Documents and sync burning cellular data

go to settings - mobile - scroll to the bottom and you will see icloud drive and wifi assist with on/off switches. turn off both. i had 2 gigabytes being eaten per day by documents and data and i turned off both of these. it stopped using so much data. good luck ^-^

I worked out the issue affecting me. I noticed like many other people it seems that turning off my iMac stopped data being downloaded on my phone over cellular. Since it was Documents and Sync I assumed it must be an iCloud glitch, so turned off iCloud on my iMac, this also had the affect of stopping the excessive data usage on my iPhone.

To be safe I did a permissions repair at this point and a restart.

I then re signed in to iCloud on my iMac and 3 days later the issues still hasn't re-occured. My guess is that my iMac was "uploading" something to iCloud, and failing, but my iPhone was perhaps seeing new sync data and constantly truing to download these "new" file.

Hope this helps for anybody who has similar issues.

In addition to the above, the specific cause (in my case) was What'sApp. A 400 MB automated weekly backup to iCloud took place over 4G while I was driving. Bang goes the monthly data bundle!

If you want to use documents & data over cellular (e.g. For backing up other apps on the move), this might be the solution:

Go to What'sApp, Settings, Chat Settings, Chat Backup, Autobackup OFF.

Alternatively, turn Autobackup on in the middle of the night. The. 1 week later, Autobackup happens while you're sleeping (hopefully in a wifi zone).

I also have this problem.

On my new iPhone 6, I can virtually wait and see how it burns my cellular data in "Documents & Sync". 20 to 60 MB per day is my current rate.

My wife has an iPhone 5S and she uses it as frequently as I use mine with very similar apps.

Her "Documents & Sync" data is less than 10 MB after 2 weeks. Mine is 400 MB after 11 days.

What else can this be?

Of course, I have iTunes mobile downloads disabled, iCloud mobile data disabled, Photo stream is completely off, automatic updates are off.

I am not using whatsapp.

Nothing helps.

I have now reset my iPhone and deleted everything. Then started from scratch to rebuild my apps and links.

Also I made sure that 'Background data' was off.

All without any success.

The phone used 78 MB in less than 48 hours for 'Documents&Snyc".

What else can this be ????

This is driving me crazy.

I am now used to switching "mobile data" off whenever I am not using the iPhone.

This is a PITA, but at least my mobile data now lasts for a whole month.

A few days ago, however, I forgot to turn mobile data off before I sent the phone to sleep mode.

As a result, the iPhone burned 150 MB mobile data in just a few hours...

Now I have turned everything "off" I can think of:

iCloud Drive -> Off

iCloud Photos -> Off

iCloud Mail -> Off

All mail accounts set to manual sync.

iTunes -> Mobil data -> Off

Still, during the last few hours another 40 MB were transmitted through "Documents and Sync" while the iPhone was in sleep mode.

What else can I do ????

Should I go and get an Android phone ?

Same problem for me. Since 8.2. I got through 5gb of my monthly allowance in a week, and then a further 1gb in 24hrs. Took my phone into Genius Bar today, I've done a full reset and started phone from new. So far this evening already 40mb used. They said they will replace the phone in warranty as the next step. Not that i can understand how this is a hardware issue.

This is on my iPhone 6 Plus.

The problem has finally been solved for me with the release of iOS 8.3 and Yosemite 10.10.3.

I am monitoring daily cellular data usage of "documents & sync" since one week.

For the first time since I have my iPhone 6 (and iOS 8) it is constantly down to 0,3 ... 1,0 MB per day.

Previously, it was many MB per day - once even exceeding 100 MB in just a couple of hours.

Needless to say, I did not touch any settings after the upgrade to iOS 8.3 so this was truly a bug on Apple's side.

Good to know they apparently fixed it at last.

I Am having this same problem as well since getting my iphone 6 a few months ago. I'm going over data every month. I never even came close to going over with my 4s the years I had it. What do you suggest to try and fix it?

My wife has an iPhone 5. I have an iPhone 6s.

We both have iCloud Drive turned ON.

She has Use Cellular Data for iCloud Drive turned ON.

I have Use Cellular Data for iCloud Drive turned OFF.

Her Documents & Sync data usage last month was ZERO.

My Documents & Sync data usage last month was nearly 500MB.

She works as an attorney and is out of the office using cellular data all day long.

I'm retired and spend most of the day using our home WiFi.

What can account for my huge Documents & Sync cellular data usage?

AS others have said turning iMac off will stop this data drain HOWEVER we all know how annoying this is; I have a workaround;

In power settings make sure "Enable Power Nap" is disabled. Once I disabled this I can keep my iMac ON and I won't have any drain.

Hope this helps people with this issue 🙂

errr obviously you haven't read the entire thread? My response is about iPhones and iOS in general, I was having 100mb data drain on a daily basis on my iphone 6 plus. I was able to figure out the source of the "documents and sync" drain was because "power nap" setting was switched to on on my iMac. There is a correlation between documents and sync on the iOS and a iCloud bug due to continuous syncing with the iMac.

I was simply offering a solution for people to try, in majority of cases people who have had this "documents and sync" data bug also have a mac so I suggest attempting to turn off the "power nap" on their macs and see if that helps with data drain on their iPhones. Hope that makes sense...

Hi All,

I had this problem also. I renamed my iphone today to have the same device name as another device and after that my usage skyrocketed in the GB's range.

So you may wish to check if you have another active iOS device (ipad or 2nd iphone etc.) with the same name that is logged onto your icloud account and if so rename it.

My old iPhone had the same name as my new one. But the old one was completely wiped and given to a relative who gave it a new and different name. So, there is only one iPhone named mPhone syncing to my iCloud account.

We started having this problem 2 weeks ago. We have 3 Iphones and two burn through data like crazy. Somewhere around 500 MB per day, sing 5.7 GB in one week just for documents& setings!

One phone was on wifi all day yesterday and still used 398 MB of cellular data. We have no mac computers. Everything is turned off that I can think of.

I don't know what to do anymore? I can see my data drain and Can't stop it! Help!