Q: IOS 8 High Cellular Data Usage

iPhone 5, updated to iOS 8, having the same problems as everyone else. I've already blown through 2gb of data. I've had an iPhone since originally launched and have never used more then a 1gb for the entire billing cycle. Called AT&T and they said call Apple. Called Apple and they said they have not received any reports of this problem. I told them about this thread and was told each person could be different. I find it highly unlikely that we are all having the same issue with iOS 8 and it not be a software issue. Contact Apple so they create ticket numbers and see that they need to fix this problem. Is costing me extra money in data. I've had to shut off all cellular data. I've never had to do this and that's not a fix to this problem.

I suspect its iCloud storage, sync'ing over cellular. There isn't a switch to control whether or not it uses cellular data, and once I enabled iCloud storage, I'm seeing large volumes of data being used that weren't in the past. Its the only thing I can find that would explain how my data usage has gone up by GB's in the last cycle.

I've been on the phone with Apple for 3 hours today.  They refuse to believe that this is their problem even when I showed them my carrier's data logs that show the high data usage started after iOS8.  I also showed them screenshots of my phone after I resent the cellular data counter to 0, and 30 minutes later (while on WiFi for the whole time) there was cell data usage.

They had me reinstall my phone from a backup and this is still happening.

I have this problem on o2. They said at midnight the day after the update it used all of my 750mb!

Unfortunately for me it was 1 day after my allowance reset! So now a full month without data! Where do we need to go to complain?

My data plan just rolled over yesterday, and I've used .5 gb already I went into settings > cellular and The App store app used 600+- mb and I go to updates and add up all the updates sizes and guess what.... Even though it looks like the setting " use cellular data for automatic downloads" is turned off in settings > iTunes & AppStor. I was in my home with wifi all day it didn't use wifi to automatically update apps. So I think I just turned off using cellular in the AppStore all together. Hopefully this will get fixed. Btw I am running iOS 8.0.2.

I was having the same problem.  It started on Friday 9/26.  I hadn't updated to 8.0.2 yet but I was getting messages from my provided telling me that my data was nearing it's limit.  First at 65%, then to 90% within the next hour.  I reset my cellular usage statistic and quickly found out that it's the Mail app.  It's using ~10MB per minute.  No explanation.  I'm not sure if it's a bug with the app itself, or a bug with the mail protocol between Google and the iPhone.  This entire experience has been extremely frustrating.

I've just got an email today from T-Mobile (UK) that I've used up 90% of my data usage, I've never had this before and found this thread.  Like everyone else since update to ios8.  Was going to update to 8.0.2, but not sure it will now make any difference seeing what everyone else has written, doesn't appear to just be a US problem!

8.0.2. did not resolve this.

Charging seems to start it for me. So it could be sync related? But syncing is set to use wifi only...

Total cellular usage still way more than adding up individual item usage.

Can only stop it by switching off cellular use. What's the point having a smartphone then?

I am still having this issue on iOS 8.0.2. I contacted Verizon yesterday to get my data overage fee waived and they were being extremely difficult about it.

I had to keep explaining to them that from 9/16 (the day I updates to iOS 8) through 9/28 (the day I contacted Verizon), which is only twelve days, my phone consumed 1.4GB of data. In one month, I average around 1.6GB of data usage. After one hour of help, the customer service representative told me that I would have to just keep cellular data shut off, which is incredibly frustrating. I bought an iPhone to use it, not have my settings shut off. Later the rep told me that deleting apps from my phone would free up some GB of Verizon data; nice try, I'm not dumb. The rep also told me that Verizon has no idea what I'm using my data for, and they have no way of proving that my phone is consuming my data and not a certain app, even though I tried to explain the concept of the Usage screen in settings.

Needless to say, the chat didn't go anywhere. I apologize for the rant.

Thanks Mitton.

A clean restore is just not a practical solution unless you have hours of spare time. (Restoring from backup just reintroduces the same issue.)

Mine still appears to be a problem.  I tried to reset all content and settings, have turned off countless other items as well, but it's just used up 7mb within 5 mins.  I'm back on wifi now, but on Monday 20% was used up within an hour and a half on wifi!  Can't get an appointment at Genius Bar until Monday next week.  Just waiting for a online chat with them now. 

Engineers are working on a fix, "iphones are pulling data usage that isn't supposed to be happening".  You best report it through chat as they need to raise a ticket to speed up the fix.  They call you back so doesn't cost anything, obviously apart from loss of data allowance!!!

I have the same issue here in Germany with my iPhone 6.

Yesterday evening made the reset and configured the phone as new, THAT DIDNT HELP!

Whta I can figure out is, when I start iBooks, it loads dozens of MB over cellular data, without showing up in the system settings.

But the data amount in "iTunes Accounts" blows up.

When I kill iBooks, it stops. Unfortunately I like to read...

The tip worked a charm for me.

Upgraded my wife's iphone to an iphone6 on 9/26.  Made the mistake of restoring from backup in ITunes to get her apps back.  After that, in the afternoon of 9/26 it used 140Mb of cellular data, and on 9/27 it used 255Mb instead of her usual 22Mb or so per day.  Saw this tip, used "Erase All Content and Settings", set the phone up again using the "set up as a new phone" option, hooked it up to ITunes, selected the apps to restore, and clicked apply to move them to the phone.  Data usage for 9/28 through 10/4 is back to 22Mb per day!

Thanks for the tip, so far so good.