If the data plan used to surf the internet on a mobile phone is limited or we notice that some apps "download too much" when we are away from home, it is worth saving as much data traffic as possible for when we have to send an important message, especially if we go to the abroad / where we may have severe limitations on the amount of data we can use). On an Android smartphone there are many applications that remain running in the background and consume data, without us realizing it.
In this guide we will show you how to reduce the data consumption of the Android app and we will show you the necessary steps to prevent applications from using the data connection, so that they can only download when we are connected in Wi-Fi.
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1) Limit the use of data with Android
To impose a limit to one or more apps on the mobile connection, we can take advantage of a feature integrated in Android by many versions and little known to users, which allows you to choose which type of connection the app must use to connect to the Internet.
Basically the app will use both connections (Wi-Fi and Data), but we can set it to use only the Wi-Fi connection and completely ignore the data connection (when we are in LTE or 3G, the app will be not connected) .
to activate this limitation, go to the Settings app and open the App menu (or Applications, depending on the smartphone manufacturer in our possession).
In the list of apps that will appear, we identify the app that we intend to block, then click on it to open the advanced settings.
Among them we will have to find the item Limit the use of data or Limit data connection (depending on the manufacturer); let's open it and block access to the data line by removing the checkmark under the item Mobile data .
When finished, click OK to confirm the change.
From now on, the app will no longer be able to access the Internet using your mobile connection, but will be able to connect using Wi-Fi.
No type of app is required to do this, the Android system already provides everything necessary to meet our data limitation needs.
2) Limit the use of data in the background and on hotspot networks
In another Android menu it is possible to extend the limitation by requiring apps to download data only when they are in the foreground (i.e. full screen), while if they are placed in the background they cannot download anything until the user reports them in first floor.
To do this, simply open the Settings app, then open the Data usage menu.
The card is divided into two cards, one for consumption under data network and the other for consumption under Wi-Fi.
Let's go to the consumption tab under data network to get the list of applications that have downloaded data from the internet through it .
For each app you can touch to see the detail of the data used in the foreground and in the background.
In the tab of each app there are also the various options to limit the data and you can remove the check mark under Data in the background, so as not to allow the app to download data without our knowledge when it is not in the foreground.
This option can be set on all the apps that you don't want to be always perfectly synchronized and that don't have to send annoying notifications.
If we connect to the Internet using a portable Wi-Fi modem with an LTE network or if we connect through a hotspot network with limited data, we can make sure that that Wi-Fi network is treated as a mobile connection.
Just bring us back to the Data usage menu and click on the item Mobile hotspots, present in the list.
Click on the network name to disable constant synchronization: from now on the hotspot network will be treated as if it were a consumption connection, thus reducing data traffic.
3) App to check the data connection
If our Android smartphone does not have a data limitation system or we have not been able to find it, we can achieve the same result using free apps designed for the purpose.
Obviously the effectiveness of the block will be less (nothing beats the implementation at the operating system level), but for the most desperate cases we can still limit the use of the Internet by some apps without having to go crazy.
The best apps for the purpose are listed below.
- My Data Manager : a good free app that can show us the consumption of data on the LTE or 3G network by all the apps, with the ability to block and set an alarm for those that consume too much bandwidth.
- GlassWire : this app works as a firewall and monitors the use of the data network by all the installed apps; very good to understand who is downloading the most data and to quickly block an app with too high data consumption.
In another article we described the other apps to check the internet traffic thresholds on Android and the remaining credit.
