Restore Wi-Fi Networks on Mac After iPhone Reset

[MJedi]

Hello,

I had to perform a reset network settings on my iPhone. However, this also removed all the wi-fi networks in my iCloud Keychain, which has now synched on my iPad and 2017 MacBook Pro, and removed all previously connected wi-fi networks on them.

I have another MacBook Pro which I have not turned on, which still has the known wi-fi networks configured. Is there a way to restore the information from this MBP back to iCloud Keychain? Not knowing how iCloud Keychain works, I'm assuming it takes the newest data about wi-fi networks I've connected to as the true copy. Which is probably why my iPad and 2017 MBP has no known wi-fi networks on them, instead of what was stored previously.

I now realize it was a mistake to connect back to my wi-fi network after the reset on the iPhone. I should've waited for the iCloud to restore the wi-fi information since it has LTE!

Thanks in advance for any assistance.

 

[MJedi]

Does anyone have any suggestions?

 

[Velin]

Something doesn't sound right. Merely resetting your iPhone doesn't (or shouldn't) reset your keychain, especially if you have other ios devices using the chain, like your iPad and Pro. Have you accessed the Keychain app and confirmed they're not there? Also, I'd turn off wifi, and then turn on the second Pro and access keychain to see if the wifi networks are there.

One other thing to try on your iPhone -- turn off wifi, then turn it back on. It sounds ridiculously easy and stupid, I know, but people have resolved this issue in the past by simply restarting their wifi.

 

[MJedi]

I thought so too. But after I did the reset network settings, my iPad and MacBook Pro was disconnected from my wi-fi network, and had forgotten the network. On my MBP, the list of known networks it used to know was all gone.

I've resigned to the fact that I'll just need to reconnect to every place I used to connect.

 

[bcave098]

This is expected behaviour. Resetting the network settings clears saved Wi-Fi networks in iCloud Keychain (though I don't know of any documentation on this behaviour). Once the reset is done, the networks are removed and are not recoverable, and any networks joined from that point are added to the keychain.

 

[ddmcnair]

Did you try restoring the iPhone from iTunes?

 

[MJedi]

This is expected behaviour. Resetting the network settings clears saved Wi-Fi networks in iCloud Keychain (though I don't know of any documentation on this behaviour). Once the reset is done, the networks are removed and are not recoverable, and any networks joined from that point are added to the keychain.

Thanks for the confirmation.

Did you try restoring the iPhone from iTunes?

I didn't try this. I figured it's more trouble to restore the iPhone over reconnecting to my wi-fi networks.