As jrmj notes, phone plans with tethering aren't as common and often come with strings attached.
I use my phone in coffee shops that don't have [acceptable] WiFi. The main drawback is needing to be mindful of phone battery in addition to the laptop battery.
That being said, it's a great resource when you need a space to work at 11am-2pm (when all of the WiFi-offering spots are filled). There are a couple of local coffee shops with no WiFi, that don't forbid laptops – they're usually empty during peak hours.
Although they may exist, I’ve never seen a European provider prohibit tethering.
One would hope such silliness should be illegal.
I just googled it and see that Verizon in the US was successfully sued for blocking tethering .. one would hope that more people take action against companies attempting this.
I use my iPhone and cellular iPad for 80 GB tethering per month used outside of home and work, for instance in a NYC cafe or outside during the summer. I don't like relying on public WiFi for security reasons. I also bring a nice large powercell for additional charge. It adds about an extra pound, but gives me a full recharge on the 16" MacBook Pro.
Using fast.com (Netflix server) I get 56 Mbps down and 24 Mbps up on Verizon with my iPhone 15 Pro Max in Manhattan which is another reason to use WiFi.
Why would a provider forbid tethering? And besides the why, how would they even know you're doing that? If I turn on my phones hotspot, doesn't that look exactly like my phone is doing something™ requiring a high bandwidth?
Very annoyingly, the iPhone also has a way for the carrier to somehow disable the mobile hotspot feature of the phone for their sim.
On the mobile hotspot settings page it will just show a message with a link to the carriers website instead of the toggle to enable it, I find it really annoying since as you said I don't understand how there would be a difference in what the usage would look like to the carrier and it feels like Apple is imposing a restriction just for the benefit of the carrier that makes the phone less usable.
Because they want to charge you for the expensive "tethering" option. I know, that's fucked up but the US are not very good at forcing consumer-friendliness on their companies.
On the "how they detect it", unless you're using a VPN they can look at the traffic and easy distinguish "computer traffic" from regular "phone traffic".
I perpetually keep my Hotspot on my phone on. For family members and my spare phone. It doesn't drain the battery in any noticeable way.
To me it's weird and so much friction to try figure out wifi Hotspot and password and login. Makes me feel like a homeless poor person, as if I can't pay for my own mobile data.
I didn't have internet at my house for a week and had to use my phone hotspot: the amount of heat my phone generated greatly increased while the battery life greatly decreased.
If you're not noticing a drain on your battery from keeping your hotspot on its because no one is connected to it / using it.
Espresso House (in Sweden) tends to have public access wifi, but it is extremely slow compared to 4G.
What I find more surprising is that Sweden dropped “unlimited” data plans, I’m not aware of any data plan that is unlimited now. So if you want to do some video calls then I would be looking for wifi.
30GB/month will get you very far also for video calls IMO.
But yes that is exactly the thing. Except for the security risks it is just not worth the hassle to go through a captive portal sign-on just to find out that the WiFi is so much worse than using your phone.
Yes, NYC has Wi-Fi at many shops and restaurants, and at the very least, it has these LinkNYC stations that provide free Wi-Fi along with Google Maps and other services.
I use my phone in coffee shops that don't have [acceptable] WiFi. The main drawback is needing to be mindful of phone battery in addition to the laptop battery.
That being said, it's a great resource when you need a space to work at 11am-2pm (when all of the WiFi-offering spots are filled). There are a couple of local coffee shops with no WiFi, that don't forbid laptops – they're usually empty during peak hours.