Chromebook WiFi issues after recent update being looked into

Chromebooks basically are laptops that come baked with Chrome OS (Google’s operating system for laptops which supports Android apps, games and more) instead of the usual Windows or macOS.

These lightweight and budget friendly devices are designed to be used mainly while connected to Internet. However, Chromebooks do support many Chrome as well as Android apps that can be accessed even when offline.

Just like Google Chrome, Chrome OS also uses three update release channels – stable, beta and dev. But after receiving the stable channel update for ChromeOS that were pushed in April, Chromebook users have been encountering WiFi-related issues.

While some say after waking the device from sleep, the WiFi just won’t connect until they restart their device. Others say the problem occurs after some period of inactivity, even without closing the laptop. Moreover, disconnecting and reconnecting to WiFi helps, but only randomly.

All in all soon after the laptop goes to sleep either due to inactivity or when users shut it, the Wifi disconnects. And restarting the device is the only way out to reconnect to WiFi most of the times. Take a look at how some of the complainants word the issue across Chromebook help forum:

When wifi is shortly broken or laptop was put in sleepmodus, internet stays broken when I open my chromebook. Have to fully restart my chromebook to get internet. Sometimes after 10 minutes Chromebook does disconnect internet by himselve and even then I have to fully restart my chromebook to solve the problem.

I can confirm that I don’t even need to close the chromebook; even if it’s open and connected to Gmail I will lose the connection if there’s no activity. Basically, any time the chromebook goes to “sleep” (the screen goes dark) the only way to restore the wifi connection is to power off the chromebook and restart it — even if the icon in the bottom right shows that the chromebook is connected to the network.

3 days ago I opened the screen in the morning and it tried many times to connect and then showed ” DHCP lookup failure”. I powered down, restarted and it connected okay. Since then every time it has “gone to sleep” it has not connected.

While the issue creeped in after Chrome OS’s April update, users running the later OS versions also encounter the same. As far as we can see, the problem mainly affects Samsung Chromebook users.

Coming to what has the company said and done so far, what’s good is that soon after the matter was reported, a Chromebook help forums product expert pitched in and informed users that the matter is being investigated.

The team is investigating reports of WiFi issues.

Coming to the latest development on the matter, just a few days back, another forums product expert spoke on the matter and confirmed the glitch saying:

There is a known issue with wifi not reconnecting after sleep. It’s being worked on.

Here’s hoping whatever is causing the ‘WiFi not connecting after wake from sleep’ issue gets resolved soon. Rest assured, we’re keeping a tab and will let you know as and when any new development comes to our sight. In the meantime, you can try the forums product expert’s suggested workaround.

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