My Mac is not connecting to Starlink wifi.

I am using Starlink for almost 2 months now. For the last 4-5 days, my Mac connects to Starlink but the internet does not work for 5 mins and comes back for 10 seconds, and again goes for 10 15 minutes. Basically, the internet is not working.


Also have other devices and they all connect without a problem. I have this problem only on my Mac.


Mac Details

Mac Pro 13-inch, 2019, Two Thunderbolt 3 ports

Mac OS 13.2.1 (22D68)


Wifi Settings

My DNS: 192.168.1.1

IP: 192.168.1.228

Router: 192.168.1.1

IPv4: Using DHPC

IPv6: Link-Local only


I've tried to change DNS (8.8.8.8 - 1.1.1.1 and same as my IP and Router) but nothing helped.


Thanks in advance!

MacBook Pro 13″, macOS 13.2

Posted on Jun 10, 2023 8:39 AM

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Posted on Jun 10, 2023 9:17 AM

Update macOS to 13.4, and—if any are installed—remove any add-on VPN apps.


Check for Wi-Fi router updates, too. (Are you using a Starlink-provided Wi-Fi router, or some other router?)


I’m here assuming the MacBook Pro is connecting to Wi-Fi, and is not wired to the Wi-Fi router.


DNS generally doesn’t come and go, it’ll usually show as a ~30 second delay or as an unavailable network connection for anything attempting a domain name translation. And most stuff does translate domain names. The following ping command does not translate names and does not use DNS. This ping command will check basic connectivity, and will run until ^C is (control C) is entered, or the Terminal.app window is closed.


Launch Terminal.app from Applications > Utilities, and enter the following:


ping -i 5 8.8.8.8 


Every five seconds, that’ll check for connectivity to and from a Google server. That’s entirely independent of DNS, too. You’ll either get a response from the Google server and elapsed response time in milliseconds, or an error. Leave it run ing in the Terminal app window, and check back when there’s an outage. (Independent of the network connectivity check provided, I’m also mildly interested about the ping times achieved via Starlink, too.)


Also see if wireless diagnostics show any issues:


If your Mac isn't connecting to the internet over Wi-Fi - Apple Support


PS: A Mac Pro is a very different computer from the MacBook Pro that you have here. mac Pro is a big computer.


Similar questions

40 replies

Dec 7, 2023 7:38 AM in response to VikingOSX

The biggest stumbling block with 802.11ax is the commonly-used 160 MHz channel width (In addition to the too-high channel-number).


You can usually work around the Wi-Fi 6-ONLY issue by narrowing the channel width down to 40 MHz channel, where most Macs will see that as a variant of their older protocols that they can use, and most Routers will talk to older, slower devices that way.

Jun 10, 2023 12:51 PM in response to MrHoffman


Thanks!


I have another local Wifi and It works well on the Mac and also my mobile hotspot works too, only Starlink wifi, and only on this device does not work.


The same Starlink on other Devices works perfectly

Other Wifi's working well on my Mac but Starlink doesn't,

Something is wrong with the Starlink configurations on the Mac?


The firmware is updated.


At the moment it started to work again, I will check the router and Wifi diagnostics once it starts to disconnect again and update here. (It works for a couple of hours and then the same problem occurs almost the rest of the day)

Jun 11, 2023 10:50 AM in response to Grant Bennet-Alder

"There is also no way to select a specific wifi channel for either network, there is no way to change the DHCP settings, and no way to properly run a static IP as there is no start and stop address, it's just completely random. There is no way to configure your own DNS, in fact, no way to configure much of anything. browsing to 192.168.1.1 simply displays "You are connected to Starlink!". " Relevant post for quote


Well, I see a lot of complaints about it, I guess there is really no way to change it... I also reached out to Starlink Support for that problem and let's see what they offer, also mentioned how to change the channels if I can..

Dec 7, 2023 9:05 AM in response to VikingOSX

VikingOSX wrote:

Is the Starlink Wi-Fi being served as Wi-Fi 6 (802.11ax)? If so, the 2019 iMac can only deal with 802.11a, 802.11ac, or 802.11n and would not see any Wi-Fi 6 SSID.


?


I’m running a pile of Wi-Fi 4 and Wi-Fi 5 gear on Wi-Fi 6 with WPA2/WPA3 transitional security, and it works fine.


And Starlink isn’t going to default-configure their Wi-Fi to specifically require either Wi-Fi 6, or Wi-Fi 6E 6 GHz, or (what you might be referencing) WPA3 (not-transitional) security.

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My Mac is not connecting to Starlink wifi.

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