iOS5 using excessive cell data?

[applehappy]

Reposting with new subject line:

Is anyone else experiencing a spike in cell data usage since upgrading to iOS 5? I am on the ATT 200MB plan, which is always plenty for me, I am usually on wifi.

I got billed for overage and looked online and can see that my phone is SENDING chunks of data, (5, 10, once even 40MB) and it just says "phone" for who it is sent to.

This is happening both on my iPhone 4S and my wife's iPhone 4.

Am I missing something here? Is photo syncing doing this? I have enable 3G turned off in the STORE.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

 

[z3r0inc]

iCloud. And yes, PhotoStream is probably a big one.

 

[apunkrockmonk]

Photo stream is wifi only from what I understand.

 

[applehappy]

This doesn't make any sense. photo stream is supposed to be wifi only, same with wifi syncing. And I have Store sync set to wifi only. Why is my phone SENDING data in the middle of the night over the cell network when I have a wifi network at home?

 

[gloss]

I'd make sure you turn off all your iCloud and location services.

 

[applehappy]

I realize if I turn things off I will use less data, but why is my phone sending large chunks of data over the cell network at odd hours?

 

[darthlinux]

If icloud is sending data to back up your stuff then it will send chunks of data.

 

[Gemütlichkeit]

damn I'll have to monitor this too. Thanks.

 

[nwcs]

Two thoughts. One, make sure in Settings->Store that "Use Cellular Data" is off. Second, it's my understanding that the times listed by the carrier for when data is sent/received has a large margin of error based on when their accounting software sweeper collects the data.

 

[applehappy]

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; CPU iPhone OS 5_0 like Mac OS X) AppleWebKit/534.46 (KHTML, like Gecko) Mobile/9A334)

Bump. Looking for more ideas, common experiences.

 

[Mdk1309]

I'm experiencing the same effect, got billed almost EUR 400,- for exceeding my traffic. According to my provider's logfiles, the iPhone sent huge amounts of data over cellular during the night, although it should have definitely been logged into my WLAN at that time!

I assume some kind of subtle bug, that continues syncing/backuping over 3G when the WLAN connection drops during the process...

 

[tigertazz]

I reset my data usage today turned off all my apps and put my phone in my pocket. By the end of the day the phone had used 5mb over cellular networks with nothing running.
All my mails are set to manual retrieve, iMessage was off and so the only thing running would have been iCloud. 5mb per day just to sync adds up quickly.

Anyone else had this??

 

[sooner518]

wow. just checked my account and i have used 850 MBs this month. I averaged about 180 MB over the last 6 months. thankfully I still have the grandfather unlimited plan, but this is really surprising!!! iCloud shouldnt be downloading THAT much. it should do it all over wifi. I'd be pissed if I were paying for it!

 

[Gemütlichkeit]

I've been monitoring my account since I last posted. I gotta say my data consumption hasn't changed since io5

 

[cdebnil]

wow. just checked my account and i have used 850 MBs this month. I averaged about 180 MB over the last 6 months. thankfully I still have the grandfather unlimited plan, but this is really surprising!!! iCloud shouldnt be downloading THAT much. it should do it all over wifi. I'd be pissed if I were paying for it!

Wow, wtf, I have unlimited too from AT&T. I am 1 day into my billing cycle and AT&T is telling me I've already used 332 mb. I have Icloud completely off except Find my Iphone. I haven't used my phone at all today or yesterday except to browse a couple of websites and check my fantasy football score. Also have photostream and backup off. Don't know wtf is causing all this data usage.

Also I use wifi at home most of the time....

 

[Skika]

I can confirm this, it happens that iPhone sends about 5 mb over night even though its on wifi and shouldn't be doing anything.

 

[cdebnil]

Reposting with new subject line:

Is anyone else experiencing a spike in cell data usage since upgrading to iOS 5? I am on the ATT 200MB plan, which is always plenty for me, I am usually on wifi.

I got billed for overage and looked online and can see that my phone is SENDING chunks of data, (5, 10, once even 40MB) and it just says "phone" for who it is sent to.

This is happening both on my iPhone 4S and my wife's iPhone 4.

Am I missing something here? Is photo syncing doing this? I have enable 3G turned off in the STORE.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

How do you look at who the data is sent to with AT&T? Is it on the website somewhere?

EDIT: Sorry, nm found it out. Have to click view details under the data section....I'm seeing similar trends where I have huge packets of data 20-70 mb at at time sent during times i knew i was at home using wifi....very strange. At this rate, I'll be at 10 gb by the end of the month.

 

[mkrishnan]

^^ Go to AT&T, log in; click view recent usage to see data usage since your last bill or analyse past usage to see historical usage. For the recent usage data, you'll see a table that basically lists data used per day; select only Internet / Media Net as the type of data usage. Don't pay attention to the variation in the day-to-day totals (sometimes you'll see 10kb used one day and 80MB the next day) -- I think this is a quirk of how they count, but the total should give you a rough idea.

wow. just checked my account and i have used 850 MBs this month. I averaged about 180 MB over the last 6 months. thankfully I still have the grandfather unlimited plan, but this is really surprising!!! iCloud shouldnt be downloading THAT much. it should do it all over wifi. I'd be pissed if I were paying for it!

If you had 2GB limited data you'd still be fine, wouldn't you?

I've been monitoring my account since I last posted. I gotta say my data consumption hasn't changed since io5

Mine is a little on the high side, but there was a huge amount of data use in the first day I was on iOS 5, and then it returned to normal. In the last 12 months, my data has ranged from 0.2-1.1 GB in a month -- I'm on track to probably have 0.9-1.0 GB this month, which puts me inside the pre-iOS 5 range. (The 0.2 was a standout -- last October was the last month I had home internet, and then after that my data usage went up quite a bit, and I've never been below 0.5GB since then).

 

[EasyRyde]

Wow! I just noticed this too. I know for a fact the first line item my phone was in my bag. I was getting a haircut. What the heck was my phone sending 6MB of data for? No wonder the batter drains a lot.

I still have MobileMe. Not iCloud yet. Always on Wifi (Wifi at work, home, gym, and optonline wifi when it hits on the road).

Here is the instances:

10/24 07:34 PM phone Internet/MEdia Net Sent 6087KB
10/23 02:53 PM phone Internet/MEdia Net Sent 3326KB
10/23 11:55 AM phone Internet/MEdia Net Sent 2297KB
10/22 04:06 PM phone Internet/MEdia Net Sent 3564KB


Can anyone help explain this!?

 

[sooner518]

ok I mis-remembered my past data usage. I average around .6 GB per month the last 6 months. but i still have a week on this billing cycle and Im at 850. i copy/pasted usage into Excel and put it into a graph and didnt notice any specific time that data was being sent consistently.

I did notice two HUGE days after I had downloaded iOS5 (the GM) but BEFORE I had activated iCloud (I installed iOS5 on October 4. I activated iCloud on OCtober 12). On Oct 9 I had 118 MB of data and the next day, 112 MB.

Regardless, my daily usage since downloading iOS5 has increased from 19MB/day (in September) to 39MB/day(since October 4, when I downloaded iOS5 GM). Not putting it on iCloud yet, but peculiar so far....

----------

Wow! I just noticed this too. I know for a fact the first line item my phone was in my bag. I was getting a haircut. What the heck was my phone sending 6MB of data for? No wonder the batter drains a lot.

I still have MobileMe. Not iCloud yet. Always on Wifi (Wifi at work, home, gym, and optonline wifi when it hits on the road).

Here is the instances:

10/24 07:34 PM phone Internet/MEdia Net Sent 6087KB
10/23 02:53 PM phone Internet/MEdia Net Sent 3326KB
10/23 11:55 AM phone Internet/MEdia Net Sent 2297KB
10/22 04:06 PM phone Internet/MEdia Net Sent 3564KB


Can anyone help explain this!?

surely there are times when you arent on wifi. in a store or outside perhaps? Thats only 14MB over a 4 day period.

 

[Drunken Master]

I've found that since I got iOS 5 I've actually used less data, even though I'm using my 3G a lot these days.

I disallowed a lot of the location services and whatnot though.

 

[EasyRyde]

Yes, all these times the phone was locked. I do have "Diagnostics Reporting" turned off. I wonder if it's an open app that is sending data? Needless to say, i have to monitor this very closely.

ok I mis-remembered my past data usage. I average around .6 GB per month the last 6 months. but i still have a week on this billing cycle and Im at 850. i copy/pasted usage into Excel and put it into a graph and didnt notice any specific time that data was being sent consistently.

I did notice two HUGE days after I had downloaded iOS5 (the GM) but BEFORE I had activated iCloud (I installed iOS5 on October 4. I activated iCloud on OCtober 12). On Oct 9 I had 118 MB of data and the next day, 112 MB.

Regardless, my daily usage since downloading iOS5 has increased from 19MB/day (in September) to 39MB/day(since October 4, when I downloaded iOS5 GM). Not putting it on iCloud yet, but peculiar so far....

----------


surely there are times when you arent on wifi. in a store or outside perhaps? Thats only 14MB over a 4 day period.

 

[Pedro Julio]

I'll chime in on this. I've had the iPhone 4 since it first came out, and until now I have only once even come close to 2 GB monthly limit.

I upgraded to iOS 5 the day after release. This month I am at 85% of my 2 GB limit with 10 days left on my billing cycle. It has been a slightly heavier use month for me, but this seems excessive.

I have to look at my usage logs in greater detail.

THEORY 1: A backup of your phone is sent to iCloud. Your initial back up is going to be pretty huge. (especially if you have a lot of stuff on there) After that it'll just be Delta uploads. iCloud being wifi only wouldn't explain this, but it might be related. I know that document backup on iCloud can use cell data...unless you turn it off.

 

[EasyRyde]

Opting out of iAds

I just followed the instructions on this article and not sure if this will help limit phantom data.

http://allthingsd.com/20100621/appl...r-targeted-ads-but-not-our-location-tracking/

I basically opted out of iAds by navigating to http://oo.apple.com from the device.

Not sure if iAds is sending data back to Apple.

"If you do not want to receive ads with this level of relevance on your mobile device, you can opt out by accessing the following link on your device: http://oo.apple.com. If you opt out, you will continue to receive the same number of mobile ads, but they may be less relevant because they will not be based on your interests."

Going to track to see if this helps.

 

[steve-p]

I took my 4S out of the country on launch day and left data roaming enabled. I got billed for almost twice as much data in 4 days than on the previous trip in the summer with a 3GS, which was 18 days. That was with exactly the same usage pattern, and on WiFi a lot of the time. I'd say there's a big increase in data usage.