[Someone1234]

It is a niche price.

More expensive for high data users, but less expensive for low data users. Flexibility is really king here, if 9 months of the year you use < 1 GB/month ($30/month) but want the option to have much more (e.g. emergency) and international travel, full speed hotspot, then it may be for you.

As to "why is the US/Canada so expensive?" Urban areas subsidies rural cellular. The US is hugely populated on the East and West coasts and a cellphone network that only targeted those population centers would be as cheap or even cheaper than Europe. But most networks are deploying LTE to middle-America where there are few people, and most cellular infrastructure loses money.

Networks have tried doing cellphone networks that only work within New York State, California, or Texas for example but people want the hypothetical ability to travel on the open road whenever and wherever they want.

[benglish11]

"Roaming" used to be a thing (I don't think I've seen domestic roaming in years). It essentially solved this problem, anything inside your typical geographic range was included at normal price, but you paid a hefty surcharge when roaming in rural areas. The problem was, you could accidentally or even intentionally travel outside of your network and get charged exorbitant roaming fees. It was really easy to accidentally rack up a huge bill and so many consumers were against it despite it being a "fair" solution, from an economic sense.

[Majestic121]

Thanks for the explanation, it indeed makes sense that coverage for much denser area like Western Europe is less expensive than for low density zones.

[notatoad]

In canada, the cheapest phone plans are available in Saskatchewan and Manitoba, our two least-densely-populated provinces.

[Someone1234]

And they too are using infrastructure built by national networks and government grants, therefore they too are subsidized by urban areas.

[codezero]

I believe it's also capped at $100 – after that you get unlimited data, but it's rate limited.

[praneshp]

Once you hit 6gb, you stop paying till you hit 15gb. After that, you're rate limited, or you can call up Fi support and have them put you at full speed and charge the usual $10/gb

[kxr]

Capped at $60 for data.

[codezero]

Ah yeah, looks like they rolled out some new plans with the change up, or I didn't look at all the options when I last looked.

[pasbesoin]

That cap's been there for a while. IIRC, it was implemented some months after T-Mobile started the "race to unlimited data"... was that the winter before last? Speaking of the U.S. marketplace. I never read an official explanation, but my assumption/understanding was that this was Fi's response to remain competitive with other carriers' "unlimited" plans.

What concerns me is the throttling at/after 15 GB. Other carriers have this, too, but it is supposedly "dependent on local load/conditions", and comments have led me to understand that, for some if not many people, they don't encounter the slowdown much in practice.

Whereas, being an MVNO and also perhaps having better software, Fi might be more strict and aggressive with the throttling? I don't know.