Comparing the most expensive mobile data charges in the world, China ranks 12th

A new study analyzed the cost of 1GB of mobile data in 228 countries or regions this year. India once again topped the list with its extremely low costs, while China's ranking soared from 165th in 2019 to 12th, with the average cost of 1GB of mobile data plummeting from US$9.89 to US$0.61.

In contrast, the United States is one of the most expensive developed countries to purchase mobile data, ranking only 188th in the world, with an average cost of $8.00 per GB, far higher than the global average of $5.09. Meanwhile, the cheapest country is India ($0.09/GB) and the most expensive country is St. Helena ($52.50/GB).

However, there is an important flaw in this study, that is, the average cost it calculates is not "weighted", so it cannot reflect the differences in real purchasing power average (PPP) between countries. In other words, because countries may have huge differences in taxes, infrastructure standards or deployment costs, government size and wages, etc. In some countries, you may pay less for 1GB of data in terms of numbers, but the actual purchasing power is very different.

It should also be added that some countries (North Korea, Eritrea, etc.) are missing from this report due to a lack of public data or a lack of comparable data types. In addition, in the few cases where there are only "unlimited traffic" packages in some countries, the average data usage per user in that country is used to calculate the cost of 1GB. Let's take a look at the detailed list below: