6 Reasons for Slow Mobile Internet Connection and How to Fix It

Tired of looking at your mobile phone while you wait for websites to load? If yes, maybe it's time to find out why your internet connection is so slow. There are many contributing factors to connectivity when using the Internet: it is not just about the type of your internet service provider, or the features of your smartphone - different issues can present various combinations of issues, causing trouble with your internet connection. Most commonly, internet connection speed is affected by types of Internet access, issues within your phone, or by external factors. Let's troubleshoot the reasons for slow internet connection!

6 Reasons for Slow Mobile Internet Connection and How to Fix It

1. Crowded Wifi Network

If you're not the only person using your WiFi network, you'll be sharing bandwidth. The pipeline between your devices and the internet is limited, and if a lot of devices try to send and receive a lot of data, they'll have to take turns. This will slow down the internet for everyone connected. For Wi-Fi networks, numerous connected devices can also lead to a slowdown, as the Wi-Fi communicates with each device in turn.

Fix/Solution: In order to get rid of this, you can use 'Portable Wifi Hotspot Manager' which can be downloaded on Play Store, to manage users connected on hotspot, or if your phone has One-time data limit feature which can limit the number of connected devices, these can be found under Settings > Portable hotspot.

2. Network Range and Physical Obstructions

One simple reason why you are experiencing unstable internet connection and may not be working as well as it should be is that you're not in a great spot to pick up a Wi-Fi signal. If you're far from the Wi-Fi router or have many walls, floors and lots of objects between your device and the router, you'll probably have a poor connection that can slow down your internet access. Stone, brick and concrete walls will especially interfere with your signal, as can any device giving off its own wireless signal, like a smart home device.

Fix/Solution: If you can carry your device somewhere else, this is an easy fix. Just place your device near the WiFi router.

3. Issue with Philippine ISP data plan along with speed

Sometimes, your internet is slow because you're only paying for slow internet. Log onto your provider's website may it be Globe, Smart, PLDT or Converge ICT, or give them a call thru their customer service hotline and find out what plan you have.

Fix/Solution: If you're just paying for slow internet, and the best way to speed it up will be to upgrade.

4. Local congestion or ISP throttling

Another reason you might be getting slow internet, and one that's not easy to do anything about, is simply that there are tons of people using up the bandwidth available to your neighborhood. The area you live in doesn't have an unlimited pipeline to the internet, and if a huge population is all on the internet at once, the congestion can slow down the internet. This probably won't happen often, but when it does, you're going to hate it. Regarding bandwidth throttling, Globe implements Fair Use Policy which slows down internet once 800mb a day was reached. Smart implements also a fair use policy on data usage, but instead of slow internet connection, once 800mb a day was reached, the SIM will be blocked from connection to the internet. To solve this, read how to unblock Smart SIM.

Fix/Solution: To monitor your data consumption and to avoid reaching the data cap of ISPs, these apps might come in handy:

For Android users, download Datally on Play Store. After installing, open Datally app > tap Daily Limit > set the amount you can use in a day > tap Set a daily limit.

For iOS users, download My Data Manager on Apple App Store. This app will help you monitor your data usage.

5. Bandwith hogging due to background process

It might not even be your neighbors that are stealing the bandwidth available to you. Let's face it, our phones and electronic devices do a lot of stuff behind the scenes that we don’t even realize is going on. Like auto updates and auto sync features which consumes data without the user knowing it.

Fix/Solution: If you’re browsing the internet while the automatic update is turned on, your browsing may be slower than usual. To fix the automatic update of apps is recommended to be turned off. You may also clean up the unnecessary tasks from the task manager to get more free RAM, just swipe rarely or unused apps from your recent apps.

See also, A Comprehensive Guide For Troubleshooting Android Device

6. Issues with DNS server

When you type an address into your browser, like google.com, your phone uses something called DNS to look up and translate that into a phone-friendly IP address. Sometimes, though, the servers your phone uses to look up that information can have issues, or go down entirely. If your default DNS servers aren't having problems, then you probably won't find too much of an improvement with an alternative server—but it might speed up your browsing by a few milliseconds, at least.

Fix/Solution: While there was no exact solution when you experience DNS problem with your ISP, using a VPN (Virtual Private Network) might be a help to make your internet connection more stable.

What can you say about these tips on how to solve slow internet connection? Let us know your thoughts by leaving your comment below.

Thanks for reading!

Credits: miui