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The iPhone 5 is pretty good, and for most folks, its Wi-Fi is actually very good. It was in our tests. But a lot of people have been reporting in that the Wi-Fi is actually awful, and can’t hold a signal at all. After some digging, we might have found an answer.
First off, this isn’t the same issue as Wi-Fi data bleeding onto your carrier plan (though the two could certainly be related). This is people holding an iPhone 5 in one hand, and an iPhone 4S in another, and the 4S getting full Wi-Fi bars, and the iPhone 5 struggling to get keep even just one for a few seconds.
Head over to the iPhone 5 discussions on Apple’s boards, and you’ll see that this is a pretty common problem. But what has worked for some people is switching from WPA/WPA2 over to WEP.
WPA and WPA2 are newer encryption technologies than WEP, but they have a few more issues syncing on networks with older devices. If it’s an issue, the newer WPA-enabled devices are supposed to be able to automatically switch back and use WEP. It’s possible the iPhone 5 is having problems with that. You should be warned, though, that WEP is significantly less secure.
The switch to your router is relatively simple. You’ll need to access your Router gateway, which should be easily found through Google. For example, most Linksys routers are 192.168.1.1, while Western Digital routers can be accessed by simply typing “wprouter” into your URL bar. From there, just go to the Wireless and Security options, select WEP instead of WPA, and enter your new password. All done. Hopefully your Wi-Fi issues will be cleared up. Let us know if it works—or doesn’t—in the discussion below.
Thanks Lia!
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The apparently easier to use iPhone…..
Every single Apple product I have ever had has had a one time or another had wifi issues, my macs wifi drops out all the time various iPhones have had similar issues from one update to the next despite various ISP’s and wifi routers, It absolutely pisses me off especially when Apple use the tag line it just works.
I cannot believe after over 4 years + they haven’t got something as fundamental as Wifi working consistently. My guess is they’re either doing it on purpose to try and convince customers to by their wifi router (Big Mistake if thats the case) or the people at Apple responsible for wifi related code actually work for Google or Microsoft.
What annoys me more is that they expect users to jump through hoops experimenting with wifi settings as if its our fault, turning a supposedly simple to use device into a hacky nightmare. How to fix your iPhones crappy wifi sack the team at Apple responsible and make Apple sort it out !
I haven’t had any problems with any of my apple products, I use a time capsule and a airport extreme and my mac, ipad and iphones never seem to have wifi problems. I guess i am lucky
You have an Airport extreme well my first guess that Apple is trying to fleece customers who’ve already ponied up over 2K on Apple gadgets, out of another £80 to £400 may be correct. Whats the betting that if I was stupid enough to do that, then all my other gadgets wouldn’t play nice with it and Id have to eventually change all of those gadgets to equivalent Apple products too. Besides the fact IT SHOULD JUST WORK !!!! with the router/s I have, like ALL of my other non Apple gadgets do.
My chromebook works well with the apple stuff as does my HP laptop.. My PS3 and Xbox 360 my samsung tv and 3 ip cameras all go through the airport and have no problems, I guess I am the luckiest person alive. I must do the lottery this weekend.
Completely agree with this – have a couple of Airport Expresses around the house which have to be restarted about 30-40 times a year to deal with ‘glitches’, compared to the router upstairs which tends to be a once a year job when the people at the other end have their annual fiddle around.
my guess the problem with Apple wifi is a combination of laziness incompetence and greed, They basically make their own wifi routers and then instruct the teams responsible for coding the wifi on OSX and iOS to only test on Apple routers to save having to any real work, if it doesn’t work on other companies routers, who gives a fuck they can just blame the other company and hopefully a decent enough percentage will buy the Apple router in the vain hope that will fix the problem ie more cash for Apple.
The incompetence comes into play when they get some clueless dick to code a half hearted temporary fix once every 6 months to avoid an out and out riot on the Apple forums. Problem is people aren’t stupid and know via a basic process of elimination, that. all their other gadgets work with their router so the problem must lie with Apple and Im sure they must be losing more money through pissed off customers refusing to buy any more Apple products, than they make on airport express / extreme sales I know for one I will not buy another Apple product until they get this sorted out once and for all !
“Something something something…iPhone not good…something something something…”
Fucking hate my iPhone 5. I want to use my iPhone 4 again but it’s simlocked to ass network 3. Already on my fourth iphone 5. AHHHHHH.
just get it unlocked
contact 3 as your contract is up with them can they not supply the unlock code this video gives you the details
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TEOtyRaFY6c
Thanks mate! But I bought the iPhone factory sealed on eBay and Three said that because it wasn’t bought instore or on their website, they will not unlock it.
damn
is it jailbroken because you can do a jailbreak unlock
http://apcmag.com/unlock-your-iphone-4-to-use-it-on-any-network.htm
Yeah I tried that too. My baseband is too upgraded for a jailbreak right now
time to switch to android
go on i dare you to tell him you want to divorce him for Android
hahaha i thought i read husband and you were a woman lol then i read it in my English reading head on pmsl
HAHA. I came from Android to iOS…now after how disappointing the iPhone 5 is, I genuinely regret not getting an S3.
an s3 was my next upgrade, until the nexus 4 came out, i shall hold off till they bring a 32gb version out though,
Yeah there’s a lot of nice phones coming out now. I hate to say it being an iPhone loyalist the last few years, but Apple are losing it. I’ve had 3 iPhone 5′s now. 1 couldn’t receive calls and 2 had faulty screens. My fourth has developed the same fault as the previous 2 but I just don’t care enough any more to get it exchanged.
“What’s that Jimmy, your new iDevice doesn’t like more modern wiFi encryption methods? Well I know, rather than complaining to Apple, let’s compromise the security of our entire home network by switching to an encryption method that’s child’s play to hack into!”
WEP is outdated and has proven to be easily hackable plenty of times. If you do decide to switch to WEP just to accommodate the iPhone 5, then please for all that is good in the world also enable the MAC address whitelist feature/function in your router. That way you won’t be having any uninvited guests, with any luck.
This will also mean any invited guests will find it hard to connect to your wifi too, the decision’s yours!
That’d be my solution. Guests can whistle for their wifi.
I’d make them pay, much better for you than hearing them try to whistle.
WEP is not just ‘significantly less secure’, it is about as secure as a wet paper bag. You can crack WEP in minutes.
Anybody recommending swapping to WEP should be permanently barred from ever giving any advice on technology ever again.
WPA and WPA2 have been around for longer than Apple have been selling the iPhone, and if they can’t get their products to play nicely with an almost 10 year old industry standard they should be derided.
^^ Exactly my thoughts
Slightly ashamed to say that we, up until very recently, still had a router on WEP (in my defence back when we had it, about 5 years ago, I knew not a lot about computers – hence buying an Acer laptop with Nvidia graphics at the time lol) It’s only an old Belkin thing I used for testing devices that didn’t like connecting to our WPA2 11n VM Hub, and now I’ve upgraded it to WPA.
Shameful indeed. Go sit in the corner with a dunce’s cap on, boy!
so let me get this right
…
Its a feature then
…
depends on your perspective. It is if I want your bank details not so much if you want to keep your money.
hahaha
So, Giz’s solution to the problem of a fault with the iPhone is to compromise the security of anything connected to your Wifi? Not to complain to Apple and ask for a formal response, not to publish articles complaining about the problem and advising people to contact apple requesting a solution, not to suggest that people return the phone explaining that IT DOESN’T FUCKING WORK. No, apparently your Web security is less important than stopping using the iPhone 5. Anyone who follows this advice is a moron and the weak warnings given by the writer of this piece are giving me second thoughts about him too.
“Anyone who follows this advice is a moron”
I think that ship has sailed, they already own the phone
True in this specific case, but other people reading this who are having wifi problems might be tempted to follow the same advice, thus I am trying to be inclusive. I’m an equal opportunities insulter.
Step 1: Trade in your iphone for an android /troll
WOW … Kyle Wagner – you’re an idiot.
WEP, as many have commented upon, has been broken. And instead of sorting out the root problem (iPhone5 in this case) you’re advocating using a less secure encryption method for wireless.
Infact .. you’re not an idiot .. you’re a fkin idiot.
Oh come on. I would expect to see “advice” like this on some mainstream blog where the journalist didn’t know a thing about technology. But this is a tech blog, being written (I hope) by people who know a bit about technology. And you’re actually “recommending” that people shift to WEP? Really?
That’s strange. I have absolutely no issues at all on my Galaxy S3
Nor on my Original Galaxy S….
I concur. That is strange.
No issues on the Galaxy S3 or the Lumia 800…
Absolutely no Issues on the Galaxy Nexus. I’ll hopefully be able to report on the Nexus 4′s Connectivity by the end of the week.
Nope, no problems here on my iphone 5.
No issues on my Xperia Go. In fact it still maintains its WiFi connection after being dunked in the sink a few times.
My iphone 5 is fine too
It’s kind of like asking a customer at a clothes shop to try out the clothes in front of a mirror in the public because all the trial rooms are being used or busy or out of service.
Hmm…interesting !!!
Why not just switch to an Android instead?
Because nobody should have to consult this document:
http://www.av-test.org/fileadmin/pdf/avtest_2012-02_android_anti-malware_report_english.pdf
to be able to use their phone.
You could get malwares from any dodgy app (even on iDevices), may be just avoid them and stick to popular/trusted ones?
I use WPA2 and have had no problems with any of my iPhones, including my iPhone 5.
Surely you could also set your access point to WPA/WPA2 only, to stop it switching to older crappy WEP devices, then get rid of those devices?
D
This comments section went places.
WEP was meant for privacy, not security. Its about as secure as drawing a line in the sand.
You need to use some differential diagnosis to find out the cause. Is it a setting on your specific router that is the cause? It could be QoS is enabled and that affects it, or it could be that you need to use AES instead of TKIP, or vice versa. It could be that you need to use WPA2 instead of WPA or vice versa.
Test, test, test then report.
I think Gizmodo and other Tech sites should have a regular section devoted to Apple wifi issues, hopefully that will shame Apple into actually fixing this F***ing issue once and for all, you’ll actually be doing Apple a favour because if this issue persists eventually they will be loosing more customers than they are gaining, I say that as a Apple customer who is currently busy hacking off Vaders hand with a light sabre and is seriously considering going over to the dark side
we have around 9 Linksys (now cisco) WAP2000 AP’s on our site for visitor wireless access. The only clients we have any problems with are Apple be it phones or laptops. Hopeless
WiFi isn’t a problem with my ’5 its the fookin LTE; I’m on my 4th one so far. The girlfriend’s will always get a ping of 25-30ms and has hit a whopping 65mb on downloads, all mine at the same time/place have been getting pings of 200-800ms and the best download I’ve seen is about 6mb.
3 LTE in Hong Kong seems to range from shite to great – but it depends on the phone