APPLE I0S 26: New captive WiFi feature makes it easier to log in across devices

Logging in at hotels using your name and room number via a web portal can be a pain in the arse. Mainly because Apple’s shared password across devices feature doesn’t work for these ‘captive WiFi networks’.

The new iOS 26 and iPadOS 26 add a feature to iPhones and iPads that will solve this issue. This feature will de-stress my digital life!

Captive WiFi networks

You can recognise a captive Wi-Fi network because it requires you to fill out a web form to gain access. For travellers, they are commonly found at hotels, coffee shops, airports, and similar public places. The new Apple IOS 26 feature, will make it quicker and easier to connect all your Apple devices to this kind of network.

Creative Strategies analyst Max Weinbach spotted this new feature. The change means that sign-in details for captive Wi-Fi networks will be synced across iPhones and iPads when running iOS 26 and iPadOS 26. Weinbach uses his experience while staying at a Hilton hotel, where his iPhone displayed a prompt to fill in Wi-Fi details from his iPad that he had previously connected to the hotel’s WiFi network.

Mark Gurman of Bloomberg, who is renowned for his access to leaked details from Apple, was the first to report that Apple was planning this feature. Interestingly, the feature was not mentioned during the latest World Wide Developers Conference (WWDC 2025). Others soon found a reference to the feature in the first IOS 26 beta code.

It is expected that iOS 26 will be released in September 2025.

2PAXfly Takeout

This will make my life so much easier when I travel and have to log into hotel networks.

I’m currently staying at a hotel in Malta, attending a conference. Although the hotel does not use the captive WiFi feature, the conference I am attending does. Frustratingly, it requires a whole form to be completed each time you access the network. That means each day of the conference, at least, you need to log in.

What a pain. I hope the new IOS 26 feature will streamline this process.