All of my devices forget all wifi passwords about once a week

I am another fatality following a similar pattern. I can add that when my device(s) log out mysteriously, I have to also re-select my WLAN (I live in a city so there are many WLANs). So its as if I have I never logged in to my own router ! I also noticed that the name of my router was missing on the list you can find in Network preferences of routers you have used (I use tons of routers as I travel alot). It seems between the many contributors to this thread Apple should be able to recognize a pattern and offer a fix. Read the whole thread and you see its not your year/model or your system, or your location many theories have been spun and none of them identify the problem so far.

Yesterday I was using my MacBook Pro, logged into my home WiFi. I closed the lid putting it to sleep. After dinner I came back, waking up my MacBook Pro. It not only was disconnected from the home WiFi, but also it forgot the password! This has never happened prior to 2023. Something must have happened on the backend with Apple's cloud services. This issue of forgetting passwords has now become more frequent.

I think it’s OSX (I’m on Catalina). Have opened keychain and deleted the entry for my home wifi and then created a new one re-entering the wifi password and flagging ‘remember this network’..let’s see it that works.

Similar issues as all above report - have many, many iOS and MacOS devices that have been on the same networks, and same passwords for years unchanged and now all type of devices are forgetting the WiFi passwords such as Apple TVs, iPhones, MacBooks, iMacs, iPads. With no changes to the networks, it has to be the device. I suspect one device (build) is affecting the keychain and the other devices then are told it no longer exists after the offending device removes the keychain password from iCloud side file. My WiFi passwords for work and home have not changed in over 7yrs and yet all devices believe they have never been on the network before. This isn't a network provider, AP (access point) or WiFi version issue. It is purely an Apple iCloud/Keychain issue that started ~ 60 days ago i would say. This needs to be acknowledged by Apple and needs to then be resolved at Apple.

Well, give them a call. :-) See if they will give you a month or two for free for your trouble. Generally speaking, has been my experience that most businesses are happy to accommodate their customers for any inconveniences or service disruptions.

As for me, I understand that glitches happen. I mean.. just look at what all this technology allows us to do! Things that we take for granted now would be unheard of 15 years ago! Not to mention the insane behind the scenes tech / programming / and know-how needed to keep all this running! Maybe I am just being too chill about it.

I don’t think Apple needs our sympathy as if they were a corner mom and pops store.

they have cashed on all the things you mentioned above and increasing prices by 30% show they will take first care of themselves.

Love the tech but we are paying for a service and it’s not working as intended; the least they could do is show face around here but that’s not happening either.

This is by no means the biggest problem in my life but it is my biggest problem within the context of this community so I don’t see the point of coming here to compare a technical problem with technological advances, I believe most of us are here because we want this specific issue sorted.

Hi Carlos. Thanks for doing this. As a software engineer I know both how important AND how tedious it can be to gather all the data needed to figure out what is going on, especially for flaky bugs like this. So thank you from all of us.

Yes same here it’s been happening since 16.4.

its either a bug or apple are preventing iCloud access to passwords if it fails to take a subscription payment.

can’t tell which sometimes. Apple actually billed my phone provider for an app most certainly without my permission so nothing would surprise me.

restricting access to storage is one thing password keychains is just stupid.

tim

Count me in.

Although mine seems to be a little different than eveyrone elses. I don't loose all passwords on all devices at the same time. Each device seems to be on it's own forgetting schedule, where it forgets after 3 to 7 days.

Also I do use iCloud Keychain which is supposed to sync preferred wifi networks and passwords. But on Macs, you can see the list of preferred networks and they are clearly not in sync at all. It's like something glitched and each mac/device keeps reverting back to it's own saved state without wifi passwords. You add them, they're good for a while, then they go away.

I've also been working with apple support on this issue but I got absolutely nowhere. Chat support sent me to phone support, phone support sent me to senior phone support, senior phone support won't send me to an engineer and keeps suggesting troubleshooting ideas that are not even remotely on the right track. I'm tempted to abandon my support ticket and start a new one from scratch.

I've experienced this problem on a 2012 mac mini, 2009 imac, iPhone 11, iPhone 7 plus, iphone 6s. The ONE computer that has never had an issue seems to be my primary Mac, a 2018 mini that stays on wifi and it's "Preferred Networks" list in system prefs is a mile long and contains everything.

I've tried turning iCloud Keychain off and on multiple times.

I've tried FULLY logging some of the machines out of iCloud, deleting all data, and then logging them back in.

It makes no difference at all. I'm at my house and my mothers house the most, and both networks constantly disappear from computers/phones.

Apple senior phone tech tried to suggest the problem was the wifi router at one point. Ironic since both routers on those two networks are genuine airport express base stations :D

This is *CLEARLY* an iCloud Keychain problem. Which means only Apple can fix it.

OK. In the spirit of trying to “help people use Apple products and technologies more effectively,” I went with your “feedback from”approach as noted above. I also removed the “Ghost of Jobs” language from the feedback form I submitted, but kept the main thrust intact: This is a bad look that needs to be addressed NOW, because it doesn’t only affect all of us who followed Apple’s design ethos into “the iCloud’s the thing” thing in the first place (an ethos I still 100% share), it affects market perception, so this needs to be prioritized as a basic blocking & tackling thing that gets Job One status… especially if the $71B fire under the GPT announcement is to stay lit… because if we can’t get a quick “all hands on deck” fix to something as basic as this, what’s going to happen when GPT (which I also already use extensively under a different brand name) starts misfiring? And do we really want to look like Microsoft in their no-new-features phase, or ever?

So… Let’s see how long this one survives, and whether the feedback on the thread you recommended gets the attention this issue deserves.

Point is: A lot of people have all been terribly frustrated for months now, and only the most vocal few are coming to this platform to get some relief (and share their ideas for improving the situation)… how long will it be before this discussion spills over from this board into the media space that really matters… and how many squelching attempts does it take before that happens.

I’m guessing I’m not alone in these thoughts.

So, I’m hoping someone at support gets the message through to the appropriate product managers, up to, and including the Apple C-Suite, so this issue doesn’t go mushroom.

I want Apple to succeed, because precious few tech firm out there does guest-centric Agile design & release even half as well.

And I hope this post is deemed by those who hold the proverbial electronic red pencil her to ““help people use Apple products and technologies more effectively.”

Because, if Apple doesn’t use Agility to its own efficiency, how will any of us be helped to use the products they produce to that same end?

… so much over reacting in this forum discussion LoL … this issue is only an annoyance, nothing more. Apple is working on it, let the engineers do their work. These things take (a lot of) time (many many testing and quality control process to go through for any code modification / correction)

Just be patient (yes it is a word)

An additional info from my earlier post.

My old ipad air 2 used as a Hub at home has still not “forget” the wifi password (more than 2 weeks now)

It could be that the issue is linked to a certain release of iOS.

For what it's worth, I'm having this problem on:

iOS 16

iOS 15

macOS Catalina

macOS Mojave

And I *think* High Sierra and Monterey, but I'm not 100% sure on those and I don't have many machines running those exact OSes. And every device that has had the problem, has had it repeatedly.

And while I do agree that there is a lot of overreacting... I also would argue that while in some setups, it is only an annoyance, but in other setups, it is a significant problem.

Following this thread as I am having the same exact issue. 6 apple products using the same Apple ID (iPhone, iPad Air 4, MacBook Pro, Mac mini, iMac 2022 and iMac 2011) forgetting my home wifi passwords and all other wifi network passwords.

Hope to see the fix soon.

Dear Kherberos,

1) we all paid premium price for premium devices, and we expect expect premium service.

2) this forum post has been on for months with no fix - that’s to your notion of “over reacting”.

3) You claim “This issue is only an annoyance, nothing more”. Let me tell you that on more than one occasion it hindered the start of my work. I work at multiple offices. I have had a situation when I came to an office of a company where I work as a contractor after hours, there was no tech support available to tell the wifi psswd, and I had to turn around and leave without finishing the project. Do you write down the WiFi passwords of all locations where you expect automatic connection? I don’t, that would throw us back 20 years. If my “smart” device doesn’t remember the passwords, I don’t either...

4) “Apple is working on it….”. How do you know? Have any of Apple people responded to this forum? I can’t recall any response from Apple. Are you from Apple as you are so confidently saying that Apple is working on it? If so, you should identify yourself as such.

Peace.

I have:

MacOS High Sierra

MacOS Ventura

iOS 16.5.1(c)

At one time, my MacOS High Sierra merely went to sleep, and upon waking, forgot the password of the WiFi to which it was just connected to for the previous 2 hours, this prompting me to re-enter the password