Is there an app that will automatically turn off wifi when out and also automatically turn off 3g when home?

iOS or Android?

edit :: I guess I should include Windows phone too.. LOL.

Android

Every device I’ve ever seen turns off the 3G when the wifi is connected, so I am a bit curious what weird-tech device you have that needs an app for that.

My wife leaves her wifi on all the time, and it automatically connects to our home LAN whenever she is in range. It took no real configuration other than entering the password for our home LAN and telling it to disregard open (and therefore untrusted) networks.

Wi-Fi Matic does that.

I am a bit curious what weird-tech device you have that needs an app for that.

The requester also wants WiFi turned off when away from home

I was about to say tha it sounded dumb to me as switching the wifi card on and off takes a lot of battery power, as does having something open in the background, but since I read there was an app out that did that in @Vincentt‘s answer, I thought i’d check my assumption against the reviews.

Lo and behold:

Jim Henderson
Does what it says but doesn’t help
Well as an IT director I tried this app on 4 different phones and it worked flawlessly on all. However over the 2 week test every user reported the battery dying much quicker than just leaving WiFi on 100% of the time, so evidently the theory of WiFi off except when connected to a network saving battery is incorrect. Tested on galaxy s4 and s5 HTC one m8 and LG Flex

So yeah, my doubts are confirmed, if you want that to work you’ll have to rely on your own brain and manual skills because having periodic checks burns more battery than it saves.

Edit: Wi-Fi Matic uses location tracking, not periodic wi-fi checks, so my assumption may yet be incorrect, as location tracking, especially GPS, is extremely battery intensive. Still, not a good app for what you’re looking for.

IFTTT allows you to create “Recipes” based on if/then statements, like “If i’m at home, then turn on wifi”.

If you want something more physical use an app like Trigger to create behaviors that you can trigger by tapping your phone on NFC sticker areas. You can buy 8 for $10 on Amazon.

@Thammuz It doesn’t use GPS, it uses cell towers. It’s a coarse way of determining your location, but more specific is not needed for this situation. It only checks once in a while (you can configure how often). That said, that’s only theoretical – having another app running and waking up once in a while to check your location (even using hardware that’s active anyway) might still be more power-hungry than having your wireless hardware active – I haven’t seen measurements.