When you are away from home, you need to make sure your iPhone connects to wi-fi networks to ensure that it’s getting backed up. This tip assumes that you have automatic backups to iCloud enabled. If you need help turning on this feature or checking to see if it’s on, then please refer to my previous tip, How To Backup Your iPhone or iPad.
Once you have turned on iCloud Backups then your iPhone or iPad will automatically backup to Apple’s iCloud servers daily if the following 3 conditions are met.
- Your iPhone is connected to a wireless, aka Wi-Fi, network
- Your iPhone’s battery is being charged
- Your iPhone is asleep. This means that the screen is dark and you’re not using it.
When you’re at home, these 3 conditions are typically met every day. However, when you travel you likely need to manually connect your iPhone to the Wi-Fi network in your hotel or wherever you’re staying. Please take the time to ask your hotel’s conceive or your host how to connect to the wireless network. Then, each night when you charge your iPhone’s battery, your iPhone should backup to the iCloud servers.
You can easily determine the date of the most recent iCloud backup by doing this.
Tap on Settings and then tap on your name, which is listed at the top. (This assumes you have iOS 10 or higher. If you’re using an earlier version then tap on Settings, scroll down to iCloud and tap on it.)
Tap on iCloud
Scroll to and tap on iCloud Backup
The date of the most recent backup will be listed.
You can, optionally, tap on Back Up Now if you’d like to manually initiate a backup.
If you found this article helpful, you might also like reading a previous tip about fixing common iPhone backup issues.