Starlink priority data is sold in data blocks. A service line carries recurring blocks that refresh each billing cycle, and top-up blocks for the rest of the current cycle. Through the Enterprise API, a provider sets the recurring amount, adds top-ups, opts service lines in or out of automatic top-up, and reads usage per service line for the current cycle and up to six previous ones.
How do data blocks work?
Starlink calls a data plan “a container” that holds data as blocks (managing data plans):
- Recurring data blocks: the amount replenished at the start of each billing cycle.
- Top-up blocks: one-time purchases that expire at the end of the current billing cycle.
The products endpoint lists the blocks available. Recurring blocks combine freely: Starlink’s own example is a service line with two 500GB blocks and four 50GB blocks, which gives 1,200GB of priority data each cycle.
A service line’s current configuration shows two things: the data available this cycle, and the data it will receive at the start of each cycle. Changing the recurring amount through the recurring data endpoint sets the next cycle’s data, and can add blocks to the current cycle as well.
What is opt-in?
Opt-in decides what happens when a service line uses all its monthly priority data (service activation):
- Opted in: top-up blocks are added automatically, in 50GB increments, and billed.
- Opted out: no top-up is added. Starlink warns that opting out “will interrupt the customer’s service” when the service line goes over its monthly data.
All service lines are opted in by default. Starlink’s instruction is that providers “should only opt out at the customer’s request”. The opt-in and opt-out endpoints set it per service line.
How do you read usage?
The data usage query returns consumption per service line per billing cycle. Its key terms:
- Priority data: high-speed data, counted against the plan.
- Standard data: deprioritised data, unlimited on most plans.
- Billing cycle: the monthly period starting on the account’s billing day.
- Overage: priority data consumed beyond the plan’s limit while opted in.
Requests page through every service line on an account, or filter to named service lines, which Starlink recommends for large accounts. By default the query returns the current cycle and one previous cycle. It can return up to six previous cycles. All timestamps are UTC.
What are the limits of the usage data?
Two limits shape any reporting built on it:
- History. Six previous cycles is the most the query returns. A longer record has to be stored as it arrives.
- Billing days differ. A customer account’s billing day is the day its first service line was created. Usage across accounts runs on different cycles, so a total across an estate has to respect each account’s own dates.
What should a platform show?
- Usage per service line against its blocks and top-ups, through the current cycle.
- Service lines over their limit, and those heading over it, first.
- Each account’s cycle on its own dates.
- History kept beyond six cycles.
- Opt-in state per service line, with any change made at the customer’s request recorded.
How does Nexus Telemetry Enterprise approach this?
Nexus Telemetry Enterprise reads usage for every service line on every connected account, keeps it in its own store, and shows the lines over or heading over their limit first. It manages data blocks and priority data through Starlink’s API, with each action traced to Starlink’s public documentation.
Where do you start?
Pull the current cycle’s usage for one account and check which service lines are opted out, and why. Then read the rate limits guide before polling usage across a large estate.