Also known as geostationary. Describes the orbit of a satellite that remains stationary over a single geographic point on earth (i.e. synchronized to a geographic position on earth). This is accomplished by orbiting the satellite at a distance of 22,300 miles (35,900 km) above the equator. At this distance, an object orbits the earth at the same speed the earth rotates (approximately once every twenty-four hours) and so the object appears to remain stationary above the point.

Geosynchronous satellites are useful for many applications but not for two-way conversations. The reason for this is that it takes radio waves almost a quarter of a second to make the round trip (44,600 miles at 186,000 miles/second). This added to other delays in the normal transmission of digitized audio and video produces unacceptable latency during two-way conversations.

LEO (Low Earth Orbiting) satellites orbit the earth at only a few hundred miles and so do not suffer from the latency problem.