It’s a worry if you’re traveling too,
because roaming fees for data use can be truly terrifying. If you’re using more
data than you want to, or don’t want to use more data than you can afford, here
are five ways to lower your smartphone data consumption.
Use Wi-Fi
You’ll find that more and more public
places - not just the ubiquitous coffee shops but malls, transport hubs,
supermarkets, trains, buses and some civic buildings and outdoor spaces - offer
free Wi-Fi, usually in exchange for a few personal details. Check your phone
plan too: many data plans include a certain amount of Wi-Fi access, so for
example in the UK many Vodafone customers can use BT Wi-Fi hotspots, which are
everywhere. Any data you transmit or receive over Wi-Fi won’t affect your 3G or
4G data allowance.
Using Wi-Fi is particularly useful if
you’re traveling abroad, where mobile data charges are often extortionate. If
you want to switch off data roaming so that your phone won’t try to connect to
the local phone network(s) for data you can disable it in Settings >
Wireless and Networks > Data Usage > Mobile Data. Remember to switch it back
on when you get home!
Set a limit
To switch on this feature, go into
Settings > Wireless and Networks > Data Usage and tell your device what
your monthly data limit is. You can set two numbers here: one to alert you that
you’re getting close to maxing out your monthly data use, and a hard limit that
your device won’t let you exceed. Your phone network may also offer an app that
lets you see just how much data you’re using and warn you if you’re about to
hit the data cap.
Take Taylor Swift with you
Some services such as the Premium
version of the music streaming service Spotify enable you to download tracks
for offline listening. The main reason for that is so you can access tracks
when you can’t get a data connection, bit it’s also a handy way of ensuring
that having Taylor Swift on repeat won’t count towards your data allowance. For
extra data saving points, download the tracks while you’re on Wi-Fi, not when
you’re using mobile data.
Offline working isn’t just for music.
You can use it for apps such as Google Maps, and for content such as ebooks.
Banish ads and compress content
Buying ad-free versions of your
favorite apps reduces the amount of data those apps use, and apps such Onavo
Extend enable you to compress data so you use less of it across all of your
apps. If you’ve got a rooted device you can also install an ad blocker;
unfortunately reliable ad blockers are as rare as rocking horse droppings in
the Play Store, so if you haven’t rooted your phone you’re out of luck in that
department
It’s also worth trying an alternative
web browser. The excellent Opera Browser for Android enables you to pause
downloads when you aren’t connected to Wi-Fi, and its Off-Road Mode compresses
data to reduce the amount you use. It has the happy side-effect of speeding up
browsing when you’re connected to a really slow network, too.
Stop apps from messing about in the
background
Social networking apps are
particularly bad for it - Facebook is notorious for it - but apps of all kinds
can be downloading data without your knowledge. We’ve put together an extensive
guide to stopping apps from running in the background, and we’ve also described
how to stop Google Play apps from automatically updating themselves. If you’ve
ever picked up your phone to see Google Play going crazy with endless updates
to apps you’d forgotten you even had, that alone will make an enormous
difference to your device’s data consumption.
