Why Is My Data So Slow? (And How To Fix It)

The last thing you want when you’re out and about and need to look something up is that pesky circle spinning in endless circles. Or you’re trying to text someone and you see the bar load to where it’s almosttt fully sent but it never quite manages to get there and you end up needing to find a spot with wifi. If these two scenarios sound at all familiar to you then you may be interested in answering the question: “why is my data so slow?”

With slower speeds you’ll have trouble doing a bunch of different activities on your phone that you’d normally have no issue with like surfing the web, sending a text, emailing someone, browsing social media, watching an episode from your favorite TV show while you wait for the bus, downloading apps, streaming music, and more. It’s safe to say that having slow data sucks and unfortunately there isn’t just one reason as to why this happens to thousands of people with cell phones. There’s actually a few different reasons and today we’re here to discuss them and give you the solutions! 

Yes you’ve read that right, there are solutions to your slow data problems and hopefully with a few different steps we can get your phone back in proper working fashion- along with giving you the deets on why your data is so slow in the first place!

• Why is my data so slow?
• Mini Deep-Dive: Data Deprioritization and Throttling
• Our Solutions to Slow Data

Why is my data so slow?

The main crux of why we’re here today is to break down why your data is so slow and it turns out that instead of there being one “end all be all” reason, there’s actually multiple different reasons as to why data can slow down so much. 

Let’s chart these reasons out for you so you can be in the know next time you might be experiencing interruptions in your regular data speeds:

The “Green” Reasons

You may be asking what “green” reasons mean and that is our way to describe reasons for things that can be fixed with a few simple changes, nothing too involved and it may become obvious after you read it, but you might not have thought of it in the moment because slow data can cause p a n i c. 

Poor Connection(s)

The most annoying problems can have the easiest solutions and that’s why we listed poor connection at the top of the “easy reason” list. When you’re out and about in areas that you might not have frequented in the past your phone could be far enough away from cell towers that your normal “5G” or “4G LTE” icon you see at the top of your phone screen might not be there. In fact you might only see one or two bars or the dreaded “No Signal” icon. With poor connection you won’t be able to search and browse with speeds you're used to- but as soon as you move into a more urban area or go back to somewhere you know you get reliable signal your data speeds will go back to normal. 

• As a bonus fact, even if you’re out and connected to public wifi you still might not get the speeds you would normally get at home and that’s because public wifi spots have a bunch of other devices connected to them which would cause the wifi to not be as strong as your used to.

Outdated Technology

It’s not you, it’s your phone. As technology continues to climb higher and higher every year it seems as though we blink and the next five models of “improved” phones are out and the one you’re holding in your hand is a few models too late. App developers and online browsers will update to stay with the current tech- meaning that your phone may just not be able to handle the level of browsing and processing power that a newer model would. If getting a new phone isn’t an option for you then you should go through your apps and delete the “heavy duty” ones, the ones that cause the most battery power to drain or that cause the most data usage. Deleting excess photos and videos might also help some.

Low Tier Cell Phone Plan

If you’ve been with your current wireless company for a long time and you begin to notice slower data speeds then you might need to check your current cell phone plan as your past habits may not account for your new ones. You might have recently begun to use your phone’s data more and more and your current cell phone plan, say a lower tier cell phone plan, might not fit with your most recent data use. The big three wireless companies, Verizon, AT&T, and T-Mobile’s postpaid plans are all “unlimited” which may be a bigger upgrade if you’re currently paying for a prepaid limited data plan or are signed up with a MVNO. 

• MVNO stands for Mobile Virtual Network Operator and it’s essentially describing a smaller cell phone company, companies like Boost Mobile, Mint Mobile, Tracfone, etc, and they are typically all under the three umbrellas of Verizon, AT&T, and T-Mobile. These smaller wireless companies don’t own their own cell towers, while the big three do, so to save money and to offer customers better deals that will fit many styles of budgets, MVNOs will buy “data in bulk” - that’s where you’ll see those cheaper prices come from. (But if you are signed up through a MVNO you may also be experiencing data deprioritization and/or throttling which we will cover in detail soon don’t worry). 

New heavy data users may have to “tier-up” and switch to an unlimited plan or one with a bigger data allotment for the month.

Too Many Tabs!!

When you open a program on your phone and don’t close it properly your phone is still running that app in the background. It’s taking away from some of the processing power that could be going to the app you’re currently using. We forget to close out our old tabs quite frequently so we get that you may forget too and that could be a potential reason as to why you’re experiencing slower data speeds. Make sure to swipe out of those extra tabs and apps so as to not overload your phone with background activity. 

If you want to compare and contrast Verizon, AT&T, T-Mobile, or any wireless carrier to over 1,200 other phone plans so you know you’re getting the service that’s right for you, then make sure to check out the REALLY compare page which allows you to look at pricing, coverage, what phone plans are available, current deals and steals, and how you can make the most of your potential phone bill.

The “Orange” Reasons

Our “orange” reasons are explaining the middle-ground, the reasons that you might not have thought of when you’re trying to figure out why your data is so slow. These might not even be known as potential problems in the first place, especially to the average Joe. But fear not, we’ve got the map laid out for you:

Network Congestion

Network congestion, it sounds like your network is “stuffed up” from a cold and that’s sort of what’s happening to it but instead of mucus it’s devices. A wireless network isn’t unlimited, not really, it involves a certain amount of bandwidth and when that bandwidth becomes overloaded with a large amount of devices being used all at once then the network will become congested and during those peak times it will then slow down data speeds to manage the over-index of signals trying to go through. 

Peak times of network congestion normally happen in the morning and evening. Think about how often you wake up and then check your phone, then think about all the millions of people doing the exact same thing. And when it’s evening time and everyones getting home from work? The next few hours will probably be spent browsing through TikTok, gaming, or calling their friends for a tea session. So if you notice a pattern to your slow data speeds it may be because the network is congested and if you wait a little bit it should clear up soon- just like a cold!

Your Data Wants to Roam

“Data roaming” – a term that you might have heard in passing but never paid too much attention to, well now's the time to bring out the pens and paper as it could be the reason your data is slow. Data roaming is when your data searches for, or “roams,” looking for a new cell tower to connect to when you’ve left the range of your previous one. There aren’t cell towers covering every square inch of the world, if that happened we’d have strong signals everywhere, but instead when you leave the cell towers range your data will roam to find the next closest connection and while it’s doing this your speeds will be slower. And the next closest connection might not be from your wireless network, it can be from another, and while you’re connected to another’s service’s cell tower your speeds won’t be as fast as they would be if you were connected to your own. 

• Fun Fact: Verizon, AT&T, and T-Mobile have “roaming agreements” which means that they have all agreed to help cover those who are out of the range of their current cell towers.

For example: Person V is a Verizon customer and they are out in the city and getting coverage from a Verizon cell tower. But then they move out of range and the closest cell tower to them is a cell tower from AT&T, Person V will still get phone signal and data but it isn’t from Verizon- it’s from AT&T. That means they will experience slower speeds until they are back under their “own” cell tower.

(You can turn this off, which we will go over when we talk about solutions).

The “Red” Reasons

Now we’ve come to our “red” reasons, the ones that might cause the most headaches or the most setting changes if these are indeed why your data is so slow.

Gotta Clear Your Cache

When you’re searching something on your phone, say Youtube.com for example, if you are a frequent visitor of the mega popular music sharing website then you’ll notice that when you type in the first two letters of Youtube, “yo-”, it’s showing in the drop down or filling out the rest of the web address with the full name. That’s all because of your cache, just like computers will store “cookies,” your phone is storing your cache. It’s a useful tool to have as it remembers your previous searches and you don’t have to retype or re-sign into websites you’re a repeat visitor of. But just like having too many photos or apps on your phone causes your storage space to dwindle, your cache can get full too and that can cause some data problems. That’s why you have to clear your cache, which we will go over in our “solutions” section.  

Reset Network Settings

As we said before, it’s not you, it’s your phone's fault, and this time it’s because of its network settings. Network settings are the wifi network(s) your phone will store and remember so the next time you visit a place with a wifi spot that you’ve connected to before, your phone will automatically connect to it. It also stores your bluetooth connections so you can turn on your wireless headphones, they connect within a few seconds, and you can get on with listening to your music. It’s definitely a useful tool to have, but like with anything, a network’s settings can get messed up, which means you’ll have to reset your network settings which we will also cover in our “solutions” section. 

Mini Deep-Dive: Data Deprioritization and Throttling

There are two more reasons as to why your data might be so slow and they are data deprioritization and throttling. 

Data deprioritization is the temporary slowing of your data speeds in order to give priority to other customers. This might be because of network congestion, or because you are in a “high-traffic” area like a concert hall or sports stadium. If the network has so many signals racing through, said network will prioritize higher paying customers and it will deprioritize lower paying ones for a select amount of time.

Throttling is when your data is dramatically slowed to the point where it’s almost unusable. Your data speeds can get throttled if you’ve used over your data allotment for the month, (like if you’re signed up for “30GBs” of data for the month and you go over 30), instead of overage fees your data will just slow down almost completely instead. Your speeds will be throttled until the start of your next billing cycle.

To learn more about data deprioritization and throttling check out our related article: Deprioritization vs Throttling: The Key Differences

Our Solutions to Slow Data

Now that we’ve covered the “why” it’s time to talk solutions:

How to turn off “data roaming”

• For iPhone Users:

1. Go to ‘Settings’ and click on it
2. Click ‘Cellular’
3. Towards the top of the screen you’ll see ‘Cellular Data Options’ – click that
4. There will then be a ‘Data Roaming’ toggle feature, switch that off

• For Android Users- (it’s good to note that not all Android devices are the same so these settings may seem different on your phone model):

1. Go to ‘Settings’ and click on it
2. Then find ‘Connections’ and click on it
3. You’ll see ‘Mobile Networks’ – click on that
4. Just like iPhone/IOS users, there will then be a ‘Data Roaming’ toggle feature, switch that off

How to “clear your cache”

• For iPhone Users:

1. Go to ‘Settings’ and click on it
2. Scroll down until you see ‘Safari’ – click on it
3. Then scroll down again and find ‘Clear History and Website Data’ – click on it

• For Android Users- you’ll need to clear the cache of a particular app one-by-one if you use multiple apps that collect your cache:

1. Go to ‘Settings’ and click on it
2. Either find and click on ‘Storage’ or ‘Apps’
3. You will then see a list of apps, click on a frequently used app like ‘Chrome’ and then click on the ‘Clear Cache’ option, not the storage or app itself- (you don’t want to accidentally clear out all your storage on the app as that will essentially “factory reset” it)

Reset Network Settings

As we mentioned above, resetting your network settings will remove previously saved wifi networks and bluetooth devices so you will need to re-enter those passwords and re-connect those bluetooth devices again. 

• For iPhone Users:

1. Go to ‘Settings’ and click on it
2. Click on ‘General’
3. Scroll down until you see ‘Reset’ – click on that
4. A pop-up will appear with a few options, click on ‘Reset Network Settings’
5. Confirm your password and click on ‘Reset Network Settings’ to begin

• For Android Users- (again this path might be different for your Android device as not every version, make, or model is the same in the world of Android):

1. Go to ‘Settings’ and click on it
2. Find ‘System’ or ‘General Management’ – click on it
3. Click on ‘Advanced’
4. Find either ‘Reset Options’ or ‘Reset Network Settings’ – click on that
5. You’ll either be prompted to then click on a setting called ‘Reset Wi-Fi, Mobile, & Bluetooth’ or you’ll be presented with a “reset settings” confirmation, click on it

Hopefully we’ve answered the question of why your data is so slow and have given you an insight into the wondrous world of cell phone usage. Making sure you’re up-to-date on currency technology “lingo” is a great way to stay ahead of any potential data speed problems.