Meta announces Petal subsea cable linking US and France with petabit capacity

October 3, 2026 at 03:44 PM2 min

This digest was compiled by AI from multiple sources — links to the originals are below.

Meta announced Petal, a 4,300-mile subsea cable connecting the U.S. and France, on Sept. 21. The cable, expected to enter service in 2029, will be the first to deliver petabit-scale capacity across an ocean. The announcement comes as Meta expands its subsea infrastructure to six continents.

Key Facts

Petal will carry 1 petabit per second, about 125,000 gigabytes per second, double the capacity of today's most advanced transoceanic cables.
Meta has invested in more than 20 subsea cable projects touching every continent except Antarctica.
Project Waterworth, announced in February 2025, will stretch more than 31,000 miles and connect the U.S., Brazil, South Africa, India, and other regions.
Meta's 2Africa system lands in 33 countries and can reach 3 billion people.
Petal is being developed with Japan's NEC and Sumitomo Electric Industries, with Orange handling the French landing.

Petal Cable Specifications

Meta announced Petal on Sept. 21, a roughly 4,300-mile subsea cable connecting the U.S. and France. The cable is expected to enter service in 2029 and will be the first to deliver petabit-scale capacity across an ocean. Petal will carry 1 petabit per second, or about 125,000 gigabytes per second, double what today's most advanced transoceanic cables can handle. Meta says that capacity is enough for three-quarters of the world's population to stream music at the same time. The cable uses two-core fiber, fitting two light paths inside each strand, allowing capacity doubling without proportional increases in power or infrastructure.

Global Subsea Network

Meta has spent the past decade building its presence on the seafloor and has invested in more than 20 subsea cable projects. Those projects touch every continent except Antarctica, with the company valued at roughly $1.85 trillion. Project Waterworth, announced in February 2025, will stretch more than 31,000 miles, longer than Earth's circumference. Waterworth will connect the U.S., Brazil, South Africa, India, and other regions across five continents, with some segments laid as deep as 4.3 miles. Meta's 2Africa system, whose core was completed last year, circles Africa and connects to Europe, the Middle East, and South Asia, landing in 33 countries and reaching 3 billion people.

Partnerships and Ownership

Petal is being developed with Japan's NEC and Sumitomo Electric Industries, and French telecom Orange is handling the landing on France's Atlantic coast. Meta has partnered with rivals, including the MAREA cable between Virginia and Spain, completed in 2017 and jointly owned with Microsoft and Telxius. Increasingly, Meta is taking the driver's seat; Waterworth will be wholly owned by Meta, making it only the company's third solely owned cable, according to TeleGeography.