How to Track Your Internet Bandwidth Usage in Android, iPhone & PC

Did you ever try to track your Internet bandwidth usage? Yes, i am talking about the 3G, 2G network traffic which is being consumed in your mobile phones and computers. Technically, this term is called counting network traffic. Read more to know about network traffic and learn how to track it. You might have always thought of these kinds of services where they can track your network traffic and keep you in the limit of a broadband connection usage. This problem is more seen in people who use a limited Internet connection plan. We always search on how to track the data which has been consumed so far? We usually have a limited Internet pack in 3G dongles, 2G Dongles, Mobile Internet and few other Home based Internet providers. Mostly, people prefer a unlimited Internet plan to get more benefits in downloading the data. But 90% of us don’t know a simple fact that even a unlimited broadband plan will have a download limit. ISP’s like BEAM, TATA, Airtel, Reliance or any other will follow these same strategies to fill their pockets.

For example, BEAM cable provides 10MBS Plan for just Rs 1000/- and say it’s an Unlimited Internet connection plan. Did you ever ask them that, is this 10MBPS bandwidth limited to a particular data range? If not, their answer would be yes. As BEAM degrades the 10MBPS speed to 2MBPS after 30GB of data download. Not only BEAM, even Tata and other ISP’s follow the same strategy. So, now you might be thinking, how do i know the amount of data I am spending every day. And how much more is still left to utilize? To answer your queries, we are writing this article on how to track your consumed broadband usage. At the end of the article, you can perfectly know the amount of data consumed in your Internet broadband plans..

You might be observed many times that, Even though you are not using the Internet connection in your mobile or on PC, you will continuously see a increase in broadband usage and end up with data download limit very fast. The main reasons for this is, many applications in your Windows, Mac and Phone use a backend process to download the data from Internet and update automatically. This can be observed more in mobile phones. Reason is Smartphone’s use a lot of bandwidth to connect to social networking sites and download the data to your phone. They automatically link your profile to Facebook, Twitter and other apps once connected. So you will obviously see a drop in download limit and consume more internet bandwidth. To avoid these types of unwanted processes, we will use some applications in our article. These applications will solve your problems of using more bandwidth and alert with alarms at regular intervals.

How to Track your Internet data download limit in Mobile Android Phones:

If you are using an Android mobile, you should know about Onava Count App. No matter the phone is connected via 3G or 2G network, it can still monitor all the amount of data used so far. You can also see the Data Alert and Warning messages on the screen all the time. With this, you can see the amount of data spent on each session. If you feel any app is running in background and using a lot of unwanted bandwidth, you can just block it with Data hog blocking option. There are a lot of amazing options which will track your each and every step in a session. You can download Onava Count Application from Google Play for free of cost.

You can also find these same features in Mobile Counter App. This free app will track your data from any GSM, CDMA, Wifi networks. You can also know the number of applications running on home screen. You can track the amount of data being spent on these apps and limit them to your wish. You can download this application in Google Play for free.

How to Track your Internet data download limit in iPhone: 

If you are using a iPhone, there is no need to install any additional options. iPhone has a inbuilt option to track your mobile network data usage. This feature in iPhone is called Cellular Network Data Counter. You can change the settings to enable this feature.  Just go to Settings -> General -> Usage and Enable the Cellular Usage. With this, you can know the amount of data sent and received up to date. And if you are looking for a separate iPhone application with this feature, just go to iTunes and search for Data Usage Monitor or Click here. This free application will alert you when your plan limit is about to end. You can also know the area of location through which your network is accessed.

How to Track your Internet data download limit in a PC: 

If you are using a windows PC, then tracking your broadband connection is very simple. You an use a small application called, Networx. This application can also be used to track many computer’s data records within a single connection. For example, you will see Internet cafe’s with many systems, but the broadband connection of that network will be a  single connection. Also, you can track your data in form of tables, according to a day, week, month. You can check the records in form of graphs. You can also track the net speed time to time. Networx has a ability to find suspicious network activities. If there is any possibility of getting into a wrong network connection, Networx will warn you to be alert. Visit the Networx official site to download the application (look at the bottom left side panel of the site to download the application).

BitMeter OS is another similar application like Networx. This application was designed by Open Source community. The best part of this application is, you can find the broadband limit and data network usage in any browser window. Also you can import the data into a Microsoft Excel file and keep it as a record. You can also use this application in both Linux and MAC Operating systems. Just go through the Official site for more info and Click here to Download BitMeter OS.

How to Track your Internet data download limit in a Mac:

No need to worry if you are a Mac user. We got solutions for all platforms now. If you want to track your network data in a Mac, you need to install a application called, Surplus Meter.

Also there is another software for Mac to keep a track on your network data, its called the Menu Meters. Menu Meters will not only track your network data, but also can track your CPU usage, Disk memory usage, You can put a custom time to show the data download report when ever you use the Internet connection.

These were the most useful application and software’s to track your network data. Also we are giving few important tips on how to save your Internet data bandwidth and to avoid unwanted consumption of limited broadband network data.

Few Important Tips to Save Your Network Data Consumption:

1) Usually when you are on a video chat on 3G network, it costs 100MB to 300MB for 30minutes. So keep an eye on it when you have a limited internet connection. Its lot better to use a WI-Fi connectivity for this kind of data burning activities.

2) And if you are using YouTube to watch videos in live streaming, it costs 200MB bandwidth for a 1 hour video. It may also increase to 300MB, if the video is a high resolution one. So avoid more live streaming of videos. Especially when your connection is a limited one. If you are streaming live videos, make sure the resolution is set to low. You can find this option in the YouTube control bar while playing the video.

3) If you have a Tablet or iPad, then switch off your data services when you are not using them. Else you can also change the network from 3G to 2G if you are not active on the Tablet.

4) If you are using weather report apps, or automatic email sync apps, then data might be burnt very fast. So make sure you don’t install much of these apps. Most of install same type of applications for more than one time. Just the name differs, but all the features and options will be the same. So just install one app of its category.

5) Coming to PC, If you are playing a online video game in Internet, know the fact that it burns 100MB of data for just 1 hour.

6) Avoid using HD movies when watching a live match or a old film. If you are watching them in normal resolution, the data usage will be reduced to 55%.

7) Keep your Windows notifications off. Because, Windows will keep updating your PC for each and every second you use your PC. So just change the Automatic Updates to off.

8) Don’t open multiple tabs of similar pages in a browser. Most of open Facebook in 10 different tabs and check 10 different pages or groups or notifications. By doing this, you are burning the network data 10times faster than a normal use.

These are the most important tips to save your bandwidth and avoid unwanted networking data usage. If you have any queries or issues, please drop us a line. We would surely respond in an hour.