Free AT&T Wi-Fi Access for iPhones

MacRumors · Apr 30, 2008

A couple of readers have reported that AT&T hotspots are now offering free Wi-fi access to iPhone users. AT&T Wi-Fi hotspots at Barnes and Noble as well as Starbucks are now offering iPhone users a custom portal to access free Wi-fi. A special iPhone formatted page asks for your mobile phone number. Once entered, you can access the Wi-fi access for free. Blurry photo provided: MacRumors has been able to confirm this finding at a local Barnes and Noble.

AT&T recently partnered with Starbucks to provide Wi-fi access to Starbucks' 7000 stores nationwide. This partnership allowed existing AT&T broadband customers free access and AT&T promised that it would "soon extend the benefits of Wi-Fi at Starbucks to its wireless customers", but no official announcement has yet been made.

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Grimace · Apr 30, 2008

Awesome, finally a benefit from having AT&T&T&T!!

pkoch1 · Apr 30, 2008

Where was this found? What state(s)?

nineteentwelve · Apr 30, 2008

It seems that iPhone users get the best deal when going to Starbucks then. What with access to the custom iTunes Store, and now this. Nice deal if you ask me.

cheekybobcat · Apr 30, 2008

Definitely a plus for iPhone owners. I don't think this will be a plan-switcher for most :/

Can't wait to get mine though!

Foxglove9 · Apr 30, 2008

I thought if you owned an iPhone you automatically had wifi access as part of your AT&T service?

arn · Apr 30, 2008

pkoch1 said:
Where was this found? What state(s)?

Barnes & Noble in Virginia here. one of the user reports said NY.

arn

superfula · Apr 30, 2008

Foxglove9 said:
I thought if you owned an iPhone you automatically had wifi access as part of your AT&T service?

Nope. At least not up until now.

hypermark · Apr 30, 2008

A side bit of goodness is that I am an AT&T DSL customer who happens to also own an iPod touch (not iPhone). In any event, I went by Starbucks today discovered the AT&T Wi-Fi connection in my settings, chose that, input my AT&T email address and password, and woila, FREE Wi-Fi on my iPod touch. Very cool.

Mark

Sky Blue · Apr 30, 2008

Foxglove9 said:
I thought if you owned an iPhone you automatically had wifi access as part of your AT&T service?

I believe you normally have to pay for access at some stores.

nineteentwelve · Apr 30, 2008

Is this going to let iPhone users from across the world use AT&T Wi-Fi for free? For instance, if I was to visit New York and go to Starbucks, could my O2 iPhone log on for free. I doubt it myself, but I was just wondering how it is going to differentiate between the two. Or will just be based on the iPhone's browser user agent?

EDIT: I've just realised you need to log in with an AT&T username and password. Duh.

Thudpucker · Apr 30, 2008

Houston

It came up in Houston last weekend (4/26-27) but I've got t-mobile and couldn't use it -- the login screen came up automatically but didn't take my t-mobile #. Guess if you've got an unlocked iPhone it's edge only at Starbucks (didn't seem to be any way around the 'free ATT iphone' login screen to use an alternate wifi access account).

PlaceofDis · Apr 30, 2008

very nice! i'll have a stop at starbucks tomorrow and see if its here in Chicagoland yet.

zap2 · Apr 30, 2008

soo cool!

can I use my cell number for Wi-Fi on my laptop, or just the iPhone?

albeik · Apr 30, 2008

I always use EDGE at my local Starbucks here in Acton, MA. But this morning I got the said page on my iPhone with Free WiFi access. Sweeeeeet!

I was going to post it here - but I guess I was a little late

deep · Apr 30, 2008

Great!!!

I just keep getting more and more value out of this freaking awesome phone!!! All things non-Apple just suck!

happydude · Apr 30, 2008

a nice little perk . . .

. . . if only i drank coffee . . .

arn · Apr 30, 2008

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU like Mac OS X; en) AppleWebKit/420.1 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/3.0 Mobile/4A102 Safari/419.3)

zap2 said:
soo cool!

can I use my cell number for Wi-Fi on my laptop, or just the iPhone?

If you hit it with your laptop it goes to the normal login page which asks for a username and password

bassist51 · Apr 30, 2008

Does anybody know if the wifi can be accessed with an ipod touch?

deannnnn · Apr 30, 2008

zap2 said:
an I use my cell number for Wi-Fi on my laptop, or just the iPhone?

Yeah I was wondering the same thing...
I'm going to try it out tomorrow =)

D4F · Apr 30, 2008

Going to stop at Starbucks soon here in South FL and check it out.

NewSc2 · Apr 30, 2008

what?!?!?! no @^$*$# way. this is awesome news.

albeik · Apr 30, 2008

happydude said:
. . . if only i drank coffee . . .

I don't drink coffee... Always get my No-Water Soy Chai

moo083 · Apr 30, 2008

Seen it

I was at Starbucks on Saturday and saw this. Totally awesome. But I thought I would mention that the first time I got an error and it went to a T-Mobile error page. I guess AT&T is using the old T-Mobile Hotspots.

Dreil · Apr 30, 2008

arn said:
Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU like Mac OS X; en) AppleWebKit/420.1 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/3.0 Mobile/4A102 Safari/419.3)

If you hit it with your laptop it goes to the normal login page which asks for a username and password

Has anyone tried User Agent -> Mobil Safari 1.1.3 -- iPhone? That should allow you to get it.

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