Despite the fact that many now use tariffs with unlimited Internet, there are those who do not need a lot of traffic. It is all the more unpleasant to find that the Internet package has ended, and the next update is still a week or two away. But Apple has made it as easy as possible to access such information (not surprising, since applications larger than 150 megabytes still cannot be downloaded from the App Store).
Where is the Internet going? An unequivocal answer to this question cannot be given - it all depends on the specific device, operator and installed applications. However, it is possible to detect mobile Internet consumption channels without installing third-party applications.
To do this, go to the "Cellular" section of your iPhone or iPad settings. All your applications are located here, as well as data on their consumption of mobile Internet (in fact, many people know about it). But the section "System Services" deserves special attention. In it, you can find out how much data is consumed, for example, Siri, Push notifications, or tethering.
This information can help you determine whether to turn off notifications for certain apps or location services that track your location. All this works in the background and not only consumes traffic, but also negatively affects the battery life of the device.
It will be most useful if you turn off the "Help with Wi-Fi" function, due to which the consumption of mobile Internet grows significantly. Owners of completely unlimited packages are not in danger, but limited packages are still in danger.
Recently, we have been receiving more and more questions from users about the excessive consumption of mobile Internet traffic. Therefore, we decided to devote a separate article to how you can control traffic on the iPhone or iPad. After all, even “unlimited” tariffs, as a rule, still have daily or monthly restrictions. And when you select a certain number of megabytes, the speed of the Internet connection on the device automatically drops. In order to avoid this, it is enough just to “conjure” a little in the gadget settings.
To avoid "leakage" of traffic, first of all, we recommend disabling the "Help with Wi-Fi" function. We set out in detail the essence of the issue in one of the previous articles, and in short, this function is activated in iOS 9 by default, and in the event that the Wi-Fi speed drops, it automatically and without warning the user starts loading programs and applications by switching to Mobile Internet.
Disabling the “Wi-Fi Assist” function sometimes helps to plug that black hole where traffic flows
Now more about controlling the amount of information that you download and send via the mobile Internet. The ability to view general statistics existed back in iOS 6, it was enough to go to the standard Settings-General - Statistics application.
But to see in detail which program ate how much traffic, only iPhone or iPad users with a 3G module with OS, starting from version 7 and higher, can already see. Cellular data statistics are located in the "Cellular" section in the settings. There is a general layout by the number of received and transferred megabytes, and if you scroll down, you can find an alphabetical list of all programs installed on the device, indicating the amount of data consumed.
After all, many applications almost constantly send and receive data on their own. This does not affect the operation of the gadget in any way and they do not ask for a request to download the application, but the traffic is consumed. In addition, a constant connection to the mobile Internet also significantly reduces battery power.
You can restrict the operation of applications on the Internet via 3G or LTE, as well as in roaming, in the same "Cellular" section in Settings. We reach the item "Cellular data for software" and mark applications that should not go online. By the way, for some reason, not all of the applications installed on the device are displayed in this list. So it will not be superfluous to manually check the settings of programs that are not on the list in order to use cellular communications. The established restrictions will affect only the use of the mobile Internet; when connected via Wi-Fi, the applications will work in the normal mode.
Now you can work with any application outside the home without the need to constantly monitor whether they receive data over the cellular network. For example, if you prefer to download applications or updates to them through a computer or via Wi-Fi, then there is a reason to set restrictions for using cellular communications on the App Store installed on an iPhone or iPad. Another example of a traffic eater is iTunes, which likes to download books, music, apps, and streaming data for iTunes Match while you're not following it. So you can safely limit it in the use of mobile data.
Experts recommend "resetting" according to the expiration date of the tariff plan you are using. Then it will be easy to understand how many megabytes for a month you still have left before the mobile Internet speed drops.
Mobile data can also be used by iPhone and iPad for services such as weather, time, and location sync. Disabling the ability to use the network for these services does not make sense, but traffic consumption statistics will at least allow you to calculate how many megabytes you are losing on this. To view the "layout" of traffic usage for servicing system services, enter "Settings" > "iTunes Store, App Store" from the main screen, scroll down to the list of applications and open "System Services".
We hope our tips will be useful, and the speed of your mobile Internet connection will never drop suddenly again 🙂 .
Cellular operators every year provide all the best conditions for using the mobile Internet, however, not everyone can afford unlimited tariffs. In the absence of an alternative, users have to be content with what they have and try to save money. In this tutorial, we'll show you simple ways to save data on iPhone and iPad that can help you stay online much more than usual.
The main "destroyers" of traffic on the iPhone and iPad are the Safari browser and social networking applications that users actively use. But other applications are not averse to stealthily spend valuable 10 or even all 100 megabytes of traffic. How to detect these "pests"?
Back in iOS 7, Apple introduced a section into the standard settings of the mobile operating system that is responsible for tracking data transmitted over the cellular network. This section contains all applications that use cellular data and the exact amount of consumed traffic is also indicated here.
Fortunately, users can not only see which application is “eating” all traffic, but also prohibit it from doing so. To do this, go to the menu Settings -> Cellular Data and scroll to the very bottom. To reduce the data consumption of your device, simply deactivate the switches located opposite the most "gluttonous" applications. It is worth remembering that as soon as the application is denied access to the Web, all its online elements will stop loading.
The default iPhone or iPad updates apps automatically the first time you go online. In this case, the device can use both Wi-Fi and a cellular network, and this, in turn, often leads to a very fast end of traffic reserves.
In order to turn off the background application refresh function, go to the menu Settings -> Main -> Update content and set the switch of the same name to the inactive state. After that, you will have to update applications manually from the App Store, but the traffic will be consumed much more slowly.
It's news to many active iPhone and iPad users that their device can sync with iCloud Drive over cellular. And in the meantime, dozens of megabytes of data can be sent to the “cloud”, depending on the amount of work performed on the device.
Preventing iCloud Drive from syncing outside of a Wi-Fi network is very simple. Go to menu Settings -> iCloud -> iCloud Drive and uncheck Cellular Data.
Similar to iCloud Drive, iTunes Match can also consume valuable data, provided, of course, that it is allowed to do so. iTunes Match subscribers can deal with "flying away" traffic by preventing the service from accessing cellular networks.
You can do it in the menu. Settings -> iTunes Store App Store, where to uncheck the item "Cellular data".
The regular Internet browser iOS Safari is designed to consume traffic. Not everyone knows that the browser can do this wisely. The Reading List feature, developed by Apple engineers back in iOS 7, allows you to save any page of the global network for offline viewing by pressing just one button.
As an example, you can save interesting pages to your Reading List while in a Wi-Fi coverage area. After that, without having an Internet connection, these pages can be opened and calmly studied. And the traffic is intact and informational hunger is satisfied - everything is in the black. 
In order to save a web page in the "Reading List" you just need to click the corresponding button located in the Send menu of the Safari browser (the icon looks like glasses).
Push notifications of almost all applications consume traffic. Users, on the other hand, really need only some notifications, for example, from their favorite social network or sports application. This means that by disabling unnecessary push notifications, we can reduce the traffic consumption of the mobile device.
You can choose which applications are worthy of your attention and which are not, in the menu Settings -> Notification Center.
The question of how to reduce the consumption of mobile traffic on a smartphone or tablet is one of the most popular user requests. The tariffs of home operators allow you not to control much where MB of traffic is spent. The whole picture changes when we have to travel, and in roaming you have to pay for each MB.
Tip 1. Learn to track the traffic consumption on your smartphone
To understand how traffic is spent, you need to know how many MB and where it was spent per day, week, month. iOS automatically counts traffic for the entire period of operation of the gadget.
Settings → Cellular → Check application data usage statistics
To check the traffic consumption for a week / month, you will need to select the "Reset statistics" option and check the data at the end of this period.
Tip 2: Turn off applications that consume a lot of data
Here, in the “Cellular Data” section, traffic statistics for each individual application are available. The iOS system gives the most detailed information in Kb / Mb. Applications that use the Internet the most can be turned off while traveling. Of course, if you do not need to be online all the time in them.
Tip 3. Disable all messengers
Is being ready to communicate with representatives of the contact list every second really so important that you don’t have to worry about paying for traffic? If not, turn off instant messengers and connect only when Wi-Fi is available. Thus, you will not receive notifications about calls and messages, but this will significantly save mobile Internet traffic.
Tip 4Turn off iCloud Drive sync
It is important and necessary to store documents and files in the cloud service. But, you can also synchronize using, for example, Wi-Fi in the room, and not mobile Internet. By doing this, you can save several tens of MB and spend them on calls to loved ones.
Settings → Cellular and at the very bottom, turn the iCloud Drive switch to the off position.
Tip 5: Block automatic downloads from the iTunes Store and App Store
It is clear that applications need updates, but it is not at all necessary to pay for them with mobile traffic in roaming.
Settings → iTunes Store, App Store and disable cellular data (switch Cellular data) for automatic downloads.
Tip 6. Save articles and books from Safari to iBooks
A great way to save all the necessary articles in the library and read them later, without re-downloading. This does not require third-party applications, Safari can handle this function quite well.
Step-by-step instruction:
Tip 7Turn Off App Notifications
Is there a need to receive a lot of notifications, only to close them. After all, each of them requires mobile Internet to download.
Settings → Notifications and turn off unnecessary notifications (switch Allow notifications), leaving only the necessary ones.
Tip 8: Block automatic mailbox updates
By default, iOS constantly checks the information for all attached addresses and downloads new letters to the smartphone's memory.
Settings → Accounts and passwords → Download data.
We disable Push and set the update for all our mailboxes to Manual or, in extreme cases, the maximum value of the allowable consumption of MB during the Selection.
Tip 9Disable Wi-Fi Help
The system automatically turns off the weak Wi-Fi signal and connects the cellular connection to download data. Sometimes, you may not notice that the iPhone is using cellular data.
Settings → Cellular → scroll down to the “Wi-Fi Assistance” option → set to Off.
Tip 10Turn off background app updates
Even if you are not using the application, it can still consume traffic in the so-called “background” mode. You can stop the process by moving the "Content update" switch along the path Settings → General → Content update.
Most Owners iPhone and iPad use tariffs or tariff options with "unlimited" Internet. But, as a rule, such offers still have a daily or monthly data limit, after which the Internet connection speed on the device is automatically limited.
There was a convenient opportunity to control the consumption of mobile Internet traffic on iPhone or iPad.
In older versions iOS, in particular in iOS 6, there was an opportunity to view the amount of downloaded and sent information in the standard application section Settings -> General -> Statistics.However, this menu had one drawback - it was impossible to understand which specific programs consume precious mobile Internet traffic.
AT iOS 7 it became possible to view in detail the statistics of cellular data consumption for each program on your iPhone or iPad with 3G module. In the new firmware, cellular data statistics are located in the section cellular in Settings. In this section, you can find the already familiar number of transferred / received megabytes, and just below is a list of all programs in alphabetical order, indicating the amount of data consumed.
In this section, you can also disable access to mobile Internet for certain programs.
Below the list of programs is the key to access System Services. Here you can see which services used your Internet traffic most actively.
At the very bottom of the settings section Cellular there is a key to reset statistics. We recommend that you do this in accordance with the validity period of the tariff plan used. Then you can always find out how many megabytes are available for download before limiting the speed of mobile Internet. In order not to forget about resetting the settings, it will be convenient to create a recurring or event in the calendar.
