I've got unlimited mobile data for a great price in spain as well. Honestly, I hope the us catches up at some point because software still doesn't even consider it an option - I have to actively fight all my settings so I can get updates, backups, streaming at high quality and the like because the OS considers they should always be done on wifi.<p>Sometimes, the situation has been so absurd that I've had to use the share Network function with a friend's phone to fool my phone into believing I'm on wifi so I could download an update.
> Over here, unlimited mobile data means unlimited mobile data.<p>This. Although India has the cheapest data next to Finland, the ground reality is quite different.<p>I tried using 4G as my primary internet connection after COVID, and I got frustrated by "hidden" limits and random throttling from the ISP - ended up getting a fiber line.<p>The 4G modem was a complete waste of money.
UK here. I pay £20/month (USD $26) for unlimited data, voice and SMS.<p>I have two such SIMs, one for the home router (because it's cheaper <i>and</i> faster than FTTC) and another for my phone.<p>Usage varies, but on a busy month the home SIM will see 100-300 GB, mostly for Netflix. The phone SIM sees about 10-30 GB.<p>Speed varies by time of day, but at peak it's 90 Mbit/s down, 20 Mbit/s up. At the slowest times of day it drops to about 8 Mbit/s down. The phone is faster than the router, so I've occasionally switched to using the phone to download something large.<p>Last time I checked, there was technically a cap on the monthly data of 3 TB. For a while they also limited tethering to 30 MB, i.e. using the phone as a wifi hotspot, and then (if they detected it) you could theoretically be charged a lot for tethered data over that cap. But they officially removed that restriction a few years ago.<p>The links are a bit unreliable. But the FTTC connection I had before was more unreliable, and more than twice the price. The FTTC connection before that was nearly three times the price (gouging - it started out cheaper than quietly kept increasing a lot). And if I move home, I can take my link with me now, instead of being tied into a 12 month contract at a fixed location.
The left side of the chart is a surprising cohort, hardly the usual suspects when it comes to being behind the curve. There’s the US, sure, but it’s actually slightly ahead of Norway, and significantly ahead of both Canada and Japan!<p>You have two Scandinavian countries on opposite ends of the spectrum, two east Asian countries on opposite ends, and even two countries with significantly large landmass (look at Russia only two spots short of Korea). What gives?
As a regular video creator and consumer who tethers mobile data, I'm using about 100GB/month.<p>My total mobile bill is 700 Taiwan dollars a month, which is about 25 USD.
In Russia I pay $2 for 100 min + 11GB of traffic which I never use (less than 1GB each month) because of WFH.<p>It'll be around $3 for unlimited traffic though.
I’d love to see Switzerland’s avg usage.<p>For $30 a month true unlimited where you just don’t even think about data transfer.<p>Speeds in the 100 MB/s range most of the time and people seem to just take it for granted.
I moved recently and had to tether for ~a week while my ftth was being relocated - ended up using around 80GB of data in that time. Normally I use less than 6GB per <i>month.</i><p>I would be curious to see how different mobility patterns in different places (e.g. I live in Singapore, where commutes are naturally short) affect mobile data usage vs. other more obvious factors like home internet penetration.<p>It feels like I use much more data when I'm back in the US or working on site, even if I have a fixed base to work at, just because of the amount of time I spend moving around.
New Zealand reporting in here, the cheapest plan for unlimited mobile data is around 20 USD/month, but you need 4 people committed together to get such rate. A true independent unlimited mobile connection will set you back $45 USD or so with first 40GB at full speed.<p>Realistically speaking the 20USD/month is already quite reasonable, if world as it was pre-COVID I might coerce some friends and family to join the plan with me.<p>But I really would prefer 25 USD no strings attached.
What drives the high cellular prices in the United States? Is it regulation? Infrastructure cost? Lack of competition?<p>I don't buy the lack of competition argument honestly. Cellular data is a commodity. Cell towers are not exactly a utility to the extent that optical fiber/coax is. If there was margin to be exploited, capital would have flowed in to take advantage. But it's likely that the risk adjusted return in the cellular business is already too low to attract more players and drive down costs without a significant technology moat.
I’m glad I live in taiwan now. Back in the states my internet sucked, both mobile and home.<p>Now I use my phone as a mobile hotspot and do my work on it. I use about 30 or 40 gigs a month when I’m not at home.
It's a good thing that with EU's "Roam Like at Home" people from Finland can go transfer those 17GB/month in any other EU country, but people from Romania saw the introduction of "national" SIM cards which leave you literally stranded (no signal) when crossing the border. Better roaming for me but not for thee.
I'm not sure we should see unlimited 4G plans as a positive. 4G consumes a lot more enregy than Wifi for the same bandwidth, so usage of Wifi should be encouraged when possible.<p>(<a href="https://whatis5g.info/energy-consumption/" rel="nofollow">https://whatis5g.info/energy-consumption/</a>)
I'm on the T-Mobile Connect 2GB plan with unlimited talk and text. I was paying $50 a month for basically the same plan but thanks to one of the Sprint/T-Mobile merger conditions they have to offer it for $15 now.<p>I don't like to watch video on my phone, I almost never hit the 2GB limit unless I try.
In Taiwan, pay about 1000TWD or 33 USD. for the 80mbs unlimited data 30 day plan(no contract). Never throttled always fast even when in far away tea mountains like Alishan. If I took contract its 700 or 23 usd/month. Unlimited meaning yes you could download 24/7 it won't cap.
I have some hope that Amazon and SpaceX will force prices to go down for at least home internet by bypassing the ISP monopolies. Might be a while though if ever. Google Fiber has sadly fizzled out because of the anticompetitive practices of the local monopolies.
That cost per GB chart is interesting--how can Portugal be 5x more expensive than Spain, or Japan be (what looks like) 30x more expensive than Korea? Are there hidden subsidies or costs driving this or is it from infrastructure, policy, or historical reasons?
I average 2gb because I restrict myself since the rates I get are outreageous here in the US... I use wifi whenever I can to limit mobile usage (which is of course not included in the 2gb figure).
Will neighborhood 5G change up the internet availability landscape in the US? I pay $70 bucks a month for cable internet which is oversubscribed and sucks in the evening.
See, I just see that as wildly inefficient. Why do I need to stream videos on the go? If I listen to music, why wouldn't I have it locally?<p>My usage is usually right around 1 GB a month, and I'm constantly on my phone, social media, browsing, etc.
Finland is a tiny developed country it probably has good fiber or coax penetration both of which offer better latency than 4g.<p>So what gives? Its similar to my usage pattern, only time I use mobile internet is when I am out of WiFi range