My Mac can't detect my iPhone hotspot

Hey Marlena,

You might have solved the problem already but incase you didn't this might help. I was having the same problem you were and did everything you were told to do as well and it didn't help. For whatever odd reason this did the trick, sign out of iCloud on your mac and sign back in. Hopefully this helps.

I, too, frequently encounter this problem... every time I want to connect my Mac to my iPhone's hotspot. This isn't limited to a single version of iOS nor version of iPhone hardware.

Here are the things I do before retrying:

• Turn the hotspot off and back on

  try again

• Put the iPhone in Airplane Mode

  try again

• Turn the Mac's wireless off and on

  try again

It pretty much is always changing things on the iPhone that corrects the connectivity problem.

Things I never do to make this work:

• Restore the iPhone
• Reboot anything
• Reset any network settings

P.S. If either of the devices you are dealing with are issued by the company you work for, defer to their IT department for any troubleshooting steps you go through.

Does your iPhone have the option to use USB hotspots? If it does, tap on that and plug in your iPhone into your MacBook. Then, go to WiFi in System Preferences or in the right-top corner. Hope this helps!😀

Hello Markena,

It sounds like you arent able to join your iPhones Personal Hotspot. I would use this troubleshooting info from the following article to cover the basics, and a bit more:

iOS: Troubleshooting Personal Hotspot

Basic troubleshooting

1. Turn Personal Hotspot off and on: Tap Settings > Personal Hotspot or Settings > Cellular > Personal Hotspot.
2. Install the latest version of iOS.
3. Reset your network settings: Tap Settings > General > Reset > Reset Network Settings.
4. If you still see the issue, restore the iPhone.

If you're still experiencing issues, try the steps below.

Wi-Fi troubleshooting

If you encounter an issue using Personal Hotspot with other Wi-Fi devices, try these steps:

1. Turn Personal Hotspot off.
2. Turn on Wi-Fi: Tap Settings > Wi-Fi.
3. Turn on Personal Hotspot.
4. If another device can't join your Wi-Fi network, make sure the Wi-Fi password is correct.
5. If the device can't see your Wi-Fi network, check your device name. Windows may not correctly show a device name that uses non-ASCII characters.
6. See how many devices are using your Personal Hotspot. Depending on your wireless carrier, the number of Wi-Fi connections may be limited to three devices at once.
7. If the other device still can't connect, turn Wi-Fi off and on for the device.
8. Make sure that your device can see other Wi-Fi networks.

Note: If you see "Unable to Join" or a timeout error when you try to connect a device using Wi-Fi, remain on the Personal Hotspot screen until the first device connects. After the device connects, you can leave the Personal Hotspot screen and use your iPhone normally. Your device will stop broadcasting Wi-Fi if you put it to sleep or if 90 seconds elapse and no connected devices use Wi-Fi. To share your Wi-Fi network again, tap Settings > Personal Hotspot.

Thank you for using Apple Support Communities.

Cheers,

Sterling

Thank you for using the Apple Support Community. Due to the nature of your issue you may find more information by using another one of Apple's support resources - https://getsupport.apple.com/GetproductgroupList.action.