[sansseriff]

SNSPDs have lower dark count rate, and especially lower timing jitter in the near-infrared than APDs.

The deep space optical demonstrations I know of all work in the near infrared (e.g. 1550 nm), just like most of terrestrial fiber optics used for communication. Probably because there's lots of infrastructure at that wavelength already, and it's a good passband through earth's atmosphere.