Painfully slow iphone uploads for videos

[Ronburgandy]

So I have only ever really used Dropbox as a folder on my desktop computer.

However recently my other half (who is also a dropbox PLUS member) has enlighted me on how totally ineffective Dropbox is for using a phone to upload.

Firstly, when uploading you HAVE TO have the app open at all times whilst uploading otherwise the upload STOPS. So if this is a large file you can't do ANYTHING ELSE on your phone for the entire duration of the upload? How has this not been remedied? It's annoying as hell.

Which leads me to point 2...

She's been trying to upload a 45 minute video, and can't even get past the "preparing to upload" stage. It had said "preparing" for AN HOUR with nothing changing. I was adamant the app must have crashed, because surely the preparing stage could not take this long, so we force crashed it, and tried again.

No matter what we do, we cannot get past the preparing to upload stage. And even if we could, we'd then have to sit there with the phone open and screen lock turned off, so that the app didn't stop uploading.

This is so so rubbish. Why would any of these things not been sorted? I saw on a different post that an "accepted solution" was that a 1 hour video took TWO DAYS to upload! What the hell? How can that be an accepted solution?

Is this really what dropbox is like to use as purely a phone app? I'm relieved I've never had to use it in this way, but my partner is in tears just trying to use the stinking app to upload some work that she needs to share with someone. I thought Dropbox was the best name in the business for file sharing, but I'm starting to seriously doubt this now.

Should we be looking for another app to share work files? Or is there a fix we don't know about?

[Jay]

Hi @Ronburgandy, thanks for bringing this to our attention.

As a first step to see if the app is experiencing unusual behavior, they could try uninstalling the mobile app, rebooting the device, and re-installing it to see if this helps.

After that, we can look into there steps to take.

Keep me updated with any progress!

[RyanFromDropbox]

Hi there 👋 I'm a Product Manager at Dropbox, and I work on the mobile uploading experience. First, thanks for flagging this feedback with the team -- that sounds incredibly frustrating.

I'd love to get a bit more context on the issue you (and your better half) are facing, so I can troubleshoot with our team! 

To start, can you let me know:

1. In your iOS settings, is "Background App Refresh" enabled for Dropbox? (You can check this in Settings > General > Background App Refresh > scroll to Dropbox). This is the primary setting that lets Dropbox upload files while your app is closed.

2. Is the your phone on low power mode? (i.e., is the yellow battery bar showing?) This is another iOS factor that limits an app's ability to work "in the background."

3. Finally, do you experience this with all of your uploads -- or only files of a specific size/type?

When you get a chance, let me know -- and we can go from there!

Cheers,

Ryan