Wi-Fi calling is when your phone uses Wi-Fi to make calls over the mobile network in order to enhance connectivity, in case your network is weak in an area. Wi-Fi calling is a feature that is enable by your telecom provider.
It leverages the Wi-Fi in your phone to make calls clearer and smoother.
In India, all leading telecom providers like Airtel, Jio, and Vi provide Wi-Fi calling to their customers and as the feature is more common now, people are eager to know what it exactly does and how can you make Wi-Fi calls to a person sitting on the other side, since you are obviously not sharing the same network.
What is Wi-Fi Calling?
Wi-Fi calling is a feature that allows users to make and receive calls and texts over a Wi-Fi network instead of the mobile data, which can be unreliable in places with weak connectivity.
Your smartphone uses Wi-Fi networks to make calls instead of the telecom provider’s network.
Wi-Fi calling is usually activate from the telecom provider’s end automatically and users don’t generally need to do anything in their smartphones to activate Wi-Fi calling.
Is Wi-Fi Calling Consume more Data or Battery?
In terms of data, many Wi-Fi calling only uses your Wi-Fi network to make calls and no mobile data is used at all.
As per the Airtel, a 5-minute Wi-Fi call takes up about 5MB of data.
In terms of battery consumption, the consumption is also similar to normal calls as the smartphone is doing the same things, just over Wi-Fi instead of mobile network.
Cost of Wi-Fi Calling
Wi-Fi calling is activate from the end of your telecom provider automatically if they have the feature as part of their services.
It is a free service and users don’t have to pay anything extra for using Wi-Fi calling.
To check if your network provider ha Wi-Fi calling, you need to go into the settings of your smartphone.
For Android :
- Go to Settings
- Then go to Mobile Networks or Connections
- Lstly go to Wi-Fi
- See if Wi-Fi calling is visible or not.
For iPhone :
- Go to the settings
- Then go to Phone
- After that go to Mobile Data
- Lastly go to Wi-Fi calling.
- The option will only show if your provider supports Wi-Fi calling.
Quality of Wi-Fi Calling
Most cases, the call quality is equally good and at times, even better since bad connectivity is the problem Wi-Fi calling aims to solve.
But sometimes Wi-Fi calls take a while to connect to the other side and one has to switch their Wi-Fi off in order to let the call go though.
This is a minor issue that only emerges sometimes for some specific users and depends on many factors.
Other Features of Wi-Fi Calling
First and the foremost is the automatic activation from the telecom provider’s end.
User’s don’t need to do anything for activating Wi-Fi calling.
Telecom providers like Airtel, Jio, and Vi have activate Wi-Fi calling for all users automatically.
There are no sign-ups or registrations require for users to activate Wi-Fi calling on their smartphones.
