iOS5 data usage

It seems to be a wifi connection issue as you said above. I have this occur sometimes with my 4S. What I do is wait a few seconds when I wake my iPhone from sleep mode to ensure the wifi icon is at the top of my screen. Also, when my iPhone is being bad and won't connect to the wifi I go to settings<wifi<turn off wifi<then, turn on wifi and this usualy ensures a strong connection for the next week or so. I hope this helps a bit

The wifi icon always seems to be showing as connected ok (I always check that one) but I think that event though it shows this; sometimes it is actually connecting to 3G. This is part of the 'mystery' as everything 'looks' normal but under the hood there is something else going on with data gobbling.

It maybe a software glitch then, report it too apple would be my best advice

I have overcome the problem as follows:

1. Upgraded to IOS5.0.1

2. Turned off 'Location Services'

Since I did this I have had no further excessive data usage issues.

Of course, the problem isn't fixed; it's just avoided through my abandonment of one of the iPhone's key features.

BTW I don't ever use wifi or iCloud (never signed in for it even)

As I said in my previous posts, Apple and are through because of this issue.

Dr Stephen Fox

Sydney

Australia

nicbee333 wrote:

The wifi icon always seems to be showing as connected ok (I always check that one) but I think that event though it shows this; sometimes it is actually connecting to 3G. This is part of the 'mystery' as everything 'looks' normal but under the hood there is something else going on with data gobbling.

Are you taking into consideration the fact that WiFi disconnects about a minute after the phone goes to sleep to preserve battery life, so any background processes that use data while the phone is asleep will use cellular data?

Actually I hadn't taken that into consideration as to my mind, if I am in a wifi area, any other data processes will default to wifi - not 'suddenly' switch to data. Do you know then, that if I had started downloading a podcast or app that takes longer than a minute; that if I am not actively using my phone and it happens to go to sleep, this might result in the download switching to cellular data?

This would be a possible reason but not an acceptable solution for me. I need to be able to trust that wifi will always be the default when in a wifi area - irrespective of whether the iphone is in sleep mode.

Yes, it will switch to cellular if the phone goes to sleep. The reason is that WiFi uses power continuously while it is connected, unlike cellular data, which only uses power when actually sending or receiving. This is an artifact of the WiFi protocol, and there is nothing that Apple can do about it. If WiFi were to stay on while the phone was asleep the battery would die overnight, and you would be complaining about that, instead. With earlier versions of iOS WiFi would stay on if the phone was connected to a charger while asleep. I haven't tested that with 5.0.1 because I have an unlimited data plan and I don't care how much data the phone uses.

UPDATE: I checked my 4S with 5.0.1, and WiFi DOES stay on when the phone is asleep.

You can test this for yourself:

1. On the phone go to Settings/WiFi, tap on the active network, then on the arrow to the right of the name. Write down the IP address (e.g., 192.168.1.2)
2. Back out of settings and leave the phone on.
3. Open a Command window (Windows) or Terminal (Mac)
4. Type ping <ip address> e.g., ping 192.168.1.2 and press Enter
5. The screen will start sending a packet to the phone every second. On a Mac it will do it continuously forever until you press ^C, but on Windows it will quit after 10 seconds.
6. Let the phone go to sleep and try ping again a couple of minutes later (or on a Mac just let it continue to go).

If the phone is not connected to power the pings will time out after about a minute; if it is connected they will continue.

I had a big spike in data usage last month (December 2011): 2.2GB while I was on a 1.5GB/m plan with usual use of 0.4-0.5GB/month.

Had a look at the logs of my cellular provider: saw huge chunks of data (50-100MB up to 250MB) appearing most of the times on the early morning hours. Those were on days I remember leaving iPhone4 unplugged while at home (heck, on Wi-Fi). I was an early adopter of iOS5, and previously had no issues with battery drain or excessive cellular data.

I believe the culprit is the setup of an additional Exchange email server. I can pinpoint exactly the date (11/25) when I set up this and cross-checking the logs I see that all the big data transfers appear from that date and on. While on Xmas when I kept my iPhone plugged at night or in airport mode, there were no data transfers.

That particular Exchange server is generally quite buggy and I have experienced frequent lockups also with Outlook email client. I have now turned off the email account, installed Dataman free and I will be keeping an eye on the data rates. While reading on this thread I saw some other handy tips as well, but as said I never experienced big problems with battery/data since 2007 (iPhones 1, 3GS, 4 and all the range of iOS).

This is why I wanted to share my experience with you, as it seems third-party applications are not to blame for our issue. I am a little alarmed by iCloud however and will be checking on this as well. I 'll keep you posted and hope Apple fixes the WiFi to 3G switchover once and for all..

The difficulty here is that there are so many factors as to why an iPhone might be using excessive mobile data. For me I can confirm that it is iCloud:

This month I received a message from Tesco Mobile saying my account was suspended as I had gone over my 512 MB monthly data usage and incurred a £66 charge (I would like to mention, I have had every iPhone since it first came out, had it on a mixture of contracts and owned a MobileMe Account since becoming an Apple Employee 3 years ago, however I no longer work for the business). I have never incurred any data charges ever. My Tesco Mobile bill showed continious data usage from around beginning of Jan 2012 to 20th, on some days transfering from 12am to 7pm?! Times when I would be asleep, driving, in the gym or at work!

I carried out various tests over two days and concluded that with the iCloud account added data usage (in particular data sent) continuosly climbs by 1kb every 2-3 seconds. All other settings that might use data are turned off (i.e Documents and Data, Location Services, iAds- opted out, Push settings off) but that made no difference, no applications running (and it should be mentioned that the iPhone does not really multitask but use multitasking API's thus applications cannot transfer data unless you are aware (i.e. BBC radio app streaming internet radio). Reseting the data usage counter and I watch the data sent climb from 0 to over 500kb.

I decided to go one step further and keep the iCloud account added but turn off all iCloud services (Mail, Contacts, Calendars, Reminders, Bookmarks, Notes, Photo Stream, Documents & Data, Find my iPhone). Believe it or not.... the data still continues to climb!

So I deleted my iCloud account and the data counter stops completely. Verified by checking back 15-20 mins later and the data usage sent has stayed the same (thus no data has been sent). I turned iCloud back on again over wifi so that the iPhone can sync the data over my broadband first, when completed I turned wifi off, reset the data counter and with the iCloud account synced and added my data usage starts to climb again regardless of iCloud services on or off, 1kb around every 2-3 seconds again.

There is definitely an issue with iCloud (in my case anyway, as I say, you can't definitively say the cause of your issue is going to be the same for everyone). I have no choice but to delete my iCloud account altogether (which defies the whole point of having a MobileMe/iCloud e-mail on a smartphone that should be able to push my important e-mails to me out and about which it has always done, or keep my mobile internet permanently turned off. Either way, I am not a happy bunny.

Restoring my iPhone now (without putting a backup on it)- will report if this stops the data issue.

I found another instance where data was being used without my knowing, although I want to preface this post by saying that I suspect this particular issue probably isn't an iOS5-only problem, though it certainly does apply to unknown data usage.

I was streaming Pandora at work (over Wifi) and at some point in the afternoon paused the player, went to other apps, didn't use it at all the rest of the day. However, after I got home from work I had a usage notification from DataMan indicating my "daily allowance" (10MB) of data was nearly extinguished. About 8MB was eaten up on the 20-or-so minute drive, according to DataMan's logs.

I tried double-tapping the Home button and swiping over to the media player section and, what do you know, Pandora was attached as the "active player" (for lack of a better term) instead of the "Music" app. I have a Ford Focus with Microsoft Sync, which can stream Bluetooth audio from my phone. In this instance I suspect that, while I wasn't even listening to the Bluetooth audio stream on my way home from work--I had the radio on instead--it was still streaming Pandora in the background without my knowing, slowly nibbling away at my data.

So again, while I do believe there are legitimate iOS5 data usage issues, I don't want to necessarily blame IOS5 for this particular case, as it could just be the way things work for any iPhone and OS version when you have Pandora or some other audio-streaming app attached as the "active player." I still don't like the fact that it works this way...guess I'll now have to ensure Pandora's not setup like this before I leave work.

@tg_andersen & the.specialist:

I agree with both of you. From my experience, I've experience the data hog since upgrading my 3g (ios 4.2.1) to a iP4 iOS 4.3.1 (something like that) now at 5.0.1. No matter, both were data hogs! I don't blame multitasking as much, because I did jailbreak the 3g to have multitask (sorry apple! : (

But still I didn't use not even half my data (which actually is very small, but after certain amount of MB is not charged).

So as of now, I have everything literally OFF. As dumb as any phone can be. I don't use any 3G data apps, such as skype, pandora, facebook, etc. Nothing! Just really plan old phone & messages. I have WIFI at home and Office, so I shouldn't be using or counting data right?! Wrong, still Dataman shows medium size files regularly leaving my phone (with out doing anything).

I did notice a difference after deleting my iCloud acount (which defeats the purpose).

If I turn off "Cellular Data" under Settings -- Network -- Cellular Data -- OFF = Then OK! I don't see any changes in the data usage! : ) Happy??? NOPE! Because now I lose "3G" which technically is checked ON, but still don't show 3G on the top bar next to the Carrier name (softbank). So turning off Cell Data, I won't get any MMS!!!

SMS ok, but MMS... NOPE!

I'm soooo upset, and I don't know who to be upset at

1. Apple- Leaking data out of the iOS.
2. Softbank- Not letting me receive MMS on regular 3G network... I don't understand how can I have
   • Settings--General--Network--Enable 3G--"ON"
   • Settings--General--Network--Cellular Data--"OFF" ... and not get MMS??!!! In order to receive MMS I have to turn ON Cell Data, which in turns leaks Data all day.

May I add that, I don't leave my network ON late at night thru the morning. Is in Airplane mode. But as soon as I turn Network ON, bang! about 6-10MB gone instantly! Why?! I just turned on the phone! No messages, no missed calls... nothing.

So in conclusion: I blame iOS, iCloud, Apple and possibly my Carrier Softbank Japan!

Today I woke up with the alarm. The iPhone 4 was in airplane mode, but with wifi ON. First thing I did, was unlocked the phone, open DataMan (the night before I had closed all running apps in the multitask bar).

Dataman showed I had used 64.3 KB under 3G (remember airplane mode ON, 3G is supposed to be OFF).

Also another 38.1 MB in WIFI used. Are you kidding me???!! Why?

After turning Airplane Mode OFF. 3G back ON... automatically under 3G = 7 KB used, and in WIFI = 332.0 KB.

FYI - I didn't have any notifications on the screen what so ever. No messages, No missed calls, No voicemail... NOTHING.

How can NOTHING cost = over 70 KB of my precious DATA, in time that it takes me to wake up???!!! This is ridiculous!

If this keeps up, I hope some day somebody cracks this problems and then somebody gets sued for this thiefery.

I'm living in Taipei, TW and I'm having the very same issues with both my iphone 4 and 4s. My data has tripled since I bought the 4s and upgraded my 4 to ios 5.01. I'm now testing ios 5.1 on my 4 and the phantom data usage hasn't stopped. The cell phone companies are raking in the money with this bug. Apple needs to address and fix this issue ASAP! It seems rather odd that U.S. cellular companies stopped offering the unlimited data plans pretty close to when ios 5 was released.....:::😉

Just to set things straight, US cellular companies stopped offering unlimited data plans almost 2 years before the release of iOS 5...

...And there are complaints about phantom data usage going back almost 2 years.

iOS 5 DOES use more data, because it includes more ways to use data. There's no mystery here.