There may be many reasons for seeking free WiFi or hotspot. Maybe you are on a limited plan on your cell phone, so you want WiFi to spend less on mobile data. It may also happen that the place you are visiting is out of coverage area for your Cell Phone Carrier. Whatever the reason, you can always find free WiFi near you. This post is about how to get free WiFi anywhere for your laptop or mobile phone.
How to get free WiFi anywhere
1] Chain Establishments
Plenty of establishments provide free WiFi to keep their consumers with them. Starbucks, for example, provides free WiFi to people who’d hang out there throughout the evening. Check for franchisees of well-known supply chains. They often have free WiFi. If you are a regular customer and on good terms with the manager of the place, you can get the manager to give you the chain’s WiFi password.
Here is a list of some establishments that provide free WiFi to its customers. See if you can reach one nearby.
Hotel chains that provide free WiFi:
- Marriot
- Hyatt
- Comfort Inn
- Taj Group of Hotels
- Holiday Inn
Then there are retailers who provide free WiFi to its customers for retaining them longer. The advantage the retailers get is the people will stay longer and thus; they can earn more on food, beverages, or anything they are selling. Check out these retailers in your area
- Apple Store
- Barnes and Noble
- Best Buy
- Gap Inc.
- H&M
- IKEA
- Lowes
- Safeway
- Staples
- Whole Foods
Some restaurants, like Starbucks, also allow you to use their WiFi for free. Following is a list that I found on the Internet.
- Burger King
- Café Coffee Day
- Denny’s
- Dunkin
- Einstein Bros.
- Hooters
- Krispy Kreme
- McDonald’s
- Panera
- Peet’s Coffee
- Quiznos
- Starbucks
- Subway
- Taco Bell
- Wendy’s
These restaurants are available almost everywhere – semi-rural, urban, and metro areas, so accessing one should not be a tough task. You can simply search for “Free WiFi near me” on Google or Bing to locate and get free WiFi for laptop and phones.
The above lists are not comprehensive. There are many more brands that offer free WiFi. You may also get free WiFi in local libraries and public places.
Some public places also arrange for Free Wi-Fi. Parks like Disney and similar places offer free Wi-Fi. In India, around 400 railway stations offer free Wi-Fi to people. This is an initiative by the Government of India and Google Inc.
2] Mobile Tethering – Get free WiFi for phone and laptop
If you do not trust the free WiFi available (it is easy to hack computers at public hotspots) at above-mentioned brands, you can go for mobile tethering if you have enough charge/load for the Internet.
There are three ways to do this:
- Use the yesteryear’s dial-up modem: In this case, you simply connect your phone to your computer and dial your Internet Service Providers’ number. Since it is a call in progress, people trying to reach via your mobile carrier will get “engaged” tone.
- You can attach pair your mobile and laptop using Bluetooth and set up a Dial-Up Connection; this too won’t inform you about incoming calls
- The best method is to set up a Hotspot using your mobile data. For this, you go to phone settings and select Tethering or Hot Spot option. If you haven’t already created a password, it will prompt you for one. Once the mobile hotspot is established other phones and computers can be connected to it just as you would use WiFi.
3] Mobile apps to get free WiFi
If you search your Google Play Store or Apple App Store, you will find many apps that claim they can connect you to free Wi-Fi hotspot available within your area/locality. Some such apps are:
- Wi-Fi Hotspot 3G/4G
- Hotspot Tethering
- Portable Wi-Fi Hotspot
- Mobile Hotspot
- Wiffinnity.
We cannot, however, claim that these apps would always be clean and won’t spam. Read user reviews and check the ratings of each app before installing them to get free Wi-Fi for phones and laptops.
Apart from these, there are several other ways to get a free WiFi connection. Take a portable modem when your travel, use your ISPs hotspot, etc.
PandaSecurity has come up with an interesting Infographic on this.
If I missed any way you can get free WiFi, please let others know in comments section.
Remember, considering the dangers of free WiFi, when you connect to a free WiFi hotspot, it is always a good idea to use VPN software and follow these WiFi Security Tips – especially when traveling.
