I rarely use over 2GB of data per month. Usually most of my data traffic happens over wifi. Curious.

If you want to know why I’m asking:

My phone provider just decided to upgrade my subscription plan some ridiculous amount. I was on a cheap prepaid 18GB every 28 days plan, with data rollover. (I got nearly 900 GB of rollover data just sitting there, accumulated over the years).

Now they increased both their price and data cap about +60%. For me this is absolutely unnecessary. I was already paying for more than what I used.

Then I tried to switch providers, and realized this is the new baseline in the country, at least for monthly prepaid. Eventually I found a few providers that offer something more affordable, but it’s only long expiry plans with a lot less data. Works for me though, not complaining.

I’m just surprised with the sheer amounts in most monthly plans, am I some kind of low usage freak?

  • iegod@lemmy.zip
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    21 minutes ago

    I had no idea so I went to check. I get over 75GB in my plan but I never go above 20. Currently sitting at 8 for the last 30 days. Non-carrier data usage does indeed exceed 75GB though :)

  • Nibodhika@lemmy.world
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    2 hours ago

    According to my phone I use around 4/6GB per month (I have an unlimited plan). But I’m guessing you’re in the US or Canada, I’m always boggled when I remember that data is expensive to you guys.

  • garbagebagel@lemmy.world
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    4 hours ago

    As a Canadian trapped under the Big Three, scrolling through this thread is killing me :(

    I have 130GB at 70CAD/mo. It was the cheapest plan I could get with data. I don’t need nearly that much. I use between 20-40GB/mo and that’s only because I don’t bother to turn on my WiFi since I know I’ll never reach my limit.

  • sarmale@lemmy.zip
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    6 hours ago

    Romania, currently paying 2€ / month for 75GB, never had to worry, didn’t even knew the cap until now - I thought it was unlimited. At most I used 20GB / month which to be honest surprised me a bit.

    Pretty happy with Digi

  • The_v@lemmy.world
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    6 hours ago

    I have a 15GB plan shared among 5 phones for 4 people. We usually use around 8-10GB. It brings my total bill for all 5 phones to $150/month.

    I pay $80/month for high speed cable Internet for the house and I regularly update the wifi router. At work/school the wife and kids have wifi.

    I even pay $225 per year for unlimited Wi-Fi in my work truck.

  • Onomatopoeia@lemmy.cafe
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    7 hours ago

    Yea, us low data users are the exception, so they don’t market to us.

    In the US, USMobile has about the best rates for low data plans. I think I’m paying $20/mo for 2 lines at 4GB (shared), and adding more data in a month is cheap. So cheap I’ve set it to automatically add more if I go over.

  • seathru@quokk.au
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    7 hours ago

    I use very little, so I picked a plan with a pay-as-you-use data. It’s expensive for the amount you get ($10/Gb), but since I seldom use more than 1gb, it ends up cheaper overall.

  • tal@lemmy.today
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    10 hours ago

    I suspect that it wildly varies based on user.

    If you use video streaming from, say, YouTube and TikTok heavily, and you do so outside of WiFi networks, I bet that you can burn through a lot of data pretty quickly.

    Another user could be sitting on Lemmy or whatever all day every day and just not use much data.

    • Mothra@mander.xyzOP
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      8 hours ago

      Of course, I’m just surprised there is practically no market for low usage people.

  • SillyDude@lemmy.zip
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    7 hours ago

    $40 for “unlimited” that says it gets throttled after 50GB but in reality doesn’t. So like 500GB a month. When I had broadband and a 1tb cap I would often hit that and move torrents to my phone.

  • My operator gives me 150gb for 7.99€. It actually started with 30gb for the same price but they’ve been upgrading my gb almost yearly without price increase.

    As I stream music from my jellyfin server for around 6-8 hours a day (most of my office time) and watch some shows on my lunch time, my monthly consumption is around 60-70gb a month.

    But simply because I know I have more than enough to not worry about the streaming quality of my files, otherwise I’d be at maybe 10 or so.

      • Kristell@herbicide.fallcounty.omg.lol
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        10 hours ago

        Yeah… I actually sat down and listened to a more recent album on FLAC and 128kbps MP3 and realized I had no idea which was which, so I figured that either my speakers, or my ears weren’t HD enough to be worth the storage space xD Switched my entire library to MP3 after that

      • I work for a somewhat big company with one of the dumbest IT depts ever. On top of not wanting to risk being spied on what I do or not do with my private phone and life, there’s also the fact that their rules for a “safe browsing” are really, REALLY stupid (like blocking access to Siemens website because they use “weird” protocols to transfer files for their devices firmware or their webinars: p2p).

        I find more often than not having to do a hotspot with my phone so I can connect with my computer to simply access work related websites because IT is just too dumb to understand that in a company there should be different network profiles depending on the worker and, instead, they apply a general rule in which they consider the same “threats” for a marketing employee than for an OT (operational technologies) employee.

  • Toes♀@ani.social
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    7 hours ago

    I get around 70GB with unlimited everything aside from international calling and roaming on my plan, I typically only use around 10 a month. They recently started offering 150GB plans for an extra 5$. My plan is $50/mo.

    The key is to negotiate your plan, never go with the advertised plan. Spend an hour or two on the phone or in the store to get yourself a deal.

  • Kristell@herbicide.fallcounty.omg.lol
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    10 hours ago

    According to my device:

    • September: 30mb
    • October: 153mb
    • November: 652mb
    • December: 889mb

    Not sure why September was so low, but I’m not surprised it’s <1gb/mo. I didn’t really have unlimited data until a couple of years ago, and I don’t really sit around watching videos out of the house. It’s mostly music, which my music is all downloaded on my phone anyway.

    The spike in November is because I moved. I started walking to the store, and the internet here is less consistent, so I’m using my data more.

  • VeganCheesecake@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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    9 hours ago

    Two plans, both unlimited calls and data. One is 30€, the other 15€ (the more expensive one has significantly higher speeds), on two different networks.

    Depending on the moth, I tend to use 50-100 GB/month.

  • Libb@piefed.social
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    12 hours ago

    More or less 0. Just like I don’t use my phone much, I seldom use any data. I don’t watch/listen to content on my phone, I don’t take much photos. I don’t even check my emails.

    I just checked on their website, for January I’m sitting at an impressive 360 megs (130 giga available monthly) but this month is a massive increase in my usual data consumption as I’ve taken a lot more pictures than I use to (we’re visiting new apartments).

    I pay 12€/m each for both my spouse and mine (each with a 130g plan that we never use, it’s the smallest plan we could get), plus 2€/m for a third line that has no data plan at all (that we use as a ‘trash/publicly shared number’ we almost never answer). This cheap plan could suit us if it wasn’t that limited when moving abroad (the reason why I pay for those 130g plans we don’t use is they don’t have those limits) and if it had some data associated to it for those rare times when we need it, like it just happened this month. Those plans are all without engagement (and we provide our own phones)

    Here in France, customers need to regularly check their invoice to make sure the operator has not silently activated a new ‘feature’ free ‘for the first month’ that automatically switch to the paid tier the following month. Without the customer asking anything. It happens very often. And it can quickly ad up.