2018 MacBook Pro randomly losing WiFi connection

Don’t use the network utility. It doesn’t report correct information with Wi-Fi. Not sure if this is specific to the 2018 MBPs/MBAs or it happened before.

For Tx rate, Option click the Wi-Fi icon on the menu bar. For the Wi-Fi card model, option click the Apple icon on the menu bar and pull up the hardware report.

Here comes a hunch for a potential cause of these problems.

How many of you with the 2018 MacBook Pros / Air or Mac Mini Wi-Fi problems wear an Apple Watch and have the auto-unlock feature enabled in macOS?

Very interesting sirozha! I'll keep you informed if I loose Wi-Fi connection again, after disabling the unlock feature with the Apple Watch. But first here's the information you asked for:

Do you experience the Wi-Fi issues described in my post?

Absolutely YES!

What type of Mac (model and year) do you have?

MacBook Pro 2018 15" with macOS Mojave 10.14.3

What router/AP do you use?

Apple Time Capsule from 2010 or a FritzBox7390. Mostly just the TimeCapsule while Wi-Fi is deactivated in the FritzBox.

Do you wear an Apple Watch?

Yep, the first Apple Watch with watchOS 4.3.2, no watchOS 5 possible.

Is there a person in the vicinity with an Apple Watch?

No one except myself.

When Apple tells you to do a clean install, ask them if they got bought by Microsoft recently. That’s the Microsoft mantra to wipe the computer clean and do a fresh install. Basically, Apple Care don’t know what the heck is going on when they tell you to do a clean install.

With your Apple TV3, can you temporarily disable AirPlay altogether to see if your Wi-Fi issues get better? I don’t know if the AirPlay option in Apple TV3 enables the AWDL direct connection to allow the Mac to stream directly to the Apple TV when the Mac is nearby. It’s worth a try, though, in case Apple TV3 is capable of that feature, but Apple didn’t expose the option to turn it off, as it did in Apple TV4 and 4K.

Thank you.

Yeah, I know. But on the other hand I have an understanding for the wish of a clean install. It's actually the only way to exclude a corrupt configuration or bad software. Actually I'll check the coherence withe the unlock feature of the Apple Watch first.

I also disaabled AirPlay on my ATV3, just to be sure.

Interesting theory, I hope there's something to it. I've observed the issue when remoted into my MBP at home from my office, ~30 miles away. So just the presence of an AppleWatch alone can't be it. But I definitely do have the unlock-with-AppleWatch enabled, and I didn't think to disable while troubleshooting. I did disable bluetooth for a while though - it didn't help.

I do have a Gen4 ATV at home too, but it's hard-wired (if that matters).

There's definitely some sort of oddities about the 2018 OSX Wifi chipsets/drivers, that's for sure! Apple needs to fix this - I'm starting to see more posts in other forums griping about the problem.

Well, I may have spoken too soon. The method above (IPv6 to manual) seems to have helped with the frequency, but the problem is still occurring on my brand new Macbook Air running 10.14.4. Tried resetting PRRAM, renewing DHCP lease, nothing seems to help.

Interestingly, these wifi disconnects seem to only happen on my 2.4Ghz connection. In that scenario, I lose wifi, and have to manually reconnect by choosing the same wifi router from the drop down. Never reconnects automatically. On 5Ghz, I'll get dropouts now and then, but then it attempts to reconnect on its own.

This doesn't seem like a hardware issue... so I'm not planning to RMA the laptop. But it IS very annoying.

Fwiw, this doesn't seem to happen when I go downstairs, close to my router (an Airport Extreme 502.11n from around 2014). It's only happening when I'm upstairs, and my wifi signal is more weak/intermittent. Perhaps there's some unknown interference I'm getting. That might explain the 2.4Ghz factor.

Yes, I thought the ON cmd would help if you find out how to check it.

Well, my Wifi on...

bd1$ ifconfig en1

en1: flags=8863<UP,BROADCAST,SMART,RUNNING,SIMPLEX,MULTICAST> mtu 1500

ether 7c:c3

inet6 fe80::c5c:7928:daaa:8fa2%en1 prefixlen 64 secured scopeid 0x7

inet6 2607:fb90:f21 prefixlen 64 autoconf secured

inet6 2607:fb90 prefixlen 64 autoconf temporary

inet 192. netmask 0xffffff00 broadcast 192.

nd6 options=201<PERFORMNUD,DAD>

media: autoselect

status: active

My wifi Off...

im21:~ bd1$ ifconfig en1

en1: flags=8823<UP,BROADCAST,SMART,SIMPLEX,MULTICAST> mtu 1500

ether 7c:c3

nd6 options=201<PERFORMNUD,DAD>

media: autoselect

Thanks, I had tried that already as well. I currently have Bluetooth and Thunderbolt disabled.

I've been running my script and it has been an ok workaround to auto reconnect within a second or two. I've had it record the timings and the results are interesting. It is happening every hour at roughly the same time:

Sun May 19 10:32:49 PDT 2019

Sun May 19 10:32:57 PDT 2019

Sun May 19 11:33:09 PDT 2019

Sun May 19 11:33:16 PDT 2019

Sun May 19 12:33:28 PDT 2019

Sun May 19 12:33:35 PDT 2019

Sun May 19 13:33:47 PDT 2019

Sun May 19 13:33:54 PDT 2019

Sun May 19 14:34:08 PDT 2019

Sun May 19 14:34:15 PDT 2019

Sun May 19 15:34:29 PDT 2019

Sun May 19 16:34:46 PDT 2019

Sun May 19 16:34:54 PDT 2019

Sun May 19 17:35:06 PDT 2019

Sun May 19 17:35:13 PDT 2019

Sun May 19 18:35:26 PDT 2019

Sun May 19 19:35:45 PDT 2019

Sun May 19 19:35:52 PDT 2019

I have the same issue with my newly purchased 2018 macbook pro.

I have a 2010 and 2012 MacBook Pro. Both drop out after the 10.13.6 install. None of the iPads, Mac Pros have this issue

I've been using 10.14.2 since I got my laptop and I'm definitely still having the issue. It comes and goes, some days it's fine, some days it happens repeatedly.

Giving the TKIP/AES change a try and see if it works. Will report back.

What are you seeing in the networkutility???

Have you tried running indeterminate "ping 1.1.1.1" command in terminal? Does your connection restore when you on/off wifi?