Meta is developing a new subsea internet cable connecting the United States and France, scheduled to become operational in 2029. Named Petal, the system aims to be the first transoceanic subsea cable capable of transmitting 1 petabit of data per second. Spanning approximately 6,920 kilometers, the line is designed to carry twice the capacity of the highest-capacity subsea systems currently in service.
Having participated in more than 20 global subsea cable projects to date, Meta is developing the Petal system primarily to handle the surging data demands generated by artificial intelligence workloads and cloud services. Partnering with Japanese technology firms NEC and Sumitomo Electric, Meta will deploy an advanced fiber-optic architecture that transmits substantially more data through the same physical footprint.
Dual-Core Fiber Architecture and Transmission Capacity
The core technological innovation setting Petal apart from existing subsea cables lies in the internal structure of its optical fibers. While conventional fiber-optic cables transmit optical signals through a single core per fiber strand, Petal integrates two distinct cores within each fiber. This configuration creates two independent data transmission channels inside the same fiber strand.
This design allows operators to dramatically expand data transmission capacity without increasing the cable’s physical dimensions. Meta aims to double current capacity thresholds while maintaining standard power consumption levels. Developed alongside NEC and Sumitomo Electric, this dual-core technology is expected to serve as a benchmark for future high-capacity subsea networks worldwide.
In practical terms, transmitting 1 petabit per second represents an extraordinary data volume. Petal’s theoretical throughput is equivalent to transmitting roughly 30,000 full-length films—each averaging 4 GB—in a single second. According to comparisons provided by Meta, this bandwidth is sufficient to allow approximately 75 percent of the global population to stream music concurrently. However, these metrics reflect the aggregate trunk capacity of the cable rather than speeds accessible to individual end users.
Impact on Consumer Internet Speeds
The deployment of Petal will not directly increase residential or mobile broadband speeds for consumers overnight. End-user speeds will continue to depend on local internet service provider tiers, metropolitan infrastructure, home Wi-Fi hardware, and server load at destination endpoints.
Instead, the primary function of the subsea cable is to expand aggregate backbone capacity between continents. The proliferation of artificial intelligence models, high-resolution streaming media, and cloud platforms places unprecedented strain on international network interconnects. Petal provides the high-volume conduit required to accommodate this sustained traffic growth.
Scheduled to go live in 2029, the Petal system is positioned to reinforce transatlantic digital infrastructure and support the expanding data throughput demands of the global internet.
