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[Solved] Big Sur - Wifi no longer working? Here is how to fix it!
(@hans)
Famed Member Admin
Joined: 12 years ago
Posts: 2822
Topic starter
February 24, 2021 11:45 AM
So I ran into an issue where my WiFi suddenly stopped work.
Like completely not even picking up available networks.
I've had this experience on a Mac Pro trashcan (2013) and I have found others to experience this on iMac's, Macbook, etc as well.
There is a manual fix for this, use at your own risk of course, but it worked for me on multiple Macs.
The steps to follow:
- Turn off WiFi in the menu bar.
- In case it's open: Make sure to close the System Preferences window.
- In Finder, go to /Library/Preferences/SystemConfiguration/ (in Finder, press ⌘ + Shift + G).
- Copy these files to your Desktop, or any safe location, in case you'd like to put them back if things go sideways on you:
Note: one or the other file may be missing on your system, which should not be a problem. My Mac Pro specifically missed "com.apple.network.identification.plist".
com.apple.airport.preferences.plist
com.apple.network.identification.plist
com.apple.wifi.message-tracer.plist
NetworkInterfaces.plist
preferences.plist
- Now delete these files from their original location - you will have to enter your password to get permission to do so.
- Reboot your Mac, and after reboot enable WiFi again ... and you should be good to go ...