Controlling data usage on Android is crucial to avoid suddenly finding yourself out of credit. These tricks can be of great help
One of the main problems for those who use their smartphones often, especially away from home, is running out of data for the Internet connection. Between social networks, videos, apps and games, it's very easy to use up the "Giga" of our monthly tariff plan in just a few days. Thanks to some tips and tricks we can save our data.
The first tip is also the most basic: we monitor the daily use of our data. In this way we will see how and through which applications we are consuming more data, and above all we will always know how many "Giga" we still have available for the Internet connection. This will allow us not to spend money in the middle of the month, or towards the end of the month, to ask our phone operator for new data. There are several ways to control our personal use of smartphone data.
The operator's app
The classic method, and also the easiest one, is to go to the web service of our phone operator or to the application. On the web, all we need to do is access the Personal Area of our operator's website, obviously using our credentials or registering if we have never logged in before. At this point in the area reserved for our offer and our number we will see the total amount of data still available. The process is the same even with the app. We go to Google Play Store and download the official application of our operator. Once logged in we will see all the information regarding the "Giga" for the Internet connection. This technique has limitations. For example, often the services offered by the operator do not inform us about the details, that is, how we have consumed, and in which days, our data.
From the phone settings
If we have an Android smartphone then we can also not install any application for data monitoring. These devices have a specific feature set by default. In almost all Android devices this feature can be found in Settings, then Wireless and Networks and finally Data Usage. We will also be able to set some settings, such as a daily or weekly data cap to be reached and monitored precisely.
Third-party apps
On Google Play Store there are plenty of apps designed to monitor data consumption, which can also be customized through widgets or specific settings. For example, with this system we will always be able to know exactly how much data Instagram has consumed in a month compared to Facebook, and so on. These services basically have two aspects to take into account. First, often the report they provide us is not the same as that of our operator. We're talking about minimal differences, but they could still report different numbers. Point two, they are apps that require a lot of permissions and have access to confidential information, so let's rely only on "safe" apps.
Data Saver on Android Nougat
If we have a smartphone running Android Nougat we can use a specific function to avoid excessive data consumption. Not surprisingly, it's called Data Saver. When we activate the function every connection service and every application will be blocked. You can also decide to exclude some applications from this block, but obviously in this case the function will not perform its task fully. A drastic method would be to activate Airplane Mode, which is present on all Android phones, if needed.