iPhone 3G + iOS 4.1 fixes slow speed and performance

Sep 9, 2010 - 18 Comments

iphone 3g There was a lot of speculation and hope that iOS 4.1 would help fix the dreadfully slow speed of iOS 4 on iPhone 3G. Well, it did. Having installed iOS 4.1 on an older iPhone 3G I can confirm that speed is significantly improved over iOS 4.0 and performance is noticeably better.

If you have a slow iPhone 3G running iOS 4, do yourself a favor and upgrade to iOS 4.1! You can download iOS 4.1 now and is highly recommended. To really get the most out of your older phone, combine the software update with disabling Spotlight and clearing out unused/old apps. This combination really does the most to boost performance of the 3G.

While iOS 4.1 is much faster than iOS 4.0, performance is still not as fast as iOS 3.1.3. If you still have an older OS version installed on your iPhone 3G and don’t want folders then I would say don’t bother upgrading at all, there simply aren’t that many essential features in iOS 4 that the 3G can really take advantage of anyway.

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Posted by: Paul Horowitz in iPhone, News

18 Comments

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  1. Shoaib says:

    Hi. please tell me which OS (Operating System) will be better for Iphone 3g??
    last night i upgraded it to 4.1 and My IPhone is Working slower :(
    please tell on which OS my (Operating System) Iphone wont get slow. or on which OS my Iphone Speed will be excellent.
    Thanks.
    waiting for Replay

  2. udumfux says:

    i can honestly say that iOS 3.1.3 is way faster and more stable then iOS 4.1 …I have a 3GS and I’ve ran all the new firmwares and I always jailbreak, I can’t stand the limitations and lack of customization options in the stock firmware… anyway other then folders and the sad excuse for multi-tasking in iOS 4+ that only bogs down my phone and lags it to hell don’t waste your time if u haven’t upgraded your firmware don’t and if u jailbreak your device be sure to save your SHSH blobs with tiny umbrella as apple doesn’t sign off on older firmware versions and makes it so you are unable to downgrade which u will want to do after a couple of days running the newer iOS :P

  3. Vidya Elluru says:

    Hi, I have upgraded my 3g phone from 4.0 to 4.1. But, it still functioning very slow and it takes longer time to open apps like, youtube, safari. Need your suggessions please.

    • Will says:

      Other than disabling Spotlight, your best bet is to wait for the iOS 4.2 update which is said to further improve iPhone 3G performance.

      On a related note, iOS 4.2 is expected to be the last software update for iPhone 3G, so hopefully it will perform well.

  4. John Cena says:

    The 3G is very slow with IOS 4.x. I think you should better keep it with 3.1.x versions. I had 2 3G to update to 4.0, but both of them were slow, so by using SHSH blobs I went back to the previous versions. I think similar with the 3GS thing though, it’s also not performing very good under 4.1 currently, I may think of going back to 3.1.3. Only the iphone 4 is performing exceptionally under IOS 4.1, but I hate the multitasking of the Apple, I think I will close it as soon as “Proswitcher” becomes available in 4.1

  5. Tim alton says:

    Well if your jailbroken on the iphone 3G you can have multitasking and wallpapers only if your willin to openssh some files. For exmaple on testing I found multitasking runs perfectly on iphone 3G with out background. But once added with the wallpaper background, the sluggish performance appears and you loose the speed. MY suggestion is once openssh delete anything begginning with Wallpaper in /System/Library/CoreServices/SpringBoard.app and it will fix all problems but ultimatly give you multitasking and wallpaper. Although you will loose that nice shadow effect but its a good trade off for performance but still have all the features

  6. […] iPod Touch users who are reluctant to upgrade due to known issues with iOS 4, rest assured that an upgrade to iOS 4.1 will help avoid the majority of these issues and will most importantly, allow you to get the best […]

  7. albo says:

    I will never forgive Apple for not warning all the 3G customers about this performance debacle. No 3G should ever have been upgraded without a very public disclosure of the consequences.

    This is what happens when one company gets so much market power — in this case, over the mobile market — and when the switching barriers are so high to go elsewhere.

    We have six iPhone’s in our household, but will be switching *everyone* over to google devices when our pathetic AT&T service contract expires.

  8. Candido says:

    I installed version 4 and I’m having problems with memory and battery, no open program, only shows MB free memory, and the battery this spending more, someone know what this happening?

  9. andre says:

    me too, cant text pics anymore

  10. Emma says:

    I updated my iPhone 3 to 4.1 but now I cant send picture messages. The camera icon has gone in the message app and when you go into the photo’s folder there isn’t an option to send a photo either. Anyone else having this problem?

  11. Merdo says:

    Last week updated my I Phone 3g from 4.0.2 to 4.1 and I lost all the recent call I can’t see any call missed or dialed or anything and living like that is really like hell any one face this problem please reply me I need help and no one has a solution…… :(

  12. Rod says:

    updated my iphone 3G to 4.0, then 4.0.2 and now 4.1. For 4.1 did the restore as recommended for best results. Now marginally better performance, but still much slower than before any updates. Calendar in List View comes up then goes completely blank and only comes back if I change calendar view to Day or Month and then go back to List. Still have delays launching apps and text message app. All Spotlight searches turned off. Very few apps on the phone. Only 10% of memory used. Very frustrating…

  13. Neerav Kothari says:

    it removed SMS searching atleast in 3G. i guess thats how they fixed the speed issue.

  14. Cadestantine says:

    just updated to 4.1 on my 3G. TONS better than 4.0.2! Can’t say if it is better than 3.1.3 was. It’s been a while since I’ve run that. I re-checked my Spotlight Search options and still seems to be working faster than 4.0.2. Maybe now I won’t have to use Dragon Search to find info online faster than my phone could find info stored in memory…

  15. Gary says:

    OS 4.1 also makes a BIG difference on my iPhone 3GS, it looks like they finally worked out the sluggish performance across the board.

  16. […] iOS 4.1 fixes iPhone 3G slow speed for the most part, I highly recommend installing this […]

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