Stop Overpaying For Mobile Wi-Fi With These 2 Simple Connection Tricks

A lot of people have a smart phone with a data plan, but this doesn’t always help if you have a Wi-Fi-only device such as an iPad that you want to connect to while you’re away from home. The solution is to find a mobile Wi-Fi (also referred to as mobile broadband) provider that can get you connected. You can choose to pay for a dongle or a hotspot device via a cell phone provider, or another answer is to use ‘tethering’ via your cell phone. There are pros and cons for both.

Hotspots and dongles

If you have a cell phone, you can add this on as an extra paid-for service. You buy a hotspot device and pay a monthly fee to the cell phone service provider. The advantage of this is that several devices can use the same hotspot connection. The major cell phone companies have a range of different plans. If you decide to buy a hotspot device, look at the battery life, and the speed. You can often save on the cost of buying the device if you sign up to a contract. Also, make sure the carrier you choose has decent coverage, otherwise you might have trouble connecting. The same applies if you want to buy a USB dongle.

Tethering

An alternative is to use your own smartphone’s cellular connection as a modem. This is called tethering. While this has its drawbacks – it’s slower, it uses battery life and it uses your phone’s data allowance - it can be a solution if you only need mobile Wi-Fi occasionally and don’t want to pay for a separate device. Make sure your provider doesn’t charge you for using your phone as a modem, as many networks do.