My family and I have lived on an off-grid compound in the rural New Mexico desert for the last four years. By “off-grid,” I mean we collect our own rainwater, grow much of our own food and source our own solar energy. We have zero dependence on modern utilities except for one: the internet.
This story is part of Living Off the Grid, a 7-part series from CNET contributing editor, Eric Mack, who found energy independence in the New Mexico desert.
People usually go completely offline when they move off-grid -- not us. Getting away from the digital world is supposed to be part of the romantic notion of moving somewhere remote and impersonating Henry David Thoreau or Terry Tempest Williams. But recent events like COVID-19, the housing crisis, inflation and increasing acceptance of working from home have inspired new interest in a more independent lifestyle. Today’s technology makes bringing it all with you easier than leaving it all behind.
I’ve been living off-grid for almost half a decade, but I haven’t had to live a single day offline. Working in journalism and communications, I need access to the latest news and enough broadband for frequent videoconferencing meetings.
CNET’s guide to rural internet providers is a good place to research available options. But of course, being off-grid isn’t just rural living -- it’s usually remote living, where the nearest ISP may not even be able to find you, let alone service you.
Here’s my story and my personal tips for finding the best internet connection when living off-grid or in a remote location.
Locating local internet providers
My journey getting online while off-grid
When we moved off the grid in the first weeks of the COVID-19 lockdown and into a straw bale home with no electricity or running water installed, my first call wasn’t to a plumber or a solar company. It was to a nearby internet service provider.
The uncertainty of the pandemic and a lifelong interest in greater independence led my family to look for ways to take more responsibility and control over our basic needs without sacrificing our connection to the digital world.
I scheduled an installation for fixed wireless broadband service that would be powered by a combination of small car batteries or a portable gas generator until I could get the permanent solar power system installed. It had to be done in this order. How else would I be able to watch enough DIY YouTube videos to install the photovoltaic panels for our new home correctly on my own?
I’ll always remember the summer I washed outside daily at dusk using a tiny camp shower (basically a black bag of water hanging in the sun all day) before heading inside to binge something in 4K. Not such a bad life during a pandemic.
I’ve come a long way since that makeshift car battery-powered internet. Over the last four years, I’ve leveled up my DIY skills and our electrical system. We’re now running off the latest lithium battery technology and this year I installed ethernet wiring throughout the house to ensure we aren’t losing any bandwidth to Wi-Fi signals having to penetrate our thick straw bale walls. I installed it all myself after spendinghours researching online. We have a 64Mbps fixed wireless package from our local ISP that is slower than faster fiber and cable connections but better than we might see from many satellite providers, and our customer service is excellent, which is rare to find living off-grid. It’s plenty of bandwidth for me to telecommute full-time and support my family’s streaming habits.
I'm amazed by how many options there are in 2024 to stay connected to the world even when you aren't physically plugged into the grid or other infrastructure. It's a much better situation than I faced twelve years ago from a different rural location on the grid. At the time, my best option was a legacy satellite provider, which came with crippling data caps and high latency. Today, there are new choices: Starlink is up and orbiting, offering service from space to much of Earth and terrestrial options like 5G home internet or the fixed wireless option I still use are frequently upgraded.
Internet options in rural America: What to consider
When evaluating your choices, there’s a handful of key considerations:
- Availability: This is going to be your most obvious limiting factor. Telecommunications infrastructure was typically built alongside the electrical grid for decades, so broadband that requires copper or fiber probably won't be nearby if you're off it. As I've learned from living in multiple remote locations, though, the air is literally filled with networks to connect to. It's just a matter of getting the right receiver and putting it in the proper place.
- Cost: The average monthly internet bill is likely higher off-grid due to fewer options. The best way to evaluate your available choices is by cost per Mbps, taking into account both dollars spent per month and the speed you get for what you pay. As I mentioned above, I pay a higher relative rate from a locally-owned ISP because the customer service is unparalleled, and it's a business I want to support.
- Speed and latency: Speed is the other part of the above equation, but latency may be a bigger concern if you're dealing with a satellite connection. This is essentially the fraction of a second delay it takes data to physically reach you. When your data is being bounced around in orbit, the distance the signal travels -- even at the speed of light -- can begin to lead to noticeable lag, especially if you're videoconferencing or gaming. This used to be intolerable when I used legacy satellite internet years ago, but now I rarely notice lag on Zoom or elsewhere.
- Energy usage: If you're off-grid, you're probably thinking more about how many electrons your devices consume than the average person. I certainly was when trying to calculate how long I could run my router off a single car battery. While receivers and routers aren't typically big juice guzzlers, you may still want to check their total consumption, especially if your home is running on a tight energy budget or you're stringing together signal boosters and other hardware.
- Portability: Are you mobile or doing the digital nomad thing? Nix fixed wireless and some other options and start studying the coverage areas for satellite and 5G providers. Starlink has revolutionized how search and rescue teams I work with operate in the wilderness near here.
- Data usage: If you guzzle gigabits every month, be sure to read the fine print of the plans you're considering. Many include data caps that will greatly reduce your speed or even cut off your access altogether if you exceed them. These limits can be particularly harsh on certain satellite and cellular networks. When I used legacy satellite internet, there used to be nothing worse than hitting a cap and suddenly dropping down to dial-up speeds.
- Redundancy: In my experience, being remote means thinking about backups. Living near the edge of networks means being closer to the limit of failure. Another way of putting it is that service goes out more often in the boonies and takes longer to restore. When my main ISP goes down, I can hotspot from my phone for a decent substitute -- except when both networks go down simultaneously.
Rural living: Internet connection types to look for
Now that we know what to keep in mind when it comes to staying connected in the wilderness, let’s look at the available options in 2024.
Cable, DSL or Fiber: I've heard of situations where homeowners have access to these traditionally grid-tied data pipes but don’t have access to more basic utilities like electricity. Rarely, it can be much easier (and cheaper) for your cable or telecom monopoly to run a line to your home than for the electric company to do the same. If you’re in this situation, congratulations, you’ve lucked out. Just be sure to demand a speed test before signing a contract. DSL connections, in particular, can be lackluster the farther you are from the nearest central office.
Fiber connections typically perform the best of these luxurious options, but they’re also probably the least likely to be accessible off-grid, as they’re built out alongside such infrastructure. And unless you’re streaming multiple 4K movies at once or doing some serious gaming, you may not need such a fat pipe. If you can handle a little less download speed and are more concerned with the monthly hit to your wallet, old-school cable internet will save you some money, but again, you’re not likely to find much cable if you’re remote.
Potential providers: CenturyLink, Kinetic (Windstream), Ziply Fiber
5G (not fixed): Perhaps the simplest way to bring broadband into your home is being lucky enough to be in the right place to get a strong 5G signal from a nearby cell tower. Much of the country is now blanketed with 4G or 5G, but a reliable 5G signal is certainly harder to come by the farther you get from towns and from the grid. Still, it’s worth checking the coverage maps of the major providers below, as well as the vanishing number of small regional and tiny local carriers that exist in some rural areas.
Potential providers: T-Mobile, Verizon,
LEO Satellite Constellations: Satellite internet is different than it used to be. LEO stands for low-earth orbit, which is thousands of miles closer to the surface of Earth than where big telecom satellites have been circling us for decades. The advent of Starlink has increased the potential speed and lowered the latency of getting your data routed through orbit. Setup costs can be a little high compared to most other ISPs, though. Competition for Starlink has been on the way for years now, potentially from the UK’s OneWeb and Amazon’s Kuiper project, but nothing is in the US market just yet. For many in the middle of nowhere, Elon Musk’s cosmic internet constellation has been a game-changer.
Potential providers: Starlink
Legacy Satellite Services: For decades, this has been the last resort for getting online due to high latency, low speeds and data caps. The primary selling point for old-school satellite, which connects to smaller constellations of large satellites in much higher orbits (usually over 20,000 miles above the surface), is that it should be available nearly anywhere with a decent view of the sky. But Starlink is increasingly becoming competitive on this point as well.
Potential providers: Hughesnet, Viasat
