If you haven’t got an unlimited plan on your phone, you’ll need to keep an eye on your mobile data use each month. You don’t want to run out right when you need it the most or get hit with extra charges.
1 Use Wi-Fi Wherever Possible
The easiest way to use less mobile data is to make sure that you use Wi-Fi wherever you can.
When you’re at home, work, or school and have access to a secure Wi-Fi network, keeping Wi-Fi enabled on your phone will make sure you connect automatically.
You have to be a little more careful when connecting to other public Wi-Fi hotspots, although the rise of HTTPS has made them far more secure than they used to be. As long as you know who is providing the hotspot—a hotel, a coffee shop, etc.—then you should be okay.
Wi-Fi also uses less battery power than mobile data, so that’s another good reason to use it.
2 Set Data-Hungry Apps to Only Use Wi-Fi
Some apps, like cloud services, do a lot of uploading and downloading in the background. You can normally set them to do this only on a Wi-Fi connection.
Google Photos, for instance, uploads your images and videos as you shoot them. Open the app, click your avatar, and go to Photos Settings > Backup > Mobile Data Usage. You can now set “No data” to only ever use Wi-Fi for backups, choose a limit for how much mobile data to use, and decide whether to include videos in this.
Cloud apps like Google Drive or Dropbox have similar options. They’ll often be enabled by default, but it’s worth delving into the settings to check. Likewise, podcast apps. These tend to download new episodes automatically, and you can set them to do so only on Wi-Fi.
You can also restrict app updates to just Wi-Fi. Open the Play Store, click your avatar, then go to Settings > Network Preferences. Now, choose whether you want new app downloads, auto-updates, and auto-play videos in the Store to use mobile data or just Wi-Fi.
You can find out which apps use the most mobile data by going to Settings > SIMs, then tapping your provider name. Select App Data Usage to see how much they used in the last month.
3 Use Streaming Apps in Offline Mode
While certain apps that do most of their work in the background can be safely limited to Wi-Fi, streaming apps and others burn through a lot of data while you’re actively using them.
For these apps, check if they have an offline mode where you can download whatever you need in advance.
Most streaming apps will offer this. In Spotify, connect to Wi-Fi, then find the playlists you want offline. Long-press on each of them and select “Download” from the menu that opens. Next time you play those playlists, the app will use the downloaded versions. On the Your Library page, hit the “Downloaded” button to see which playlists you’ve got available offline.
On Netflix, you can download the latest episode of your favorite show to watch on your morning commute. Just hit the big “Download” button or the downward arrow alongside episodes in a series to watch them offline. You can download it on YouTube, too, if you have a YouTube Premium account, along with most other streaming apps.
And it isn’t just streaming. You can download Google Maps over Wi-Fi. Tap your avatar in the top corner and select “Offline Maps.” You’ll see recommended maps for areas you regularly travel to, or you can select your own—perfect if you’re going on vacation.
4 Reduce Streaming Quality
If you can’t access your content offline—or you forget to download it in advance—you can lower the streaming quality to reduce the amount of mobile data you use.
In Spotify, for example, go into the settings and select Media Quality. You can set the Cellular Streaming Quality for both audio and video—the lower they are, the less data you’ll use. You might need to experiment to see which level you’re happy with, and the extent to which you’ll even notice the difference depends on your headphones.
In YouTube, open the settings, go to Video Quality Preferences, and enable the “Data Saver” option. You can do a similar thing on Netflix, Disney+, TikTok, WhatsApp, and many other apps that involve media.
5 Stop Certain Apps From Using Data in the Background
Following the tips so far should save you a good amount of data. But you can be even more proactive in minimizing data use without having to change how you use your phone.
The first way is to prevent specific apps from using mobile data in the background.
These instructions are for a Pixel phone. Devices from other manufacturers, like Samsung, might have slightly different menu options, but the basic steps are the same.
Go to Settings > Apps > See All Apps and scroll down to find the app you want to limit. Tap the app name, select “Mobile Data Usage,” then toggle off “Background Data.” The app will work as normal when you’ve got it open, but won’t connect otherwise.
6 Enable Data Saver Mode on All but the Essential Apps
Alternatively, you can enable the Data Saver mode in Android to prevent all apps from using mobile data apart from those that you explicitly allow.
Go to Settings > Network and Internet > Data Saver. Toggle on “Use Data Saver,” then tap “Unrestricted Mobile Data” to select those apps you want to allow to use data. For the best results, only whitelist the absolute essentials. That includes messaging apps so that you don’t miss important notifications.
7 Set Up a Data Limit
Finally, make use of Android’s Data Limit tool to keep an eye on how much mobile data you’re using and to stop you from hitting or exceeding your allowance.
On a Pixel, go to Settings > Network and Internet > SIMs, then select your provider from the list. Now go to Data Warning and Limit.
Set Data Limit is where you add your monthly allowance. When you hit this, mobile data will be disabled on your phone for the rest of the month. You should set the Mobile Data Usage Cycle to the date when your plan resets each month.
You can also add a Data Warning to alert you if you get close to your limit. I set mine to around 10% less than my allowance.
If you haven’t got unlimited mobile data on your phone plan, you will need to keep an eye on how much you use each month. But you don’t want to have to spend too much time thinking about it, and you don’t want to have to change how you use your phone either.
What we’ve looked at here are mostly things you can set and forget. Spending a few minutes setting them up now should mean you keep your mobile data use under control and don’t risk either running out or getting hit with excess fees.
