Wifi is constantly interrupting (OSX Monterey and Ventura)

Dear all,

My wifi connection is constantly interrupting on my Macbook Air.

The connection is not slow, but rather breaking off every few seconds. For example, when I'm browsing the internet, it helps to reload the page or press active fields on the page. Video conferencing and synchronizing cloud storage, however, is barely possible.


Problem solving so far:

I had this problem before with Monterey, but was able to fix it with the measures described here: https://www.macworld.com/article/671570/how-to-fix-wi-fi-on-mac.html (notably 16. Change the DNS setting for your network). I do not know, however, which of the measures exactly helped.


Recently, I updated to OSX Ventura and now, the problem appeared again...

Implementing again the problem solutions stated above, however, does not help now.


Any ideas what could solve the problem?


System specifications:

Apple Macbook Air (M1 2020)

OSX Ventura


A further note:

I use two identical Macbooks, one private and one for work. The wifi connections on the private machine always work fine. When I received the work laptop, I migrated the users from the private machine, but also kept them on the latter. I somehow suspect that the wifi problems of the work laptop are rooted in this migration of the users and their network preferences. Maybe, the work laptop 'thinks' that it is the other machine, but these migrated network preferences cause confusions? I have, however, deleted these preferences, wifi settings and even user accounts many times, including on the icloud keychain.

MacBook Air (M1, 2020)

Posted on Jun 26, 2023 1:57 AM

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Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Posted on Jun 28, 2023 4:30 AM

Summarizing all of the above, I have to say that it is high time this mac gets a new clean system.

You may be surprised at just how well a clean mac works these days.



It turns out that getting a clean system is much much easier now.


1) Two backups - at least one being a Time Machine

2) System Settings->General->Transfer or Reset->Erase All Content and Settings...


This will erase all the users and third party applications, but leave the OS intact - the OS is mounted in a sealed read only volume, so there is no point in completely erasing and reinstalling.

But this will get rid of all third party extensions, daemons and agents that have accumulated over the years.


3) When asked, elect to import "from another mac, drive or Time Machine backup", and choose the backup you did in step 1.


IMPORTANT: check ONLY the user accounts! Otherwise you'll bring back all the cruft that we are trying to get rid of.


4) Install the desired applications fresh from the App Store or their developers' websites.

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Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Jun 28, 2023 4:30 AM in response to simonsimson

Summarizing all of the above, I have to say that it is high time this mac gets a new clean system.

You may be surprised at just how well a clean mac works these days.



It turns out that getting a clean system is much much easier now.


1) Two backups - at least one being a Time Machine

2) System Settings->General->Transfer or Reset->Erase All Content and Settings...


This will erase all the users and third party applications, but leave the OS intact - the OS is mounted in a sealed read only volume, so there is no point in completely erasing and reinstalling.

But this will get rid of all third party extensions, daemons and agents that have accumulated over the years.


3) When asked, elect to import "from another mac, drive or Time Machine backup", and choose the backup you did in step 1.


IMPORTANT: check ONLY the user accounts! Otherwise you'll bring back all the cruft that we are trying to get rid of.


4) Install the desired applications fresh from the App Store or their developers' websites.

Jun 28, 2023 4:19 AM in response to simonsimson

1) Your system drive is essentially full. This can cause severe performance degradation.

Always strive to have at least 15-20% free on all drives, especially the system drive.



2) Configuration Profiles!!!!


This machine has configuration profiles, which seems to suggest that it is a work or school machine.

Personal macs usually do not have these profiles - which are ostensibly to control and restrict how the machine is used.


In particular, these profiles appear to be connected to wifi, and to vpn use.


If this is a mac that was setup by some IT department in your institution, you need to consult with them, to see what limitations are in place, and to let them know of the issue.



Jun 28, 2023 4:28 AM in response to simonsimson

Just to add to the good advise by @Luis S


From that same report to illustrate " Your system drive is essentially full. " 👍


Size: 494.38 GB


Free: 41.43 GB


That number would represent less than 10 % of the Entire Drive Capacity as Empty Space


Allowing the computer to drop below the suggested guidelines of 15% to 20% , cause unintended consequences including being a Contributing Factor in this computer issue

Jun 28, 2023 4:25 AM in response to simonsimson

In addition, you have mountains of old stuff - which suggests the system has been upgraded year over year, and mac after mac, accumulating cruft.


You still have stuff like wmv, shockwave, Perian...


These things have not worked in years, and yet there are still these system extensions, which modify the system at a rather low level, and could be causing all sorts of trouble.


Your version of VirtualBox is too old and does not work in Ventura.


You still have "Startup Items" - even though the use of those has been deprecated for a decade.



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Wifi is constantly interrupting (OSX Monterey and Ventura)

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