The real metric to be concerned with should be the cost of the first GB.
Note these are data-only plans, without SMS or calling. We use the Acrobits softphone (iPhone) or the built-in voip client (de-Googled Android) with voip.ms for
- Voice calls
- SMS/MMS (in-app, forwarded to any cell number, or via any email client)
- Transcribed voicemail
- Automatic call recording, and
- Spam-call blocking by configuring an IVR (spam callers can't press "1" to continue).
I've no relation to Acrobits, Fido, or voip.ms aside from being a customer, though I happily recommend all three.
Isn't Fido Toronto only or have they changed that? (it's been a while since I checked)
Also worth mentioning is this marketing thing where each of the major carriers own several cheap carriers. E.g. Roger's has: Fido, Chatr, Cityfone, Primus, Zoomer, and SimplyConnect. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Canadian_mobile_phone_...
Current plans listed are 4Gb for $10/month, though they would require being paired with a voip provider, as I mentioned above.
Fido is available nation-wide, AFAIK. You're likely thinking of Wind. Originally available in select cities (such as Toronto or Vancouver), they were bought out by Shaw in... 2015 (?) I believe, and renamed to Freedom Mobile. They are currently available in most major cities, and rely on roaming in less densely populated areas.
Unless you’re willing to make some huge concessions you won’t find a phone plan with unlimited calling, unlimited texting, and 1GB of data for less than $40 CAD / month. I currently do BYOD + 3Mb/s throttle + no support + low priority on saturated towers (IMO but not provable) for $23 per month.
I wish the government would set reasonable pay per use data rates and make all the carriers abide by them. $12 / GB would be a godsend for low end, price sensitive users.