We compared data costs in five African countries – and the results may surprise you!

South Africa has some of the most expensive mobile data plans in the world.

According to the latest Worldwide mobile data pricing index, South Africa lies 136th out of 233 countries studied (with first being the cheapest).

South Africa is still way behind other African countries when it comes to competitive data costs.

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We compared the cost of 1GB of data (valid for 30 days), or the nearest to, between South Africa, Zimbabwe, Kenya, Nigeria and Ghana from their respective leading networks and the results were as follows:

Ghana – MTN – GHc 20 (R30.78)

Kenya – Safaricom KSh 250 (R33.71)

Nigeria – MTN – ₦ 1000 (for 1.5GB + 2GB for YouTube bundle) (R39.27)

South Africa – MTN – R85

Zimbabwe – Econet – ZWL 6051 for 700MB and ZWL 11527 for 1400MB (R339.86 and R647.43)

Southern Africa is certainly not covering herself in glory when it comes to data costs.

In fact, Sub-Saharan Africa is known to be the second-most expensive region in the world for mobile data.

It’s no surprise then that two of the five most expensive countries in the world in terms of the average cost of 1GB of data are in Sub-Saharan Africa – Saint Helena (USD$ 41.06/ R742.60) and São Tomé and Príncipe (USD$ 29.49/ R533.35).

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Island nations also tend to be among the most expensive due to the high costs of establishing telecommunication infrastructure in remote locations. That said, Fiji is one of the cheapest (USD$0.15/ R2.71)

Leading the race for the world’s cheapest gig of data is Israel, with an unbelievable USD$0.04 /R0.72 per gigabyte.

*exchange rates as at 22/04/2023

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