Have you ever experienced this annoying situation?
You’re connected to the internet and using the Wi-Fi, but you have no idea what the actual password for that Wi-Fi is.
Maybe someone typed in the password for you. Maybe you haven’t touched your wireless router in five years and you lost the manual.
Whatever the case may be, you need to know how to check your Wi-Fi password even though you’re already connected. Follow the steps listed below to do exactly that:
Windows 8
If you have Windows 8 (not Windows 8.1), then there’s a really easy way to do this. Just right-click on your Wi-Fi icon in the system tray, then click View connection properties.
You’ll see all of the information you need to know about your current connection. That’s it!
Windows 8.1
For whatever reason, Microsoft removed this handy feature in Windows 8.1. If you’re using Windows 8.1, then you need to follow these steps:
Step 1) Right-click the Wi-Fi symbol in your system tray and click on Open Network and Sharing Center.
Step 2) Click Change adapter settings
Step 3) Right-click the Wi-Fi adapter, then click Status from the menu that pops up
Step 4) Click Wireless Properties from the Wi-Fi Status menu
Step 5) Click the Security tab to see the blocked out password, then check the box beside Show characters to see your Wi-Fi password pop up
How to Check the Passwords of All Previous Connections (all Windows versions)
If you want to really impress your friends, then tell them you can name the wireless passwords for any Wi-Fi network you’ve ever connected to.
You can do this surprisingly easily using the netsh command. That command lets you identify the password for your current connection as well as all previous connections you’ve made.
The command looks like this:
netsh wlan show profile name=”ConnectionName” key=clear
Just type that command into your command window (cmd.exe) and see all the connections you’ve ever made with your computer. You replace ConnectionName with the name of the wireless network.
It’s important to note that you only need the quotation marks when the name of the wireless network has a space in it. Otherwise, you can leave the quotation marks off it.
After typing in the command above for a particular Wi-Fi network, you’ll see four main settings, including:
-Profile Information
-Connectivity settings
-Security settings
-Cost settings
The password is listed under Security settings in a similar spot as it was above.
Shout out to our friends at 4SysOps.com for the tutorial!
