How to Tether a Jailbroken iPhone

After having tried it for myself having looked at forums and the like, I decided it was time to write up a better guide to tethering your jailbroken iPhone without needing to acquiesce to AT&T’s absurd “estimated $70 a month plans” for tethering.

For those who don’t know what I’m talking about, here’s a quick primer. Tethering a phone is exactly what it sounds like – passing a cable (physical or over-the-air) between your PC and your iPhone to be able to use the iPhone’s internet on the road or in case of an emergency through your PC. What you are essentially doing is transforming the iPhone into a router and modem and connecting it to your PC to use the internet on the go.

So, without further ado, let’s get started.

An iPhone (preferably 3G equipped, you don’t want to try to use Edge Internet on a PC, it’ll take you back to the modem days of the internet)

A PC or Laptop with at least one USB port and a Wi-Fi antenna (Internal works fine)

RedSn0w 0.8 (It’s the jailbreak application that’s now used to jailbreak iPhone 3.0)

PDANet (On the Cydia App, you’ll have to search for it)

PDANet Desktop (found at this link)

iPhone USB Cable

1. Every other guide out there will ask you to use the PDANet App as a Wi-Fi Router – don’t do this! The connection will be horrible and unreliable. It’s far, far easier to just use PDANet Desktop, which works on every version of Windows from XP to 7.

2. First, start off by jailbreaking your phone, there is an amazing guide here

3. Once the jailbreak is complete, download the PDANet Desktop Application to your PC and the PDANet App to your iPhone

4. Install PDANet Desktop on your PC, the process should be very simple

5. Go into the PDANet App on your iPhone and switch over to USB mode in the settings.

6. On the iPhone, disconnect from any Wi-Fi networks to use your 3G connection.

7. Open the PDANet app on your phone and leave it open

8. Go into the Taskbar application on your PC for PDANet and Right Click, then select “Connect”

9. A Prompt will appear telling you what’s happening and whether or not the connection went through

10. You’ll know the connection is good once you have the PDANet App on your iPhone reading back to you the number of bytes sent and received

11. As soon as everything is set up, open your browser on the PC and navigate to www.google.com

12. If Google manages to connect, you’re good to go

As cool as this application of the iPhone is, remember that with great power comes great responsibility – even though the iPhone’s data plan is “Unlimited”, there is a theoretical cap of about 5 GB per month that you can use due to the fact that you’re tethering. The whole area of tethering your phone is a bit murky, but thankfully, this work-around doesn’t involve letting AT&T know what you’re up to. However, that being said, I would exercise caution – only use this tethering program when it is ABSOLUTELY necessary and for WEB SURFING AND EMAIL ONLY! Start downloading too much and you too may find a $5000 bill coming into your mailbox.