Earlier this week Air France announced that it would begin offering free Wi-Fi onboard its flights. However, the fleetwide rollout is far from complete.
Air France is Offering Complimentary Wi-Fi for Flying Blue Members
As of September 8, 2025, Air France is offering complimentary Wi-Fi for members of its Flying Blue loyalty program. While this is an exciting development, you’ll need to temper your expectations a bit.
Currently, Air France has installed Starlink Wi-Fi on just four of its aircraft, two Airbus A220s and two Embraer E190s operated by Hop. The carrier also expects to have the service available on a single Airbus A350 later this week.
While the airline is retrofitting planes rather quickly, it will take a while to get the French flag carrier’s fleet of more than 250 aircraft converted with the new product. Air France expects that roughly 30% of its total fleet will have the service by the end of 2025. Fleetwide connectivity is expected to be complete in late 2026.
For aircraft that are not equipped with Starlink, the airline is offering a free “messaging” pass for Flying Blue members. La Premiere and Flying Blue Ultimate members will continue to receive free Wi-Fi onboard.
Free Wi-Fi is Becoming the New Normal
There was a time not too long ago where the inside of an airplane was the only place you could disconnect from the world for a few hours. While onboard Wi-Fi has been around for years, it was often slow and expensive which prevented many passengers from using it.
With the introduction of Starlink, everything changed. We’ve seen multiple airlines such as United and Qatar Airways add the service onboard its planes, with Qatar going as far as hosting a gaming competition onboard mid flight.
Even carriers who don’t have Starlink are feeling the need to offer free Wi-Fi to passengers in order to compete. Most carriers require passengers to be members of their respective loyalty programs in order to use those services which also helps drive membership in those high-revenue areas.
All in all I’d say this trend is a win for passengers, even though it makes it harder to “unplug” at 35,000 feet.
Summary
Air France is the latest airline to introduce fast, free Starlink Wi-Fi onboard its planes. Only a handful of aircraft are equipped with the service at the time of this writing but, the whole fleet is expected to be upgraded by the end of 2026.