Used over 1GB of data just during iphone setup

Got a new iphone for my daughter, and set it up yesterday. I am very tight on data usage, and have instructed everyone in the family to always try to use wireless and to minimize their data use. So today I checked to see how she was doing, and was shocked to see that she had burned through the entire 1 GB of bonus time we got for adding a line and more in less than a day. Looking closer it seemed that the bulk of the usage occured in the brief time I was setting up her phone (during which I should also have been connected to wifi). How could I possible have burnt through that much data, just in setting up a phone? That's more that any of us generally use in a month. Only thing I can think of is that I downloaded one app from her icloud account, but again, I should have been connected to wifi at that point! Anybody else experiance this much data use just doing a phone setup?

Making matters worse is that I again didn't get a notice when I hit 75% of my allottment, even though I am set up to be notified. That has happened other times as well.

Accepted answers

smith6612

On the iPhone assuming the data usage counters have not been set, you can go to Settings > Cellular and then scroll down. The iPhone should state below the name of each app how much data was consumed. In addition, there will be a section called System Services, that will show you the usage of any service or program that is built-in to the phone (non-removable) that has used data.

I've also included a screenshot or two from Android for the sake of others to look at for finding data usage.

Stuff like iCloud restores and iOS updates should not be possible on the cellular data. Some iCloud activities can be done over cellular, but this shouldn't happen out of the box. Those two tend to be data hungry and are rightfully restricted to Wi-Fi most of the time.

If you find an app is using a lot of data, you may want to consider these possibilities. First off, it could be possible that the phone was showing it was connected to Wi-Fi, but did not have an IP address. This causes the phone to actually default back to the cellular data since the Wi-Fi interface hasn't initialized fully. To fix this you have to do a DHCP Renew, or simply cycle the Wi-FI off and on again. Second, if an app detects that the phone is using an LTE connection versus a 3G or HSPA/HSPA+ (GSM providers), there's a chance that the default video quality will be HD. Sometimes apps use adaptive quality where HD or SD will be selected based upon available bandwidth. Instagram, despite being a larger app is known to be heavy on video and picture content, but I can't imagine it using that much data in a day.

All comments

smith6612

Check the iPhone's cellular data usage counter and see if that jives with what Verizon's Account portal reports. That counter starts the moment the phone was turned on for the first time. If the phone shows different yet the reset date and time shows the moment the phone was unboxed, you can contest the data usage. More often than not the phones are often spot-on accurate.

Also, Apple devices by default do not download content from places like iCloud, without Wi-Fi being on and actually connected to something. I would make sure the app that was downloaded wasn't massive (most are not unless they are a huge game, like EA's Sims).

johnhalldesign

The phone counter does say 1 GB. Only app I downloaded was Instagram which is only 158 MB. Can't imagine what else I could have done during that setup period that used 1 GB. Its a single data use entry of over 1GB. Is there any way you can tell either on the phone or on Verizon's website what was being done?

smith6612

I've also included a screenshot or two from Android for the sake of others to look at for finding data usage.

johnhalldesign

So this tells me it was the App Store app that used the data. Every other app's usage is miniscule. I have cellular turned off for App Store now, but I may have done that recently. Still can't figure out how App Store used 1GB of data in a single instance immediately upon setup (its the second data entry after turning on the phone). I connected it to her icloud account, but as I said, the only app I specifically downloaded from the cloud was Instagram. Weird. Its definitely going to push me over for the month.

unknown

It should be known that iPhones have an issue with wi-fi cutting off when the phone goes into sleep mode. So you think you're on wi-fi but you're not. Another reason to not use Apple products. Androids don't suffer from this problem.

smith6612

Apple does that to save power, but in effect I've found that to not help with the battery usage. The iPhone should re-connect to Wi-Fi when applications need data, but to be frank with so many things using push data there should be no need to turn it off to begin with. Wi-FI in comparison to 3G or LTE uses significantly less power.

I tell everyone I know to just leave the Wi-FI radio on. The battery savings are minute to where it's costing data plans rather than 2% battery.

To stop iPhones from dropping off of the Wi-Fi, make sure the Wi-Fi is using WPA2-PSK AES Encryption. WEP is problematic on Apple products (and rightfully so).

The other way to fix this is to turn off the cellular data, but then you risk not having it on if you receive MMS messages or if you lose your iPhone.

unknown

Exactly turning wi-fi off doesn't save much on battery. I leave mine on all the time. I have an Android phone. As I type I'm at 50% and I've been on this charge for 46 hours. 4% of of all my battery usage is wi-fi despite it being on all this time. Compared to the screen which is 24% of usage despite only being 60% brightness and not on the vast majority of the last 46 hours. so there are better ways to save battery than shutting wi-fi off. So I said just another reason not to use Apple products. It's a shame how many want to blame Verizon when they should be blaming Apple.