Are you spending too much on your cell phone bill? The average cell phone bill for a family of four on unlimited data can reach up to $2,670 a year. One of the reasons your cell phone bill is so high is the data plan. All those video chats, streaming services, and data-hungry apps mean you are using a lot of data on your cell phone. Statista says that the average smartphone user will use almost 9GB of data per month in 2021. All this cellular data usage comes with unexpected overages bills, too. No one likes sky-high cell phone bills. Here are some easy-to-follow tips to help you find ways to reduce your data use and reduce your cell phone bill.
The first step to reduce your cellphone bill is to know what you really need. Research says that 66% of Americans with unlimited cell phone plans consume less than 10 gigabytes of cell phone data monthly. These cell phone user could reduce their cell phone bill by an average of $268.44 a year without running out of cell phone data.
Wi-Fi helps you reduce your cell phone bill
Consistently connecting to Wi-Fi networks will reduce the amount of cellular data you use, and reduce your cell phone bill. This is important because watching a Netflix movie while using cellular data will eat up anywhere between 1GB to 3GB per hour. Wireless carriers divert cellular traffic to Wi-Fi to save money – so should you. Here are some tricks to reduce your cell phone bill.
1 – Turn on Wi-Fi – Make sure your Wi-Fi settings are turned on, and you are connected to an available Wi-Fi network.
2 – Turn off Wi-Fi Assist (iOS) and Smart Network Switch (some Android models). These built-in settings try to boost a spotty or slow Wi-Fi connection by using your cellular connection. These settings can use a lot of data.
- Android devices, go to Settings > Connections > Wi-Fi. Tap the three dots, select Advanced, and tap the slider for “Switch to mobile data.”
- Apple devices, go to Settings > Cellular or Settings > Mobile Data. Then scroll down and tap the slider for Wi-Fi Assist.
Limit your data usage
3 – Cap your monthly data usage – Android has a built-in feature that allows you to limit your cellular data to a set amount based on your billing cycle. Here’s how to set that up:
- Go to Settings > Network & internet > Data usage > Data warning & limit (or Data limit & billing cycle) to set the maximum amount of data you want to use for the month.
- Or, tap “App data usage cycle” to set the first day of your billing cycle.
Apple devices don’t include the same built-in feature to restrict your data usage. To keep an eye on your cellular data use on your Apple iOS device go to:
- Settings > Cellular or Settings > Mobile Data. (On an iPad, it may be Settings > Cellular Data)
- You can also reset your data usage for the “Current Period” here every month so you know how much you’re using each billing cycle.
4 – Update apps over Wi-Fi only – If your apps are set to update automatically, they may be draining your data over a cellular network. You can set your device to update apps over Wi-Fi only to reduce your cellphone bill. Once you do that, the apps will only update and use data when you’re connected to Wi-Fi.
- Android, go to the Play Store and tap Menu > Settings > Auto-update apps, then select “Auto-update apps over Wi-Fi only.
- iOS, go to Settings > App Store > scroll to “Cellular Data” and toggle “Automatic Downloads” to the off position.
Disable background app data
5 – Disable app data in the background – Some apps will continue to gather data in the background while you’re not using your phone. This may be a good feature for a news app, but not every app needs this feature. To turn this feature off for your apps
- Android, go to Settings > Data Usage to see which apps are using the most data. Tap on the app you’d like to restrict and disable background data.
- iOS, go to Settings > General > Background App Refresh. Here, you can choose whether you want this feature on or off completely, or just WiFi only. You can also toggle this on and off for individual apps.
6 – Disable display ads for your browser. Display ads auto-play videos that stream to your phone, so if you have a browser that helps you disable these ads, you save plenty of data and reduce your cell phone bill.
Turn off your phone
7 – Turn off your phone while asleep. It is likely that throughout the night, data will be used on the phone, especially if applications are running. You could save a lot of data and money over time by trying out this hack.
8 – Compress your updates. There are applications that can make your data usage around 5 times more efficient by compressing it. Take a look at the apps.
The downside, however, is that the company will be aware of the data you’re accessing. It all depends on if that is a price you’re willing to pay.
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If these hacks fail to reduce your cell phone bill, you have the option to change to a plan with a data limit in order to reduce your cell phone bill.
Related article
- The sneaky reason your cell phone bill is so high — it’s not always your wireless provider’s fault (MarketWatch)
Ralph Bach has been in IT long enough to know better and has blogged from his Bach Seat about IT, careers, and anything else that catches his attention since 2005. You can follow him on LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter. Email the Bach Seat here.