American iPad Users Pay More for Data than Most International Users

American iPad owners are paying more for data than most international users, according to a report released by Tableau Software.

The visual breakdown (interactive version available at Wired) shows that iPad users in the United States pay more per gigabyte of data than most international users. The comparison converts all currency to dollars to clearly show how the data plans stack up.

Hong Kong and Singapore are paying the equivalent of $0.51 per gigabyte while U.S. users pay $12.50 per gigabyte. The best plan through AT&T (the only iPad provider) offers 2GB fore $25 per month.

“You can get a GB of data for 51 cents in Singapore,” says Ross Perez, a data analyst at Tableau. “What’s so special about the U.S. that we pay so much more?”

It could be worse, though. Several European countries, including France, Belgium, Netherlands and Luxembourg, all pay significantly more. France is the worst offender, charging the equivalent of $25.47 for one gigabyte of data on the Orange network.

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