How iOS 9’s Wi-Fi Assist Actually Works

If you’re playing music on Spotify and you’ve got WiFi Assist on, it’s not going to use all your data streaming the song.

Both these users faced issues with iCloud while setting up their phones, as iCloud Photo syncing (obviously) uses iCloud, and so does a settings and data restore (if you backup to iCloud).

Apple has created a support page to lay out exactly how Wi-Fi Assist works and when it doesn’t.

One of the less talked about new features introduced in iOS 9 last month is called “Wi-Fi Assist”, which automatically switches a user’s iPhone to a cellular data connection when the local Wi-Fi isn’t reliable.

However when the feature was launched, there was a brief moment of concern that WiFi Assist might be too sensitive and that it could end up consuming more data than users would like.

But a few iPhone users claim that WiFi Assist isn’t as “smart” as Apple says it is.

This means that you will consume data out of your cellular data plan, and if you don’t have an unlimited data plan, you will have to pay for the extra traffic out of your own pocket.

WiFi Assist only works when you have apps running in the foreground and doesn’t activate with background downloading of content.

WiFi Assist doesn’t activate with a few third-party apps that stream audio or video, or download attachments, like an email app, as they might use large amounts of data. Pipes also ships with a clever Recommendation Engine that recommends interests, articles, and other data “that is curated just for you”. Either way, you can turn it off if you want to under Settings Cellular.

If you follow any of these tips, you should have no problem keeping your phone bill under control and you might also start to consider Apple’s decision to enable the controversial Wi-Fi Assist feature by default in iOS 9 as a good one.

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Phin uses an example every smartphone user is intimately familiar with: you hand someone your phone to let them look at a picture and nearly immediately they start swiping around to look at other pictures – often pictures you never intended for them to see.