What Does Background App Refresh Actually Do on iPhone?

When you’re trying to improve your iPhone’s battery life or use less data, one of the first settings you’ll likely check is background app refresh. It’s much easier to know what your active app is doing compared to dozens of apps running in the background, which is why this control exists.

But what does this feature actually control and when should you turn it off? As with many phone features, the answer is a question of balance. You probably don’t want to disable background app refresh completely, but you should configure it to avoid wasting resources.

During the visit Settings > General > Background app refreshyou will see the explanation of this feature: “Allows applications to refresh their content… in the background.” Although it’s vague, Apple’s support page on app switching provides a little more information on how apps enter a “suspended state” shortly after you stop using them. Combined with evidence of real-world use, this gives us enough material to work with.

Background app refresh allows apps to retrieve new information from the Internet, even when you’re not actively using them. We know this is internet-only activity since the Settings page has an option to choose whether it works on cellular data or Wi-Fi only. The setting has many uses, such as:

• Weather apps can update your location and retrieve the latest report as you move.
• Cloud tools like Google Photos and OneDrive can sync files and back up your photos.
• Podcast apps will download new episodes of shows (if you’ve set them to do so).
• Social media apps can pull new posts so you don’t see content from a few hours ago when opening them.
• News apps can offer the latest news ready for broadcast.

What almost all of them have in common is preloading content so you don’t have to wait for an update when you open the app.

It’s convenient not to have to open apps to keep them updated, especially if you have a lot of them on your phone. For example, it’s annoying to open your podcast app on the bus, only to find that the latest episode hasn’t downloaded as expected.

But you probably don’t need an automatic update for every app on your phone. And luckily, it’s a granular option. Visit Settings > General > Background app refresh to review its configuration. Faucet Background app refresh at the top to choose if it works on Wi-Fi and cellular data or only on Wi-Fi (good for saving carrier data). You can also disable background refresh completely by choosing Disabled.

Otherwise, here you will see a list of (almost) all the apps on your phone. Although they can all be enabled by default, many apps don’t need this permission. It’s a good idea to keep background refreshing for any apps you use regularly or rely on for real-time information. I recommend leaving it enabled for apps dealing with travel, navigation, file syncing, reminders, productivity, etc.

Conversely, background refreshes are not necessary for dining or shopping apps, most games, or apps for browsing websites (like Wikipedia or IMDb). If you barely open it, you probably don’t need regular updates of its contents.

When disabling apps here, be aware that disabling background app refresh does not remove notifications. Even if an app isn’t fetching new data in the background, it will still show notifications as long as you have them enabled and they aren’t blocked by a Focus. In most cases, disabling an app’s background refresh will, at worst, force you to wait a few seconds for new data to load. If you’re not sure, try turning it off and see how the experience changes.

When you enable Low Power Mode on your phone (accessible through Control Center), background refreshing for all apps is turned off. This makes a great secondary option when you generally want apps to fetch data in the background, while still having a preservation method for those times when maximum battery life is paramount.

If you ever notice that an app is constantly using too much data, you can prevent it from using mobile data entirely, not just in the background. Head to Settings > Cellular and press Show all under the Cellular data list of applications. Turn off the slider for any app and it will only connect to the Internet via Wi-Fi.

This menu also shows the amount of data used by applications in the “Current period“, which isn’t very useful since the “period” only changes when you reset it manually. Scroll to the bottom of the page Cellular page and press Reset statisticsthen use your phone for a while to get an idea of ​​typical consumption.

Finally, a per-network toggle can be useful here. Visit Settings > Cellular and tap your mobile operator if multiple SIM cards are installed. Then choose Data Mode > Low Data Mode to limit background activities so that only active applications can use the network. Apple Support has a list of activities that change in this mode, if you’re curious. You can do the same for a Wi-Fi network (important when using a mobile hotspot) under Settings > Wi-Fi. Tap the network name followed by I icon next to it, then activate the icon Low data mode cursor.

With a combination of background app refresh to prevent activities you definitely don’t need and other modes to save battery and data when the situation calls for it, you can avoid unwanted work in the background.