No, it is not. Fiber optic is so much faster than any satellite connection, including Space X’s Starlink satellite internet, that there is no comparison. The only faster internet connection is 5G wireless that large carriers are working to roll out across the nation but which has generated concerns among some scientists around the need to research the safety of 5G signal exposure.

Fiber optic has almost no latency and is stable and self-contained unlike wireless signals that travel through the air. It's a fascinating technology that uses lasers to transfer internet signals. The pain point is that it requires special cable infrastructure and thus is not available in all locations.

Fiber optic internet is a data connection inside a cable line (different from a broadband cable line) with glass or plastic fibers inside. The data travels in the form of light pulses through the plastic and glass fibers. It wouldn’t be possible to pulse light this way through the copper in a traditional cable internet line; it would overheat. Fiber optic uses laser flashes to send bits and bytes of data in a basic form through plastic or glass filament that can be as narrow as a human hair. A shield keeps the light inside the filament for safety. The signal is sent to a modem that translates it for your screen.

Typical data speeds with satellite internet max out at up to 50 Mbps or possibly 100 Mbps depending on the provider, time of day, and several other factors. DSL speed is considered 25 Mbps and that’s very typical with satellite internet and in some cases, with cable internet. Many satellite customers have speeds of 12 Mbps or lower. A slower speed of 12 Mbps or even lower is workable for things like reading email and surfing online but streaming can be slower. Fiber optic speed is 1 Gbps, or ten times that fastest residential satellite speed of about 100 Mbps. The only faster speed is 5G at 10 Gbps.

For a real-life example, if you download a movie in HD at 25 Mbps it will take approximately 30 minutes. The same move will download in seven minutes at 100 Mbps. It will download in just 40 seconds or so using a fiber optic connection of 1 Gbps.

Fiber optic has the same speed of 1 Gbps to download or upload content. There is no throttling of speeds because the technology is more robust. You can definitely do online gaming with fiber optic. Enterprise companies and other commercial concerns often use fiber optic connections where available to handle their massive data needs.