How to Show QR Code for Wi-Fi on iPhone, Mac, iPad

One very easy and convenient way to share access to a wi-fi router is by generating a QR code for joining that wi-fi router, which can be useful for house guests, offices, waiting rooms, rentals, restaurants, shops, and just about anywhere else with wi-fi that people might want to join. It can also make it much easier for someone to join a wi-fi network without them having to enter in a long complicated password. The latest versions of system software for Mac, iPhone, and iPad, make this task easier than ever, able to generate a QR code for any connected wi-fi router that someone can easily join simply by pointing the camera at that QR code.

While Apple has long had a useful feature on iPhone, Mac, and iPad to share wi-fi passwords easily from iPhone to iPhone, or with a Mac, that feature doesn’t work if you’re tryin to share the wi-fi authentication information with someone on an Android phone, a Windows PC, a Linux machine, or even an older iPhone, Mac, or iPad. Sometimes the wifi password sharing feature doesn’t even work with the newest model devices too, as I myself ran into recently with two new iPhone’s trying to join a friends wi-fi network. In these situations, you might find tremendous utility in generating a QR code for joining a particular wi-fi network, which allows you to easily share a wi-fi network with others by them simply scanning the QR code with their device, to which they’ll join the network immediately. This also has an added benefit of allowing people to join a wi-fi network without you having to share the wi-fi password directly, which is handy if the wifi router has a convoluted or complicated password.

Sharing passwords to wi-fi routers is kind of a hassle, so let’s learn how to make sharing and joining wi-fi networks much easier by making a QR code for any wi-fi network your iPhone, Mac, or iPad is currently connected to.

How to Make a QR Code for a Wi-Fi Router from iPhone, Mac, iPad

This process works the exact same way for iPhone, iPad, and Mac, and with any wi-fi router or network that you are connected to, here’s what you need to do:

1. Open the Passwords app on your Mac, iPhone, or iPad
2. Go to “Wi-Fi” and then choose the wi-fi network you want to show a QR code for



3. Select “Show Network QR Code” to show the QR code large and on screen

With the QR code shown on the display, the person wanting to connect to the wi-fi router only has to scan the QR code on their device for them to immediately join that network. This is usually just a matter of opening the Camera app on an iPhone, iPad, or Android phone, and pointing it at the QR code to read and scan it.

This works the same on iPhone, Mac, or iPad, though the interface is just slightly different on Mac versus iPhone. The screenshots above demonstrate this on iPhone, and the screenshot below shows the “Show QR Code” feature on Mac in the Passwords app:

And yes you can also print out this QR code and stick it on a refrigerator, a work break room, a waiting room in an office or clinic, at a short term rental, or where ever else you might find yourself wanting to share a wi-fi network easily so others can join by QR code scanning.

This article is obviously geared towards modern Mac, iPhone, and iPad devices that include the Passwords app, which was introduced in MacOS Sequoia and iOS 18, but that doesn’t mean your devices that aren’t running the latest system software are out of luck, because older devices can use the Shortcuts app to accomplish something similar for sharing wi-fi access via QR code.

One of many handy little known features of the modern Apple operating system suite, so cheers to mjtsai.com for bringing it to our attention so that we can share it with you.