Development and Resilience Research Monitor (DRRM) | 23 October 2026
“Seychelles internet is expensive” may be a fair household impression, but it is not yet a complete comparison. A price is meaningful only alongside speed, data allowance, congestion policy, installation, equipment, tax and currency date. This review therefore compares public operator information cautiously. It does not put a tiny mobile bundle beside unlimited fibre, or a promotional price beside a standard one.
What Seychelles customers can actually see
Cable & Wireless Seychelles (CWS) currently lists unlimited fibre offers at SCR949 per month for up to 60 Mbps, SCR1,049 for up to 100 Mbps, SCR1,569 for up to 275 Mbps and SCR2,099 for up to 500 Mbps, including VAT. The package cards state no daily fair-use policy, free installation and modem, and a 1 Mbps minimum download/upload speed. The same page also lists capped plans, so the word “fibre” alone does not establish the allowance (CWS Fibre Broadband package cards). Its wireless page lists Wireless Unlimited 899 at SCR899 including VAT, with a stated 15 GB fair-use threshold, alongside separate 5G offers whose cards explicitly label daily FUPs (CWS Wireless Broadband). Customers should obtain the written reset period and throttled-speed terms for the exact package: “unlimited” does not automatically mean unlimited full-speed usage.
Airtel’s public site advertises 4G/LTE and prepaid data bundles but does not expose a full fixed-broadband price sheet in its text view (Airtel Seychelles). A serious buyer should request the current written tariff, coverage, installation and fair-use terms before switching.
A fair SIDS comparison
A fair comparison should begin with the same service type and disclose every missing variable. Telecom Fiji’s official page displays Experience Lite 15 at FJD15.48 per month for 75 GB and Experience Lite 25 at FJD25.81 for 125 GB, but the accessible page does not state their speeds, so these are illustrative examples of capped SIDS offers—not a like-for-like price benchmark against Seychelles fibre (Telecom Fiji home broadband). Mauritius Telecom lists a 100 Mbps fibre plan at MUR1,525 per month with 20 Mbps upload and a 2 TB allowance, but it bundles 45-plus TV channels and is therefore not a clean internet-only match (my.t home plans).
That is why a simple “Fiji is cheaper” or “Mauritius is cheaper” graphic would mislead. FJD, SCR and MUR are different currencies; exchange rates change. Taxes and installation may be included in one price and excluded in another. Islands also face different submarine-cable, backhaul, population-density and electricity costs. The ITU’s ICT Prices dashboard is a better cross-country starting point because it uses five standardised mobile and fixed subscription baskets across economies, including SIDS (ITU ICT Prices dashboard). Even standard baskets are indicators, not a household bill.
Are Seychellois paying too much?
There are reasons to test that proposition. A small market has fewer networks over which to spread fixed costs. Competition, transparent service-level reporting and easy switching can put pressure on prices. Publishing a complete tariff card would help: monthly price including VAT, download and upload speed, normal and minimum performance, data cap or fair-use threshold, router rental or purchase, installation, contract term, overage charges and eligibility by island.
There are also reasons not to assume the answer. A low monthly price with a 75 GB cap may be poor value for a family working and studying at home. A higher-priced unlimited fibre plan may be better value than a cheaper wireless plan with a 15 GB fair-use threshold. The relevant calculation is cost per comparable unit of service, not cost per advertised megabit. Customers should ask whether the speed is “up to” or guaranteed, whether the cap slows rather than disconnects service, and whether VAT and equipment are included.
What would make access cheaper?
The Seychelles Communications Regulatory Authority (SCRA) already identifies the tools needed for a better answer: it investigates consumer complaints, maintains quality-of-service and tariff databases, participates in tariff reviews, manages the Universal Service Fund and addresses anticompetitive practices (SCRA regulatory functions). The concrete next step is to publish those tariff and quality datasets in comparable form. For every plan, show VAT status, installation, equipment, contract term, advertised and minimum speed, outage/latency measures, data cap or daily FUP, throttled speed and overage charges. Require operators to give the same information at point of sale. Use the Universal Service Fund to target uncovered or unaffordable access, and test wholesale sharing where it can add competition. Those are regulator actions grounded in existing functions, not an assumption that every price is excessive.
So, can internet be cheaper? Possibly—but the honest answer requires a controlled comparison. As of 23 October 2026, public pages show substantial choices, including CWS fibre and wireless offers, but they do not provide a complete, audited Seychelles-versus-SIDS price study. Until all inputs line up, the most useful consumer action is to compare the total 12-month cost of the same type of connection, speed band and allowance. The most useful policy action is to make those inputs public.
References
CWS Fibre Broadband; CWS Wireless Broadband; Airtel Seychelles; Telecom Fiji; Mauritius Telecom; ITU ICT Prices. Prices and offers checked 23 October 2026; currency conversion, tax and setup comparisons are intentionally not asserted where source pages do not make them like-for-like.
Image: original AI-generated editorial illustration for DRRM. People and settings are illustrative, not a documentary photograph of a real household, workplace or event.