5 Ways You Can Improve Smartphone Reception at Home

A growing population of Americans now use smartphones as their primary means of connecting to the Internet. In fact, according to the Pew Research Center, 1 in 10 American adults go online on their smartphones and don’t have the traditional home broadband service even at home.

Despite this trend, we still experience annoying connectivity issues here and there. Some causes of poor cell phone signal include:

• Obstruction. Not only natural obstructions like mountains. Some construction materials at home cause varying degrees of interference with a cell phone signal.
  
• Proximity of home to cell phone towers. The farther you are located from a tower, the worse the reception
  
• Cell tower gets overwhelmed with traffic. When you are in a crowd and everyone uses their cell phones at once, the nearest cell tower gets overwhelmed. This leads to dropped calls, low quality calls, spotty reception, unreliable internet and inability to send text messages.
  

Surely there is a better way to improve smartphone reception other than standing on a chair with our phone held up, trying to catch a signal? Here are some tips to take note of.

Charge your smartphone battery.

Always charge your smartphone’s battery. When the battery power goes low, your phone finds it much more difficult to locate the signal since it is trying to conserve energy as much as possible. When your battery starts to run low, lower the screen brightness and stop any running apps you don’t need. To ensure that your mobile phone’s battery is always loaded, bring a power bank for easy charging.

Toggle the airplane mode ON/OFF.

If you are getting a no service on your phone, put it in airplane mode for a couple of seconds then put it back to normal mode. This can help refresh your phone’s signal reception by reconnecting to a closer tower.

Move up a floor.

If you’re living in the basement, the best way to improve cellular reception is to move up a floor. It’s challenging to get network signals when you’re on a lower ground as there are many potential obstructions underground.

Change network service provider.

Let’s face it, some cell phone network providers are not capable of reaching remote areas due to lack of cell sites and towers. Find out which network is strong in your area and make the switch. T-Mobile, Sprint, AT&T and Verizon have deals and promos for subscribers who are planning to move carriers.

Purchase a signal booster.

While you’re at it, you may also get a signal extender to help amplify your cell phone reception even more. Verizon tends to have more coverage in the US so getting a Verizon signal signal booster might be a good option. However, if you live near T-Mobile cell tower, you might have to reconsider and go for a T-mobile booster instead.