Secular Brightness Trends of Starlink and OneWeb Satellites
Anthony Mallama
TL;DR
This study analyzes 1.6 million astronomical observations from 2021 to 2026, revealing significant brightness trends in Starlink and OneWeb satellites, with Starlink brightening and OneWeb dimming.
Contribution
It provides the first large-scale analysis of satellite brightness trends over multiple years using extensive observational data.
Findings
Starlink satellites brightened by 0.6 magnitudes
OneWeb satellites dimmed by 0.4 magnitudes
Both trends are statistically significant at 3 sigma
Abstract
Magnitudes recorded from 2021 through 2026 for Starlink VisorSats reveal brightening of 0.6 magnitudes, while those of OneWeb show dimming of 0.4. Both trends are significant at 3 sigma. This study is based on 1.6 million magnitudes recorded by the MMT9 robotic observatory.
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