MacBook Pro M1 WiFi issue

I have the SAME issue.

My wifi router is underneath my desk to 50 cm away.

I switched to the new M1 MacBook and on some days the WiFi connection just drops and it can be 5x in a day.

My old Macbook it never happened.

The only thing I changed was the MacBook.

Work-arounds already posted on this thread include:

use an Ethernet cable [but Ethernet adapters have their own problems under very heavy loads]

Change to 2.4 GHz band

modify Router 5 GHz settings away from the problematic (for the M1) 80 MHz channel width, back to (more compatible) 40 MHz channel width.

I use a 2.4 GHz band Router with auto settings (20/40 MHz) yet still have this drop wifi connection.

In my case, it can't be about 5Ghz at 80MHz. I live in a small apartment with two bedrooms, and the router is in the center of the unit. My friend who also owned MBA M1, even living in a smaller apartment, also having this issue. Other non-M1 Macs and Windows PCs, including other wifi-connected peripherals are having a safe connection.

I am assuming, by this far, the wifi inside the MBA M1 is having a thermal issue, that they stop working at some point of heavy loads. Yes, heavy loads. The connection drops when using such a long video conference. This is a very noticeable occasion, obviously.

I am living in Jakarta, with a warm, humid climate. The ambiance temperature is between 27-29 degrees Celsius without air conditioning.

However, there should be an empirical experiment to test the wifi working temperature.

I am looking forward to solutions.

Edit:

For additional information, I am using a ZTE F609 router. To access more optional changes to the router setting, actually, there are two accounts. One is the "user" level with minimum options, and the other is "admin" for more flexible settings. Perhaps other ISP would do the same for their level of security.

<< I live in a small apartment >>

Apartment dwellers often discover that the 2.4GHz band is COMPLETELY overwhelmed with neighbors' Routers. Dropping the connection when you have 10 other Routers visible is almost unavoidable.

Do you have a Router with 5GHz band? Have you tried the 40 MHz channel work-around?

Having this exact same issue as well. I've tried the posted workarounds, but none of them work consistently for me. This is a massive pain as my company runs Virtual Desktops for our work computers, and the M1 mac constantly drops me from my work desktop. Additionally it constantly drops my connection on zoom. I know it's not the router as I can disconnect and reconnect and it immediately provides internet when I do, and also my wife's older macbook work's just fine.

It's frustrating that this seems to be an prevalent issue that Apple is simply ignoring. There are literally hundreds of threads just like this:

https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/wifi-issues-m1-macbook-pro.2270884/page-11

https://www.reddit.com/r/mac/comments/jy3yc7/is_anyone_else_experiencing_issues_with_wifi_on/

I just wanted to check in on this as well, as I too am having this issue and have had it across two M1 Pros.

I noticed it almost immediately when I got the M1 Pro a couple months ago and, luckily, was able to simply swap it out for a new one as Apple support could not figure out the issue and said they’d seen no reports of it.

Got my new M1 Pro, didn’t do anything with it that required a sustained internet connection for awhile (no video calls) but after a few weeks, it happened again and has continued to happen since (but I was outside the “swap it out” timeframe so I just have been dealing with it).

Has anyone figured out the cause or a fix?

I’m experiencing the exact same issue than the ones described in most of the comments. I cannot connect to the internet after suddenly restarting the computer 4-5 times, it’s really annoying. Any clues or reliable solutions so far?

<< has anyone figured out a cause or a fix? >>

why YES! there are several work-arounds already posted on this very long discussion.

Please read every posting -OR-

for individual attention, start a new discussion with the details of YOUR setup. Be sure to include what model Mac and what version of MacOS, and a title that will attract the readers you need to solve your problem.

AppleTookAwayMyIdentity wrote:

Actually starting a new thread is a TERRIBLE idea, that will most likely sabotage any chance of us figuring out what is wrong and how to fix it. Having the known information in one thread is a huge win.

Great! Then use my first advice and read all the previous postings, and you will know!

For those of you worried about 80MHz channel width being a problem, that's not likely in the cases of people continually dropping from enterprise WiFi while never having problems with home WiFi. In office environments the channel width is usually kept small -- 20MHz or maybe 40. Otherwise the co-channel interference kills you.

My freshman who couldn't keep an internet connection for more than a couple of minutes at a time sent her MBA home and her parents took it to the Apple Store over the weekend -- one of her USB ports was broken. She brought it to me today having just gotten it back -- and it had a totally rock-solid internet connection the whole time she was in.

It was exhibiting a different bizarre symptom with the podcast app, not sure if that's related.

I was wondering if the Apple Store could repair a damaged USB on an MBA, and wondering if they might swap it for new hardware. If they did, and the new hardware has no problem, that would certainly argue for it being a HW problem. If they did repair it, I'm then suspicious that they did something like re-seat the antenna.

(This would work a lot better if I had possession of a failing device rather than having to borrow it from an 18-yr-old who thinks I'm just making excuses for "crappy WiFi". Anybody up for a road trip LOL?)

Hello everyone, ok so good to know this a known connectivity issue apparently with MacBook Pro m1, in my case at first I thought it was my antivirus, but after uninstalling it, the problem continues, I should say in my home the internet connectivity is perfect, however at my university we use an eduroam connection and here my connection constantly drops, I’ve tried about everything with no solution, have anyone managed to solve the problem ?

Just a brief update: I was able to fix the issue without any complication. For my computer connection, the problem was a mixture between using a VPN in my school network (I use Windscribe), and that the Key chain access certificates of my school network weren't up-to-date (for some reason that I don't understand). After downloading the right certificates and turning off the VPN everything worked perfectly.

The thing with the VPN is strange though, sometimes I connect to it for work and the internet works without problem, but after a while it gets disconnected again. Once I turn off the VPN it works normal again. Idk, maybe something with the VPN itself?

My advise for people who is struggling with this is first try to go to a public network and see if the problem persists. If not, then maybe the issue is in the certificates and how the M1 keeps them up-to-date.

Read every posting on this discussion and you may see that several useful solutions have already been posted in dozens of postings on this topic. But this discussion is already too long and too confusing (who is who with what system, and what peripherals?) to provide individual attention.

If you would like individual attentions, POST A NEW Discussion Topic and the specs of your Mac and your MacOS.

Also, be sure to include the what devices/adapters/cables you are using.

Grant, you are obviously an expert. However this topic is still of concern and starting a new post doesn't seem to resolve the issue. All (or most) workarounds listed seem to point to setting the router differently. My daughter is having this issue at home and at school. I can alter the settings on our router but she can't alter the school's router settings. It's a university so it's not like talking to the high school IT admin to reduce the bandwidth of the channel. There are hundreds of routers there.

The genius bar just sent her home today after a weak failed attempt at reproducing the problem in the store. Don't you agree Apple should admit to this issue and train their Genius bar employees? Or are they training them to deflect the problem by sending them home without a fix or a discussion or clue? If we reschedule a Genius bar appointment is there a way to refer them to something? Do we refer them to this thread for instance? BTW I have released IOS apps so I'm not totally ignorant but feeling pretty frustrated by this.

M1 Macbook pro. Google Nest WiFi. Great signal. WiFi drops or slows routinely on M1 MBP. No issue on older Macbook pro or older iMac or phones.

I'm a college network administrator, and the "reduce the bandwidth" suggestion is absurd. Enterprise networks don't work that way -- we don't give any single client a bunch of channel width because we have too many clients for that.

Cray57 -- you have something I don't have, which is that it's your kid who has one of the affected computers. I've got a freshman girl who thinks I'm crazy and has disappeared. :-)

Tell your daughter to hold down the option key and click on the airport icon in the top bar of her mac. When you option-click, the menu has a bunch of extra options, including "Open Wireless Diagnostics..." Have her run the wireless diagnostics while connected to the school's APs, and then call Apple support, or take the output from multiple runs to the Genius Bar.