Track data usage per Wi-Fi network on Mac

Last updated: 21 July 2026

A single total for "data used" is almost meaningless when your networks play by different rules. Home fiber is unlimited; the office doesn't care; but your phone's hotspot bills by the gigabyte, the 5G router in the holiday rental has a monthly quota, and hotel Wi-Fi charges per day. What actually matters isn't how much your Mac used — it's how much it used on which network. macOS doesn't keep that ledger. Bytetally does.

Each Wi-Fi network has its own counter and its own budget, independent of the rest.

How per-network accounting works

Bytetally's macOS Network Extension attributes every connection to the app that made it — and books it against the network that was active at the time. Join the hotel Wi-Fi and everything transferred is recorded under that network's name; switch to your phone's hotspot and the accounting switches with you. Networks you've joined appear under Network & Quota, each with its own running total.

Two details keep those totals honest. First, traffic between devices on your own local network is excluded from the public-usage count — copying files to a NAS or streaming to a speaker doesn't inflate a metered network's number. Second, traffic that flows through a VPN or a local proxy (like ClashX) is traced back to the real originating app, so the per-network figure still tells you which app spent the budget, not just "the VPN did it".

One budget per network — because plans differ

The point of separating networks is that you can treat them differently:

1. The hotspot gets a strict weekly cap sized to your phone plan, with overage auto-response switched on — when it's spent, Bytetally blocks or throttles automatically. More on that scenario in monitoring hotspot data usage.
2. The metered LTE or 5G router gets a monthly cap matching the contract, with an 80% warning early enough to change behaviour before the month is lost.
3. Hotel or conference Wi-Fi gets a daily cap for the days you're there — useful when the venue bills per gigabyte or degrades speed past a threshold.
4. Home and office Wi-Fi get no cap at all. Unlimited networks shouldn't nag you.

Caps are independent, so a heavy day at home never eats into the hotspot's allowance. If you also want one overall ceiling for the Mac regardless of network, that exists too — see setting a data limit on your Mac.

Compare networks over time

With Pro history, the network becomes a filter on everything else. Query any date range and narrow it to a single Wi-Fi network: how much did the Mac really use across last week's trip on the hotel network? Which apps were the top consumers while tethered, versus at home? The hour-by-day heatmap shows when a given network gets hit hardest, and CSV/JSON export (minute, hour, day or month granularity) turns a metered network's records into something you can attach to an expense report. The full history story lives at network traffic history & heatmap.

Free vs Pro for per-network tracking

Pro features come with a free trial, then a subscription or a one-time lifetime purchase.

Set it up in five minutes

1. Install Bytetally from the Mac App Store and approve the Network Extension when macOS asks (Bytetally is fully sandboxed and App Store reviewed).
2. Use your Mac normally. Every Wi-Fi network you join appears under Network & Quota with its own counter.
3. Give each metered network a cap that matches its plan — and leave unlimited networks uncapped.
4. Keep the 80% and 100% alerts on for capped networks; add overage auto-response where a hard stop matters.
5. After a trip or a billing cycle, open history, filter by network, and see exactly where the gigabytes went.

Frequently asked questions

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