Frequent travellers who juggle a number of Apple units throughout inns and airports will respect a brand new function in iOS 26 and iPadOS 26 that can make it far simpler to maintain every thing related on the go.
Final month, Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman reported that Apple was engaged on a function to sync captive Wi-Fi credentials throughout a number of units, permitting customers to extra seamlessly get their units related to Wi-FI in inns, airports, espresso retailers, and different locations that current an in-browser sign-on web page earlier than permitting entry to the web.
Whereas Apple has lengthy synced commonplace Wi-Fi passwords throughout units, captive networks current an extra impediment: though the Wi-Fi community is synced, you continue to must undergo a portal web page on every of your units earlier than you will get on-line. If you wish to use your iPhone, iPad, and Mac in your resort room, you’ll must undergo the captive portal for every machine, and you could have to do that a few times a day throughout an prolonged keep, because the periods sometimes expire after a number of hours.
On the time, Gurman predicted the function can be coming in “iOS 19,” however that was earlier than the large reveal that Apple can be turning the dial to 26 this yr. Nonetheless, when Apple unveiled its new working methods throughout its Worldwide Builders Convention (WWDC), there wasn’t even a passing point out of it, nor did it seem on the slide displaying a roundup of 36 further options — a slide that included different unstated gems like customizable snooze timers, adaptive energy, and auto-sleeping AirPods.
This led some to consider that the function wasn’t prepared but. As Gurman lately identified in his Energy On publication, Apple has been extra cautious about asserting options that gained’t be prepared earlier than iOS 26.0 or iOS 26.1 after it acquired everybody’s hopes up with a longer-term promise of Siri options that didn’t materialize. Gurman mentioned that he nonetheless expects “the power to sync your wi-fi community login data at a resort or health club throughout units” to return in some unspecified time in the future this yr, as hints of the function have already been discovered within the iOS 26 beta code.
The excellent news is that it appears we gained’t have to attend. It’s unclear if this function was up and working within the first developer beta, however analyst Max Weinbach stumbled onto it not lengthy after putting in the second developer beta.
Whereas inarguably helpful, the brand new function isn’t fairly as clear as we’d hoped. You’ll must signal into the captive Wi-Fi community on a minimum of one machine, which is completely comprehensible; nonetheless, it doesn’t seem that your different units can be signed into the captive Wi-Fi community mechanically.
Primarily based on Weinbach’s put up, this function primarily merely gives to autofill no matter data the captive Wi-Fi portal requires. That also saves time and frustration, particularly for these portals that require particular data, akin to a room quantity, visitor identify, or different entry code, however it gained’t save a lot time for people who merely want you to test a consent field.
With the wide range of captive portals, it could be too difficult for Apple to do that seamlessly. Then once more, we’re additionally solely on the second beta, and we’re coping with one anecdotal account of the function. Apple might be able to do extra with particular forms of captive portals that provide extra standards-based authentication strategies. The function nonetheless seems to be hit-or-miss in these early developer betas, so it’s too early to say what the ultimate implementation will appear like.