Are you staying at a luxurious hotel during your vacations, but its Wi-Fi keeps disconnecting on your device?
In this article, we’ll discuss why you are experiencing this on your device during your visit and what steps you can take to troubleshoot the issue.
Why does my hotel Wi-Fi keep randomly disconnecting?
- You’re staying in a room that has no or poor Wi-Fi signal coverage.
- There’s an overload on Wi-Fi bandwidth due to too many connections.
- The Hotspot 2.0 Networks on Windows are interfering with the hotel’s Wi-Fi.
- The hotel has restricted Wi-Fi access time for the guests.
- Your device is configured to use the 2.4GHz Wi-Fi frequency band.
- Network settings on your device are corrupt or misconfigured.
How do I fix bad Wi-Fi in a hotel?
Look For Better Wi-Fi Signals
Hotel rooms that are located far away from where the router is installed often experience poor Wi-Fi coverage. For this reason, it reconnects every minute or so and makes you stay inconvenient.
This problem mostly occurs in those hotels that are using Wi-Fi extenders for better signal coverage.
The first thing you should do is to move out of the room, walk a little, and see if Wi-Fi signals improve. If yes, ask the management to switch your room to the one near the router’s location.
Wait and Reconnect
Your hotel may have put a limit on the network access time for each user. This gives everyone the chance to connect to their Wi-Fi without compromising the internet speed and bandwidth.
So, if you’ve surpassed the time limit, which is typically around 2-3 hours, your device will keep disconnecting from the internet connection.
The workaround here is to simply disconnect the Wi-Fi connection, wait for a couple of hours, and reconnect.
Try Connecting To Wi-Fi in Off-Peak Hours
Hotels often have too many guests connecting to the same Wi-Fi at once, which puts strain on the bandwidth and results in frequent disconnections. This is especially true during peak hours or when the hotel is heavily booked.
To prevent this from happening, try connecting your device to the hotel’s Wi-Fi during off-peak hours, typically at night and midday, and check if the issue recurs.
NOTE: Some hotels restrict the number of devices that can connect to the Wi-Fi at a time. So, if the maximum number of devices are already connected to the router, it may cause your device to disconnect from it.
Disable Hotspot 2.0 Networks on Computer
If you’ve enabled the Hotspot 2.0 Networks (new wireless standard for connecting to public Wi-Fi hotspots) option on your device, it may interfere with your hotel Wi-Fi, causing intermittent disconnections.
Therefore, it’s best to disable the Hotspot 2.0 Networks option with these instructions:
Windows Computer:
- Right-click the “Wi-Fi/Network” icon. (in the taskbar)
- Click “Open Network & Internet Settings.”
- Click “Wi-Fi.”
- Toggle off “Hotspot 2.0 Networks.”
Android:
- Open Android “Settings.”
- Tap “Connections” > “Wi-Fi.”
- Tap the three dots.
- Select “Advanced Settings.”
- Toggle off “Hotspot 2.0.”
iPhone:
- Open iPhone “Settings.”
- Tap “Wi-Fi.”
- Tap “Advanced” or “More.”
- Toggle of “Passpoint.”
Next up, reconnect your device to the hotel Wi-Fi and verify the fix.
Change Wi-Fi Frequency Band
Since the majority of Wi-Fi-enabled devices mostly use the 2.4GHz frequency band instead of 5GHz, they become more congested and lead to frequent disconnections, especially in a hotel.
If you are using a Windows computer, luckily, you can easily switch to the 5GHz frequency band by following these steps:
- Press “Win+X” (on the keyboard).
- Select “Device Manager.”
- Double-click “Network Adapters.”
- Right-click your internet adapter.
- Select “Properties.”
- Click “Advanced.”
- Click “Prefered Band.”
- Choose “Prefer 5 GHz Band.”
- Click “OK.”
Once you do that, reconnect your computer to the hotel Wi-Fi, and the issue won’t bother you anymore.
Reset the Network Settings
Sometimes, misconfigured network settings on your device may also cause the hotel Wi-Fi to malfunction on your device.
But don’t worry! You can fix this issue by resetting these network settings and restoring the default configurations. Here’s how:
Android:
- Open Android “Settings.”
- Go to “General Management” > “Reset.”
- Tap “Reset Network Settings.”
- Tap “Reset Settings.”
- Select “Reset” to confirm.
iPhone:
- Open iPhone “Settings.”
- Select “General.”
- Select “Transfer or Reset iPhone/iPad.”
- Choose “Reset.”
- Tap “Reset Network Settings.”
- Enter your device passcode.
- Tap “Reset.”
Windows Computer:
- Right-click the “Wi-Fi/Network” icon (in the taskbar).
- Click “Open Network and Internet Settings.”
- Choose “Status.”
- Select “Network Reset.”
- Select “Reset Now.”
- Click “Yes” to confirm.
Mac:
- Disable Wi-Fi on your Mac computer.
- Open “Finder.”
- Click “Go” (in the top menu).
- Choose “Go to Folder.”
- Enter “Library/Preferences/SystemConfiguration/” in the path bar.
- Click “Go.”
- Select the following files from the Finder window:
com.apple.airport.preferences.plist
com.apple.network.identification.plist or com.apple.network.eapolclient.configuration.plist
NetworkInterfaces.plist
Com.apple.wifi.message-tracer.plist
preferences.plist
- Make copies of these files and save them to another location.
- Select these files again.
- Click “Move to Bin.”
- Enter your Mac’s password.
- Click the Recycle Bin (in the dock).
- Click “Empty Bin.”
- Select “Empty Bin” again.
- Restart your Mac.
- Next, turn on Wi-Fi (the 5 files will be recreated), connect to the hotel Wi-Fi again, and hopefully, it won’t get disconnected now.
Conclusion
In this article, we’ve explored why hotel Wi-Fi keeps disconnecting on your device and also provided you with a set of solutions to get you back online fast during your stay.
If the problem persists, your hotel room may have a card with the guest’s Wi-Fi helpline number. So, try contacting the help desk via a call to report the frequent disconnection issues and get a more specified fix.
