New to iPhone & Data Plans

[alifefulloflaug]

I bought an iPad in December and love it! I've become an Apple convert and yesterday my iPhone 4 arrived. We have Verizon as a carrier and I went with the 2 GB/month plan. I'm completely new to smartphones and data plans so I have lots of questions.

What tips do you have to keep my cellular data use at a minimum? I have wifi at home and at work, which are the two places I'm at most of the time, so that's a good thing. I don't want to go over the limit but yet I also want to take advantage of the data we are paying for.

I'd also love to hear about what apps you have on your iPhone that you just can't live without. Since I have an iPad also, I'm thinking that most of my game playing & so on will be done on the iPad. I would like I'll probably use the iPhone for more "productive" or "useful" type apps. Any ideas or tips?

Thanks!

 

[simply stunning]

As a new data user, as long as you arent streaming videos off wifi, I dont think you will come close to using the 2GB. My advice would be for your fist month use it how you want, and dont watch how much data you are using. Then at the end of the month take a look at it. I would bet that you don't use 1GB of that data. That is if your usage is anything like me. I work out of my office around town half the week, and keep up with emails/troll the forums and read news when I'm out without a thought to data usage, and I don't even come in at 1GB a month.

So, just to get a handle on how you use it, give it a try, and don't worry about it. If at the end of the month you see you have used 3/4 or 1/2 of the plan, just don't worry about it. If you have used rite up to, or more of your plan, then cut back a little.

As for apps, below is a list of what I use every day. Some are free others are paid. I'm not including the stock apps, although I use most of them daily.

Pandora
Podcasts (by Apple)
Audible
Google maps
Navigon
Ebay
Nest (need the thermostat to go with it, but love this!)
Capture (one click and it turns on your video camera. Then hit the home button to end the video)
Flashlight
Craigslist
Youtube
1 Password (LOVE this app! But really need it for the mac before it is really useful)
Skype
Kickstarter
Bible
Pulse (news app)
slick deals
domino's
My Ibidder (an ebay sniping app)
Retail me not
Yelp
Fly Delta
United
AppAdvice (app news)
Netflix
Hulu Plus
Flixter
Mint (finance app)
Paypal
Imuscle (great workout app)
Dropbox
TinyScan (PDFs from pictures)
Then plenty of games!

That is maybe a quarter of the apps I use, but most of the ones I use daily or at least on a very regular basis.

Good luck to you, and have fun!

 

[617aircav]

Very late to the party but wellcome. 2 gb of data is more than enough as long as you do not stream anything.

 

[Mrbobb]

According to your situation, you will stay well below the 2GB

 

[C DM]

Very late to the party but wellcome. 2 gb of data is more than enough as long as you do not stream anything.

Well, more like as long as you don't excessively stream something (and/or stream something very often).

 

[617aircav]

Well, more like as long as you don't excessively stream something (and/or stream something very often).

Excessive would be streaming a radio station all night. It's not enough for regular streaming, like to and from work 5 days a week.

 

[C DM]

Excessive would be streaming a radio station all night. It's not enough for regular streaming, like to and from work 5 days a week.

Depends on the commute and what's being streamed, at least to a good degree. I use streaming fairly regularly (although perhaps not every single weekday/day in general) and have rarely gone above 1.5 GB of usage in any given month in the past few years.

Also depends on what else you do with the phone, how often you do it, how often you are on WiFi, etc. Certainly can be different for different people and even at different times. But, you can definitely do streaming and still be just fine with 2 GB of data a month.