How to Fix Slow WiFi Hotspot and Tethering Speeds on Android and iPhone

You run a speed test on your phone and see 150 Mbps over 5G. Then you enable your hotspot, connect your laptop, run the same test — and get 18 Mbps. Something is clearly wrong, but the fix isn’t always obvious. Slow hotspot speeds aren’t always about your carrier or your data plan. Most of the time, the bottleneck is a setting you can change in under a minute.

Why Is My Hotspot Slower Than My Phone’s Data?

Your phone receives cellular data on one radio and re-broadcasts it as a WiFi signal using a completely separate radio. Each step in that chain introduces potential bottlenecks: the cellular signal strength, the WiFi frequency band the hotspot uses, the number of devices connected, and your carrier’s hotspot-specific throttling policies. Any one of these can cap your speeds well below what your phone itself can achieve.

Fix 1: Switch to 5 GHz (the Single Biggest Win)

By default, both iPhone and Android share hotspot data over the 2.4 GHz band for maximum device compatibility. The 2.4 GHz band is slower, more congested, and prone to interference from microwaves, baby monitors, and every neighboring WiFi network in range. Switching to 5 GHz typically doubles or triples real-world hotspot throughput on a clear connection.

On iPhone

Open Settings → Personal Hotspot. Turn off Maximize Compatibility. Your iPhone (12 or later) will now broadcast the hotspot on 5 GHz by default. Note: some older client devices (pre-2013 laptops, some budget Android tablets) can’t connect to 5 GHz, so only enable this if your connected device supports it.

On Android

Open Settings → Network & Internet → Hotspot & tethering → Wi-Fi hotspot. Find the AP Band or Compatibility option and switch from “2.4 GHz” (or “Extend Compatibility”) to 5 GHz. The exact menu label varies by manufacturer — Samsung may call it “Band” under Advanced settings, while stock Android labels it “AP Band.”

Fix 2: Disable Low Power Mode and Battery Saver

This is one of the most commonly overlooked causes. Both iOS Low Power Mode and Android Battery Saver actively reduce hotspot performance: they throttle CPU speed, limit background data, and can cap the hotspot radio’s transmit power to extend battery life. Always disable these modes before using your phone as a hotspot.

• iPhone: Settings → Battery → Low Power Mode → Off
• Android: Settings → Battery → Battery Saver → Off

Keep your phone plugged into a charger while tethering. Running the hotspot radio drains battery quickly, which causes the phone to auto-enable Battery Saver — which then throttles the hotspot. Plugging in prevents this spiral entirely.

Fix 3: Check Your Carrier’s Hotspot Data Allowance

Even “unlimited” plans almost always have a separate hotspot data bucket. A typical example: a plan with unlimited phone data but only 15–50 GB of high-speed hotspot data per month. Once you exhaust that bucket, carriers throttle hotspot speeds to 600 Kbps–3 Mbps — barely enough for basic web browsing, certainly not enough for video calls or large downloads.

Check your carrier’s app or account portal to see how much hotspot data you’ve used and how much remains. If you’re throttled, your only options are to wait for the billing cycle to reset, upgrade your plan, or use USB tethering (see Fix 6 below — some carriers don’t count USB tethering against the hotspot bucket, though this varies).

Fix 4: Improve Your Cellular Signal

Your hotspot speed is capped by the cellular connection coming into your phone. A phone showing one bar of LTE will deliver hotspot speeds in the single digits regardless of any other setting. Move to a window, step outside, or go to a higher floor to get a stronger signal before connecting devices. On 5G networks, be aware that mmWave 5G (the ultra-fast kind) has extremely limited indoor range — a few feet from a window is often all you get. Sub-6 GHz 5G and LTE are far more reliable indoors.

Fix 5: Limit the Number of Connected Devices

Your phone’s hotspot shares a single cellular data connection across every device attached to it. Every laptop, tablet, gaming console, or smart TV connected is splitting that bandwidth. Unlike a home router, a phone hotspot has no QoS or traffic prioritization — all devices compete equally. Disconnect any devices you’re not actively using and limit concurrent hotspot connections to 2–3 devices for best performance.

Fix 6: Use USB Tethering for Maximum Speed

USB tethering consistently outperforms WiFi hotspot speeds — often by 20–40% — because it eliminates the WiFi radio bottleneck entirely. Instead of phone → WiFi radio → air → laptop, data travels phone → USB cable → laptop. The connection is also more stable, with lower latency and zero interference.

To enable it: connect your phone to your laptop with a USB cable, then go to Settings → Hotspot & tethering → USB tethering (Android) or check that your Mac or Windows PC recognizes the iPhone as a network adapter after connecting via Lightning/USB-C. USB tethering is the best option for video calls or large file transfers when you need reliable throughput.

Fix 7: Close Background Apps on the Hotspot Phone

The phone sharing your hotspot is also consuming data for its own apps in the background: email syncing, app updates, iCloud or Google Photos uploads, social media refresh cycles. These background tasks directly reduce the bandwidth available to your connected devices. Before enabling your hotspot, close unused apps and pause automatic updates:

• iPhone: Settings → App Store → turn off Automatic Downloads and App Updates
• Android: Settings → Network & Internet → Data Saver → On (restricts background data for all apps)

Fix 8: Restart Both Devices and Reset Network Settings

If your hotspot speeds were fine previously but have recently degraded, a stale network state is often the cause. Start with a simple restart of both your phone and the device connecting to it. If speeds remain slow, try resetting your phone’s network settings:

• iPhone: Settings → General → Transfer or Reset iPhone → Reset → Reset Network Settings. This clears saved WiFi passwords, VPN configurations, and cellular settings, so note those before proceeding.
• Android: Settings → System → Reset Options → Reset Wi-Fi, Mobile & Bluetooth.

After a network reset, re-enable your hotspot and test speeds before reconnecting anything else to isolate whether the issue is resolved.

Quick Summary

For most users, three changes deliver the biggest immediate improvement: disable Low Power Mode, switch the hotspot to 5 GHz, and plug your phone into power while tethering. If speeds are still low after these steps, check your carrier portal for hotspot data throttling — that’s the one cause no amount of tweaking can work around until your billing cycle resets.

If you need to run a speed test to verify your hotspot performance, use our WiFi speed test tool from the connected laptop or device. Compare the result with a speed test run directly on your phone’s cellular data to quantify exactly how much overhead the hotspot chain is adding.