemll) October 1, 2025