The satellite is also used to provide the one-way Othernet internet access service to Europe that, using small lightweight receiver stations, is designed to eventually provide news, weather, educational and other media to communities with no other access to the internet.

[7][8] The satellite provides three broadcast beams, of horizontal and vertical polarisation that cover three areas of the Earth's surface.

The Pan-European Wide beam provides DTH reception on 60 cm dishes across Europe from Spain to the Black Sea and from Greece to Scandinavia.

The European spot beam (for central and eastern Europe) and the Middle East spot beam (the Arabian Peninsula, Iran and Iraq) provide for contribution and distribution services, and data and Internet Protocol (IP) trunking services between the two regions with Ka-band uplink and downlink used in Europe and Ku-band in the Middle East.

In January 2011, Astra announced that Bulgarian DTH operator Satellite BG would launch a package of more than 60 standard definition channels and 12 high definition channels, including sports, film, factual and children's television, and all major Bulgarian public and commercial services on 1 February 2011, using three transponders on Astra 3B to reach television homes across Bulgaria.