How to use your phone's internet (Android or iPhone) on PingArmor

If you’ve ever lost a gaming session because Wi-Fi died at the wrong moment, your phone can be your safety net. PingArmor uses your phone’s 4G/5G as a secondary connection — when the cable fails, game traffic moves to the phone in about 2 seconds. No DC.

This tutorial covers the four possible paths: USB tethering or Wi-Fi hotspot, on Android or iPhone.

USB tethering or Wi-Fi hotspot?

If you want a reliable safety net, prefer USB tethering. The cable delivers steady signal and charges the phone during the session. Wi-Fi hotspot works fine but quality depends on distance, walls, and interference.

Android — USB tethering

Works on any modern Android (Samsung, Motorola, Xiaomi, Google Pixel, etc). Menus may vary slightly — below is the stock Android path.

1. Plug the phone into the PC with a USB-C cable (or MicroUSB on older models)
2. On the phone, open Settings -> Network & internet
3. Tap Hotspot & tethering
4. Enable USB tethering
5. On Windows, a new “Ethernet” interface appears automatically — the driver comes straight from Android

Android — Wi-Fi hotspot

1. Go to Settings -> Network & internet -> Hotspot & tethering
2. Tap Wi-Fi hotspot
3. Set a name (SSID) and a password — write them down
4. Turn the hotspot on
5. On the PC, connect to the phone’s Wi-Fi like any other network

Prefer 5 GHz if your phone supports it — less interference, lower latency. Under Configure -> Wi-Fi band -> 5 GHz.

iPhone — USB tethering (Personal Hotspot)

iPhone needs two things on the PC before USB tethering works:

1. iTunes or Apple Devices installed on Windows — it provides the “Apple Mobile Device Ethernet” driver. Get it from the Microsoft Store (Apple Devices, free)
2. Trust the computer on the first connection

Then:

1. Plug the iPhone into the PC with a Lightning or USB-C cable
2. On the iPhone, tap Trust when it asks “Trust This Computer?”
3. Open Settings -> Personal Hotspot
4. Enable Allow Others to Join
5. On Windows, open Settings -> Network & Internet -> Ethernet — the iPhone shows up as a new interface

iPhone — Wi-Fi hotspot (Personal Hotspot)

Easiest path if you don’t want to install anything on the PC:

1. On the iPhone, open Settings -> Personal Hotspot
2. Enable Allow Others to Join
3. The Wi-Fi password is shown right below — write it down
4. On the PC, connect to the Wi-Fi network named after your iPhone

iPhone shuts the hotspot off after a few minutes with no clients connected, to save battery. If the iPhone screen locks and nobody is on it, the hotspot pauses. Keep the Personal Hotspot screen open during the gaming session, or at least check it’s connected before you start playing.

How to confirm Windows picked it up

Open PowerShell or CMD and run:

ipconfig

You should see a new interface:

• Android USB tethering: “Ethernet” with IP 192.168.42.x (Android default)
• iPhone USB tethering: “Ethernet 2” with IP 172.20.10.x (iPhone default)
• Wi-Fi hotspot (either OS): “Wi-Fi” with the phone network’s IP

If it shows up, PingArmor will automatically detect it and list it as a secondary interface — no manual setup.

How PingArmor uses your phone

The phone sits as the secondary (failover). PingArmor checks your primary connection every 750ms and switches to the phone if it sees:

• 3 consecutive gateway failures, or
• Latency above the threshold on the game servers

The switch takes around 2 seconds. The game’s TCP socket survives the switch because PingArmor keeps the WireGuard tunnel stable across both interfaces — to the game, the connection never dropped.

When the cable comes back, PingArmor does failback automatically after 15 seconds of stability. You go back to Wi-Fi/ethernet and the phone returns to standby.

How much mobile data does the phone use

Good news: very little — as long as the cable is the primary.

By design, PingArmor keeps the heavy routes (broad routes and CDN excludes) always on the primary. The secondary (phone) only carries failover traffic — when the primary actually drops. In normal sessions with no drops, the phone stays essentially idle.

You can track per-interface usage in the app — the dashboard breaks down bytes per interface, useful for spotting whether your phone is using more than you expect.

How to get started

1. Create a free account — 3-day trial, no credit card
2. Download PingArmor for Windows
3. Connect your phone via the method you picked (USB preferred)
4. Open the app, log in, click Connect
5. Play normally — if the cable drops, the phone takes over by itself

Check the full tutorial or read about how failover protects your game.