The iPhone 5 uses Cellular Data over WiFi?

Consider using the DataWiz app to see more detail regarding when your iPhone is using cell data. That with the application usage info in iOS Settings, Cellular provides some insight as to when and what is using cell data.

Sorry truerock, but unless you've experienced the problem, you don't know what we're talking about.

I've been doing a lot of reading since this "bug" started happening to me. It started out with Verizon customers, about 2 years ago.

Apple issued an official fix for Verizon.

It's too easy to dismiss this as a user error (with their data settings). There's 1000+ posts in this thread. That's a lot of people "doing it wrong" as famously said by the late Jobs when addressing the "non-existing" antenna issue with iPhone 4.

If you dig below the surface, you'll notice that virtually every one who's affected by this issue reports that their usage pattern has not changed but their usage sky-rocketed.

Here's some facts that I observe:

a) Have 4 smart phones in account. 3 iPhones and 1 Android. Only 1 of the iPhone is affected.

b) It connects via cellular even though it's on WiFi. This is a critical issue. My usage pattern (if I stream movies or twit excessively) shouldn't matter. It's on WiFi. It should use zero cell data.

c) It connects on a regular schedule (every 3 hours for me, but I've seen others report every 6 hours or some other interval) and uploads chunks of data of varying sizes (no pattern there). This happens even in the wee hours (like 3am) when I'm sleeping.

d) Turning cellular data off stops the leak, of course, but it comes back with a vengeance when cellular is turned on again. Turning cellular ON/OFF manually can't be the solution. It's on WiFi, it shouldn't use cellular data.

This seems to be an old problem (at least 1.5 years old). I can't believe Apple doesn't have a solution yet.

Itsmethebee,

I'm not suggesting that you are not having the problem (double negative there). I'm just saying that if I take a couple of AT&T iPhones I cannot personally reproduce the problem. I have had a few weird situations occur with unexplained cell data usage - but, they are rare and I can not reproduce the error.

If I had a reproducible problem I could take it to AT&T and/or Apple and discuss it. Unfortunately I can't do that.

I wish I had better diagnostic tools. I have iOS Settings to tell me which apps are using cell data. I have DataWiz to tell me when and where I am using cell data. I need both data tied together just to start looking at the issue.

When I try to reproduce the "unexplained cell data usage" problem, I use both sets of data but I have not been able to make the problem occur.

Lately when I have had the problem it turned out to be something like

1) My wifi provider was off line for maintenance during the night

or

2) my wife accidently tethered to my iPhone from her iPad when we did not have wifi at a hotel

or other non-standard situations.

I have 5 iPhones on AT&T and 3 iPads. I have AT&T U-verse at 3 different locations (Houston, Austin, Ft Worth)

And I keep forgetting to say this....

I completely believe that iPhones and/or iOS could be having intermittent issues with Wi-Fi modems freezing up. I worked in a datacenter in the early '90s where we power-cycled ALL of the routers and modems EVERY NIGHT! Technology was that unreliable back then. Every time I walked through the datacenter I would look for modems that were hung-up and needed to be power-cycled.

I am amazed that I haven't had to power-cycle my U-verse gateway since March of 2013. I think AT&T may re-boot it periodically.

My issue is that I can't pin down the status of the Wi-Fi radio on my iPhone. Apps like DataWiz just aren't capable enough to really provide analysis of this type of problem.

In a recent IT position I was in we often built diagnostic tools into applications which would ping through the corporate global network on a regular periodic basis to make sure there were no network problems. For example, an inventory application in Singapore would modify a record in a database in Houston every 5 minutes to make sure that connectivity was working correctly. If part of a net-trace started showing anomalies we would know that there was something that needed to be fixed... and sometimes it was calling AT&T in New Jersey to tell them a trans-Atlantic hub was acting up or something like that. Apple and AT&T aren't doing anything like that with iPhone apps.

truerock,

I don't mean to be rude, but I was not asking for someone to try to reproduce my problem and help me fix it.

Like I said, I have 2 iPhones that are working perfectly and 1 that has this issue. I wouldn't know how to start reproducing this (nor do I want to) in the other 2 iPhones. All 3 are on the latest iOS 7 patch.

The first post in this thread was posted almost 2 years ago. The problem has been discussed and re-hashed 1000+ times.

It's patently clear that this is not a problem with how we use the phone.

I was hoping that someone who had the issue could point me to a solution. I'm disappointed to find out that after 2 years, a problem that started with iOS 6 is still happening in iOS 7 and apparently there is no fix from Apple.

I was looking forward to the new iPhone 6. Not going to happen if such a critical issue can drag on for 2 years... and apparently people are OK with it? Because it's Apple?

<Edited by Host>

Itsmethebee,

I think I get it... its very frustrating. I don't think this is so much an iOS issue... Google: android unexpected cellular data usage

I completely agree with you that this issue should not be dragging on for years... but, I have dealt with IT professionals for decades and I can assure you that over 99% of them just don't get it from a user perspective. I have exhibited completely unprofessional, un-politically-correct behaviors and called rooms full of IT professionals with dozens of Masters degrees in technical fields incompetent. I have argued with highly competent, highly intelligent individuals about issues such as this and for what ever reason they think the technology is OK and the users are wrong.

If AT&T, Sprint, etc and Apple had their act together we would not be on the 76th page of this thread.

Smart phones are not perfect. Cell networks are not perfect and... yes... users are not perfect. Apple must provide an iOS that takes that into account and provides the tools and mechanisms that take those imperfections into account. iOS at this point does not... but Android does not either.

Wifi modems always get stuck... they will always get stuck. Cell networks... any networks have problems. Applications and operating systems must be designed to take that into account. But I will absolutely guarantee you that over 99% of the people involved with the design of iOS and the iPhone do not understand that... and the 1% that do are always overwhelmed by the huge inertia of incompetence.

99% are incompetent? If that were the case nothing would ever work.

If you aren't an IT professional then how did you know they were wrong and incompetent.

76 pages and 1,000 posts here needs to be taken in relationship to the entire world. Many of the people in this thread have posted more than one time (that includes me) and some were not complaining about the situation (again including me). So let us say we have 100 people here complaining about this issue. What percentage of all iPhones would that represent? What percentage of all Verizon iPhone users would that be?

itsmethebee says they have 3 iPhones, 2 of which do not exhibit the problem and one that does. If this were an iOS bug that would not make any sense, in that case all of the iPhones should have the problem. Otherwise if they made a software change to make the 1 phone work you would then have the other phone failing. It sounds more like there is an issue with that particular iPhone.

The original iPhone Verizon usage issue was a carrier issue and was handled by Verizon issuing a carrier configuration update through Apple. The problems since then are much more isolated and individualized. The usage showing on bills every 3 hours and 6 hours is most often a billing issue, i.e. the data wasn't used every 3 or 6 hours the billing of the usage was during that period. You can see on the iPhone which apps are using data. This issue was not near as big on AT&T and even less so on T-Mobile and Sprint.

By design when a mobile device goes into sleep mode it drops the WiFi connection. This is to prevent depletion of the battery. Also the WiFi signal cannot by signal wake up a mobile device while a cellular data signal can. About 3 years ago Apple made a change that allowed holding on to the WiFi signal even when going into sleep mode IF the device was connected to power. If not it drops the signal. If the phone is asleep and someone sends a series of emails with attachments it can use a significant amount of cell data.

My experience has been that both Apple and the carriers are concerned about issues where the phone or cell services are not working correctly. If I were itsmethebee I would put the recalcitrant iPhone in DFU mode then restore it in iTunes as a new iPhone and use if for awhile to see if it has the same problem. If it does not then restore it from backup and see if the problem begins again which would point to an app issue. If the problem exists before the restoring from the backup then take the phone to Apple and have them try to identify a defect, which could be a number of things.

Maybe your iPhone is using Cellular Data because it can not connect to WiFi.... Well my Wi-Fi is greyed out.. can not turn it on....Apple Says they are seeing many cases of Wi-Fi Blue Tooth HARDWARE burnout.. and there is nothing they can do but service the phone for me... and if It's been over 90 days, or one year.. I'm out of luck. Thanks for Best Buy's black tie service agreement. Hardware in my phone burns out less than two years after purchasing the phone. Now that stinks. Really stinks. The kicker is that they know that this is a common problem. they have created an exception to charging for the support because they know its a common problem.. But are they telling folks who are having this issue the real reason it's happening.. loud and clear on the internet... NO, they are waiting for folks to call and then selling them support tickets, and repair fees... what a racket. They sell us a phone that burns out in 18 months... then rack up the service tickets and repair fees for fixing it... wow.. not a huge fan here... not today. Total Bummer. Thank God for Best Buy's Black Tie Protection Plan, where I can take it in and get a rapid exchange for a refurbished phone. Because if I had bought the phone directly from apple.. I'd be ***** out of luck. Have a nice day everyone... see you in line at Best Buy in the morning....

classicstyle wrote:

Maybe your iPhone is using Cellular Data because it can not connect to WiFi....

The OP (two years ago) stated he was connected to Wi-Fi.

deggie,

My iPhones' wi-fi does not go to sleep. I've tested for this many times and I cannot produce that behavior.

I checked my iPhone this morning and it was receiving and sending small amounts of data via wi-fi while I was sleeping.

The iPhone 5 (iOS 7.1.2) was not plugged into a charger. It went from 99% battery at midnight to 91% battery at 9:00 AM.

Several times I have tested my iPhone by putting it to sleep and then sending it an iMessage from a different iPhone or iPad. My iPhone wakes up and receives the iMessage via wi-fi.

I used Datawiz to track the cell-data and wifi-data usage.

You have to let it go fully asleep. If you are doing so then your software is reporting incorrectly (highly likely) or you have a defective iPhone and need to get it serviced. If you left an iPhone connected to WiFi overnight that was not connected to power you would see serious battery drain.

iPhone 5 uses Cellular Data over WiFi?'

@shohidulfromdhaka

That seems to be the crux of the issue.

I've confirmed that my iPhone can connect via WiFi.

When at home, it's connected via WiFi. It works even with data switched off.

No matter how many apps I have, and how badly I "miss-configure" them to access the internet or unnecessarily backup stuff to iCloud, all that data should be going via WiFi.

Yet, when I look at my ATT bill, I see my phone using cellular data every 3 hours, connected to WiFi or not. The period doesn't matter (others have reported their phones accessing data every 6 hours, etc. I think that's carrier dependent). What's significant is that some of those data usage happens in the wee hours, like 3am, when I'm sleeping (so no intentional phone activity) and the phone is connected to WiFi because it's at home, next to me.

If the theory that when the phone goes to sleep (stand-by), the WiFi disconnects is correct, that in itself would be an even more serious problem (if that's by design). I don't believe that's true. There was a big hoopla in the iOS 6 days, and they issued a fix specifically to address that. That's why truerock can't reproduce it.

So, why is it that cellular data is being used at all (as reported by ATT and charged to my account) when the phone is connected to WiFi?

Because the billing time/date on AT&T does not equal when the data was actually used.

But the billing time is regular, at 12am, 3am, 6am, 9am, etc.

So, the billing at midnight reflects what I did before midnight. Fine.

But there should be nothing at 3am. Nor at 6am.

I was sleeping then. And the phone was on WiFi.

It's not a sporadic event, like a few bytes here and there. If that was the case this thread wouldn't exist.

People are going over their data plan. It's MB after MB or data uploads. In the middle of the night.

You could argue that I misconfigured an app to do uploading in the middle of the night, when nothing is happening, as unlikely as it might be.

My response is... why not over WiFi?