Ipad Air 2 won't connect to WiFi after iPadOS 13 upgrade

It's fixed! I did a full recovery from iTunes while holding down the Home button (as per https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT204306)

and when it asked I restored from the iTunes backup I took before upgrading to iPadOS 13. It all worked. Came up running iPadOS 13.1, connected to my WiFi router and all seems to be well now.

Oh boy am I glad I took both an iTunes and an iCloud backup before I started this saga! Paranoia wins again.

You will have to do what is suggested in this thread. The full directions are in the link below. I know that the link gives directions of what to do when you forget your Passcode, but it works to fix this problem too.

• support.apple.com/en-us/HT204306

Summary

• Start iTunes on your computer
• Power OFF the iPad
• Press-and-hold the HOME button while connecting the iPad to the computer via USB
• Continue to press HOME until the iPad shows the picture in HT204306
• Follow the directions in iTunes

1. The first option is to Upgrade. (This did not work for me. I tried this several times.)
2. The last resort is to Restore. (This will wipe your iPad!)

Good luck.

Same problem here. In addition, "settings" is screwed up - I wasn't able to enter Apple ID, skipped it, and now after a couple of restarts "settings" wants to "update Apple ID". After about 5 minutes I was able to enter the password, but 10 minutes later it was still not accepted.

Furthermore, the iPad seems generally broken - apps load slowly, then mostly crash back to the home screen.

I should have known better...looking into downgrade. Really irritating.

I am upset with myself that I upgraded my iPad today to iPadOS 13.1 because it's useless now:

I can't log onto my wifi at all, it won't allow me to join even though my password works with all of my other devices

and

overall, it has slowed to a crawl.

Since I can't access the internet at all, how do I recover?

I've tried powering off, forgetting the network, resetting the network, etc. to no avail.

Help!

Restart

Try restarting your iOS device, router, and cable or DSL modem. To restart your router or modem, unplug it, then plug it back in. 

Do try all troubleshooting steps. Just because one person says they tried all that, doesn’t mean it might not work on your device.

https://support.apple.com/en-ca/HT204051

Same problem here. Updating to iPadOS 13.1 from latest 12.x completed fine. After update though iPad Air 2 won't connect to my previous wifi networks that have a password. I also noticed it no longer recognised the screen time passcode.

Note: I have an iCloud backup but not backups to iTunes app on the Mac.

All the suggested methods like router reboot, Reset Networking Settings, Reset All Settings didn't solve the problems. Then I connected the iPad to my Mac and tried to reinstall iPadOS as per this article https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201263. The restore completed but the issues remained. Impossible to connect to my wifi with a password.

So I decided I would do an Erase All Content and Settings as last resort.

To reset the iPad to factory, it needs internet connection in order to verify Apple ID (at this stage my iPad still has my Apple ID in it).

Solution in my case was:

* set up a guest wifi network on my router without password and visible network id

* iPad was able to connect to the internet via this guest network that doesn't require password

* I was able to do an Erase All Content and Settings

Reset completed successfully and the iPad displayed "Hello..." like out of the box. On the screen "Choose a Wi-Fi network" I picked the wifi on my router that has a password. Interestingly the connection happened right away! On the screen "Apps and Data" I picked "Don't transfer data". I was able to log in with my Apple ID and complete the setup process. This iPad is now like a new one.

Checking under software I notice the iPadOS version is now 13.1.1 (previously it showed 13.1).

It seems 13.1.1 has solved the wifi with password issue.

If your iPad has version 13.1, the solution without resetting the device would be to configure a wifi network on your router that has a visible network ID and doesn't require password. This will allow your iPad to connect to the internet and get the update to 13.1.1. Once updated, deactivate the wifi network without password.

Good luck!

The text of the link is correct. The link itself is incorrect. There are a few extra characters in the original link.

Try this link.

https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT204306

Or this if the above link does not work: support.apple.com/en-us/HT204306

This seems to be the best solution so far.

All the resetting of routers, rebooting the iPad, and what not was a waste of time. This is clearly a bug in upgrading to iOS 13 and the fix is to recover the device with iTunes: https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201263

I decided to just do a clean restore, which clears years of kruft anyway.

I have an iPad Air 2 and am having the same issues (spotty WiFi, apps crashing, being repeatedly asked to sign in to iCloud). Trying the method now mentioned at this thread for troubleshooting. I hope Apple finally admits this is a problem. https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT204306

First, go into the Settings app, under General > Reset and do a Reset all Network Settings.

If your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch won’t connect to a Wi-Fi network - Apple Support

If no joy try Resetting ALL Settings.

IF still NO joy,

Unfortunately,

you may have to do a complete backup of your iPad Air 2 to Apple iCloud and/or iTunes on a computer , erase and setup your iPad as new, re-dowload all your apps from the Purchases section/option of the IOS App Store, and then restore your iPad from the backup you made.

Backing up

How to back up your iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch - Apple Support

Erase

How to erase your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch - Apple Support

OR

Restore to Factory Settings

Restore your iPhone, iPad, or iPod to factory settings - Apple Support

Restore from Backup

Restore your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch from a backup - Apple Support

No other options for your iPad Air 2.

If you feel you cannot handle doing any of this, then you will need to bring your iPad Air into your nearest, “local” Apple Store for their employees to sort and solve your iPad Air issues.

Best of Luck to You!

Correct , that link is broken . It should be: https://support.apple.com/en-ca/HT201252

If you can't access a computer and your device still works, you can erase and restore your device without a computer on your iPad.

Before you do that you can still try General - Reset - Reset Network Settings. It can help with wifi not letting you join.

First, go into the Settings app, under General > Reset and do a Reset all Network Settings.

If your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch won’t connect to a Wi-Fi network - Apple Support

If no joy try Resetting ALL Settings.

IF still NO joy,

Unfortunately,

you may have to do a complete backup of your iPad Air 2 to Apple iCloud and/or iTunes on a computer , erase and setup your iPad as new, re-dowload all your apps from the Purchases section/option of the IOS App Store, and then restore your iPad from the backup you made.

Backing up

How to back up your iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch - Apple Support

Erase

How to erase your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch - Apple Support

OR

Restore to Factory Settings

Restore your iPhone, iPad, or iPod to factory settings - Apple Support

Restore from Backup

Restore your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch from a backup - Apple Support

No other options for your iPad Air 2.

If you feel you cannot handle doing any of this, then you will need to bring your iPad Air into your nearest, “local” Apple Store for their employees to sort and solve your iPad Air issues.

Best of Luck to You!

The link has some extra characters in it. The text of the link works just fine. Here it is again.

https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT204306

Here is the text portion only that you can copy-and-paste if the link does not work.

support.apple.com/en-us/HT204306

Follow the directions exactly. Unfortunately, for most of us the "Upgrade" option did not work. We had to choose the "Restore" option eventually. I hope you have a backup.

Good luck.

Yep, me too. iPad Air 2 won't connect to any secured WiFi network. 2.4GHz, 5GHz makes no difference, if it has a password then it won't connect to it (can connect to a hotspot with no password, but that's hardly a solution). It seems like it isn't accepting the password entered, it sits there for several seconds with network access indicator rotating and then just gives up.

I restarted iPad, reset network settings, forgot previously joined networks, nothing fixes it.

I upgraded this Air 2 from 12.4.1 using iTunes 12.9.5.5 on a MacBook Pro. Upgrade seemed to go fine, no errors or other messages.

Same here as well. I've even put it recovery mode and connected it to my MacBook Pro. It downloaded 13.1 and went through the process. Still the same result. Settings app can sometimes freeze and I can't even do a factory restore.