How to activate iPhone hotspot

You have connection problems at home, so have you thought about using your iPhone as a router to share the connection with your PC but you don’t have the faintest idea of how to do it? Are you often out and about with your laptop and, without a wireless network to rely on, would you like to use the connection of your “iPhone by” to surf the Web from a computer even in such circumstances? If the answer to at least one of these questions is yes, don’t worry: you’ve come to the right place at the right time!

With today’s guide, in fact, I will explain how to activate the iPhone hotspot by providing you with all the information you need to succeed in your intent. In addition to the detailed procedure to enable the function that allows you to “transform” an iPhone into a real router, you will also find all the instructions to take advantage of the data connection of your “iPhone by” and surf the Internet from any other device.

How do you say? Is that exactly what you wanted to know? So let’s not dwell further and see how to proceed. Make yourself comfortable, take all the time you see fit and dedicate yourself to reading the next paragraphs. By carefully following my instructions and trying to put them into practice, I assure you that you will be able to activate the hotspot on the iPhone without encountering any kind of problem. Let it bet?

Index

• Activate iPhone hotspot
• Connect to the network generated by the iPhone
• In case of problems

Activate iPhone hotspot

Before explaining in detail how to activate iPhone hotspot, it may be useful to know what the browsing speed is when you use the iPhone as a router and, above all, what are the costs to be incurred to activate the hotspot.

The browsing speed depends entirely on the strength of the 3G / 4G / 5G signal received by the iPhone. As far as costs are concerned, however, it depends on the type of tariff plan subscribed: most of the tariff plans of Italian operators include tethering, i.e. sharing the connection with other devices, so you only pay for the standard data consumption. In some particular cases, however, there may be added costs for this activity. Therefore, I advise you to carefully check the terms of use of your plan before putting into practice the indications I am about to give you.

Having clarified this, in order to activate the hotspot function on your iPhone, the first fundamental step you must take is to verify that the data network of your “iPhone by” is set correctly. To do this, take your iPhone, tap the gear wheel icon to access the iOS Settings and press the Cellular item. In the new screen that appears, check that the Cellular Data option is active: if not, move its switch from OFF to ON.

Once this is done, on the Mobile screen, tap on the Personal Hotspot item and move the lever relating to the Allow others to access option from OFF to ON, in order to activate the hotspot. In the same way you can also proceed from the main iOS Settings screen, by pressing on the Personal Hotspot option.

If you wish, you can also change the Wi-Fi password for the network generated by your iPhone by tapping on the Wi-Fi Password item, typing the wireless key you want to use in the Password field and pressing the Finish button, at the top right.

Please note that you can also enable the use of the hotspot through the Control Center of your iPhone. In this case, if you have an iPhone with Face ID, swipe from top to bottom from the top right corner, while if you have an iPhone with a physical Home button, swipe from bottom to top starting from the center screen.

At this point, make a long tap on the antenna icon and, in the new screen displayed, press on the Cellular Data option (the antenna icon ), to activate the data connection and then on the Personal Hotspot item (the chain icon ), to activate the hotspot function. Simple, right?

Connect to the network generated by the iPhone

After being able to activate the hotspot function on your iPhone by following the instructions I have given you, you can finally connect to the network generated by your “iPhone by” from any computer, tablet or other devices. To do this, just use the standard procedure for connecting to a wireless network.

All you have to do from a computer or any other device through which you intend to take advantage of the connection generated by the iPhone is to access the section relating to Wi-Fi connections, select the iPhone network of [name] (instead of [name] find the name you assigned to your iPhone) generated by your phone and type the password used to protect it. Below you will find explained in detail how to do it depending on the device in use.

• Windows PC: to connect to the network generated by the iPhone, click on the network icon (the one with the cleats ) visible at the bottom right of the taskbar, next to the Windows clock, select the iPhone network of [name] from the list of available networks, enter the password in the appropriate field and press the Next button.
• Mac: click on the multifunction icon (the control bars ) located in the menu bar, select the Wi-Fi button, then the iPhone network of [name] from the list of available networks, enter the password in the Password field and click on the Sign in button, to establish the connection. Please note that if you have an iPhone updated to iOS 8 or later and if you have a Mac released from 2012 onwards with macOS Yosemite or later versions installed, it is not necessary to activate the tethering function to use the Dell hotspot. ‘iPhone because, if you enable Bluetooth on the two devices, as soon as they are close to each other, the network generated by the iPhone will automatically appear in the networks detected by the Mac. More info here.
• iOS / iPadOS: to connect another iPhone or iPad to the network generated by your iPhone, go to Settings iOS / iPadOS, select the item Wi-Fi, press the option of [name] iPhone visible in the section Networks and type the related password to access the network in question.
• Android: first, access the Settings of the device in your possession by pressing the gear wheel icon on the home screen or in the drawer, select the Wireless and Networks and Wi-Fi items and, if necessary, move the lever next to it to the Wi-Fi option from OFF to ON. Once this is done, in the Available networks section, tap on the network generated by the iPhone ( iPhone of [name] ), enter the password and press the Connect Keep in mind that the information I have just given you may vary depending on the brand and model of smartphone you have, as well as the version of Android installed on the latter.

When one or more devices are connected to the wireless network generated by the iPhone, a blue icon appears on the phone screen at the top left, indicating that at least one device is connected to the network.

Furthermore, I point out that it is possible to use the iPhone hotspot also via USB or Bluetooth. In the first case, all you have to do is connect your “iPhone by” to the computer via the supplied Lightning cable, start iTunes (only if you have a Windows PC) and authorize the connection by answering affirmatively to the warnings that appear on the screen of the two. devices.

If, on the other hand, you prefer to proceed via Bluetooth, first you have to pair the iPhone to the computer from the Bluetooth settings of the PC, type the security code displayed on the computer screen on the “iPhone” and, in conclusion, connect the iPhone to the PC. In that regard, my guide on how to pair two Bluetooth devices may be useful.

Regardless of the type of connection you have chosen to take advantage of your iPhone’s hotspot when you no longer need to use your phone as a router, remember to interrupt the connection and stop sharing the data network. To do this, access the iOS Settings by tapping on the gear wheel icon, press on the Personal Hotspot item and move the lever next to the Allow others to access option from ON to OFF.

To speed things up, you can also press directly on the blue icon located at the top left of your iPhone screen and, in the new screen displayed, move the lever relating to the Allow others to access option from ON to OFF . To learn more, I leave you to my tutorial on how to use the iPhone hotspot.

In case of problems

If you have followed the instructions I gave you in the previous paragraphs of this guide in detail but, despite this, you have not been able to activate the hotspot on your iPhone or you are experiencing problems that prevent you from browsing using the network generated “IPhone by”, I suggest you check that the network settings of the iPhone referring to your operator are correct.

To do this, press on the gear wheel icon to access the iOS Settings, tap on the Cellular item and select the Cellular data network option. In the new screen displayed, check that the data entered correspond to those indicated below and, if not, correct them.

• If you have a SIM TIM– At the field APN Section Cellular Data should find the string Tim.it, while at the field APN section personal hotspot you should find the entry ibox.tim.it. The Username and Password fields of both sections must be empty instead. To find out more, you can consult my guide on how to configure Internet TIM and the company’s official website.
• If you have a Vodafone SIM– In the APN field of the Cellular Data section you should find the string vodafone.it, while in the APN field of the Personal Hotspot section you should find the internet entry. The Username and Password fields of both sections must be empty instead. For more info, I suggest you take a look at my guide on how to configure Vodafone Internet and the official reference page of the operator.
• If you have a WINDTRE SIM– In the APN field of the Cellular data and Personal Hotspot section you should find the entry it . The Username and Password fields of both sections must be empty instead. To find out more, you can consult my guide on how to configure WINDTRE Internet and the official website of the telephone operator .
• If you have an Iliad SIM– In the APN field of the Cellular data and Personal Hotspot section you should find the iliad entry. The Username and Password fields of both sections must be empty instead. You can get more information by reading my guide on how to configure Internet Iliad and by consulting the official website of the French operator .

If even in doing so you continue to encounter problems with the hotspot on the iPhone, I suggest you get in touch with the customer service of your telephone operator following the instructions to speak with an operator TIM, Vodafone, WINDTRE and Iliad. Alternatively, if you are concerned that the problem is due to a malfunction of your iPhone, you can contact Apple.

If, on the other hand, you are interested in understanding how to prevent your computer or your other devices that you have connected to the generated network from connecting automatically to the iPhone hotspot every time, follow these guidelines.

• If you are using a Windows PC, click on the Start button (the flag icon located in the lower left corner of the screen), access the Settings menu by pressing the gear wheel icon located on the left side of the menu that appeared on the desktop, select the Network and Internet and Wi-Fi options and access the management of known networks. At this point, click on the network generated by your iPhone, press the Properties button and move the lever relating to the item Connect automatically if in the field from Activated to disabled.
• If you are using a Mac, access System Preferences, click on the Network item and, via the Network Name drop-down menu, select the iPhone option of [name]. Then remove the check mark next to the item Automatically connect to this network and that’s it.
• If you are using any other operating system or platform, you can remedy this by changing the hotspot password on the iPhone by following the specific instructions that I have already given you in the previous lines of this guide.

How do you say? You haven’t yet connected a computer or other device to the network generated by your iPhone and want to prevent automatic connections? In this case, remove the check mark from the item relating to password storage before connecting to the network generated by the iPhone and you’re done.