iOS 8 Wi-Fi Issues Blamed on Bonjour Over AWDL, WiFried Fix Released in Cydia

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Posted November 26, 2014 at 5:44am by iClarified

Mario Ciabarra, the developer behind MyWi, believes he has identified why iOS 8 and OS X Yosemite users are suffering from issues with Wi-Fi.

Ciabarra details what thinks is the issue in a post on Medium.

I’ve narrowed down the issue to the use of Apple’s Wireless Direct Link (AWDL) that is used for AirDrop, AirPlay, and Gaming connections. I’ll go out on a limb and say the WiFi issues are because of Apple’s choice of using Bonjour over AWDL and that, given the constraints of the WiFi hardware, this will be difficult to get right. But perhaps I’m crazy, and this is just a bug that can be fixed by Apple.

The problem can be easily replicated by performing a speed test and then while its running opening Control Center. This will cause the discoveryd process to browse and advertise services over your WiFi interface. You’ll see an immediate reduction in WiFi speeds that will continue for a minute or two while the AWDL interface continues to browse/advertise. You can even cause the issue by waking a nearby iOS device that then begins a browse and advertise of services affecting surrounding devices.

The solution? Until Apple issues a real fix, Ciabarra has released a Cydia package called WiFried. The package will allow you to enable/disable your D2DWiFi/AWDL and can be conveniently turned off/on under the AirDrop settings in Control Center.

Notably, this issue is said to also affect OS X Yosemite. You can disable AWDL and AirDrop in OS X Yosemite by typing the following command in Terminal:

sudo ifconfig awdl0 down

You can restore AirDrop and AWDL (and the WiFi issues) by typing this command:

sudo ifconfig awdl0 up

You can find more details at the link below. If you've been experiencing Wi-Fi issues in iOS 8 and this tweak fixes things, please let us know in the comments!

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iOS 8 Wi-Fi Issues Blamed on Bonjour Over AWDL, WiFried Fix Released in Cydia

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Charley N - July 4, 2015 at 6:20am

So far this don't work for the iPhone 4s. I'm still getting “gray-outs” and looking for a way to shut down the services causing them. Anyone who has ideas please post. Tweaks, SSH, punch phone three times, anything. Sick of finding ways to hard reset the wireless chip so I can have 1 to 4 hours of wifi.

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tng - November 27, 2014 at 5:45am

There is no fix. There isn't any problem. I check with 4 of my friends and don't see this issue. Sounds suspicious? hmmm

iMaginarius - November 27, 2014 at 2:50pm

"4 friends" is hardly a covering sample. For starters do any of them even have 5GHz? Even if they do, I am not one of your friends and I had the problem which is now fixed. So "hmmm" back at ya. If you or your 4 friends are not expriencing this, good for you. But isn't it great to know that if/when you do, there is a fix?!

iMaginarius - November 27, 2014 at 12:28am

For my part, I can confirm that installing WiFried fixed my issue on iPhone 6 (iOS 8.1) experiencing 10-15 MBit/s drop (DL) and 5MBit/s drop (UL) while opening Control Center while running the speedtest. After WiFried no drop whatsoever. The WiFi is 5GHz (Linksys E4200, DD-WRT). Thanks!

Jacob - November 26, 2014 at 11:21pm

It might be a chipset issue, Microsoft has been trying to fix a WIFI problem on their Surface Pro 3 device for a while.

gamerscul9870 - November 27, 2014 at 2:01am

At least they didn't pull the ultimate prank on themselves by mocking ipad with that. Can't get enough though.

dude1000 - November 26, 2014 at 8:11pm

Yea, you can see the services being advertised often in Console on OS X. However, I only noticed the issue when my Mac is connected to certain Wifi routers and but not all Wifi routers. I think it's a problem between hardware of the devices and routers, and possibly software issues of managing this advertising. But whatever, Apple will always just keep doing whatever they want.

qba - November 26, 2014 at 7:22pm

I respect this guy work, but I ran like 13 test w Speedtest and I see no difference on iPhone 6/64gb/8.1/jailbroken device.

Jackson Browne - November 26, 2014 at 4:59pm

Very interesting. What I don't understand, though, is why only some people are affected (although I grant that it is a lot of people). With this explanation, it sounds like it should affect everybody. I wonder if some people have different WiFi chips than others.

gamerscul9870 - November 26, 2014 at 1:55pm

Mine is working perfectly.

Mrinal - November 26, 2014 at 10:48am

I have a problem with my iPhone 5s.after updated to iOS 8,some apps and games are not working in wifi and sometimes very slow.if more than 2/3 apps running same time like music streaming app,those affected app works perfectly.i don't know wat type of problem is this.i complained several times.didn't get any answer.help me.affected app(whatsapp),game(clash of clans).

AppleGuy299 - November 26, 2014 at 12:31pm

Try backing up and restoring your phone.

Mrinal - November 26, 2014 at 12:41pm

Several times i did.even Apple Store people did 2 times.but same issue from ios 8.0 to 8.1.1

Jacob - November 26, 2014 at 6:32am

I tried to replicate this issue, but my wifi speed test was consistent with past wifi speed test.

Sly - November 26, 2014 at 10:20am

Jacob: I think it append only when you are set on 5Ghz instead of 2.4, at least it is my case, can you confirm?

Jacob - November 26, 2014 at 10:41am

My attempt to replicate the fault was using 5Ghz. I have attempted it several times without change. I wonder if this is part of what tried to fix with 8.1.1 for iPad 2 and iPhone 4S. I am using an iPad (4). As far I know my iPad only uses one antenna.