Are you looking for a way to fix no Wi-Fi problem on Debian? If yes, then you have landed on the right page. In this tutorial, I will share a straightforward method that you can apply to fix the missing Wi-Fi adapter issue on Debian.
If you just did a fresh Debian install on a PC, then you will most likely run into an issue where you can't access Wi-Fi. Debian will not even show you wlan0 device if you run ip addr show the command.
This happens because the Debian ISO doesn't include the Wi-Fi firmware by default. Thus, you have to manually install the firmware from a non-free repo in order to use the Wi-Fi facility.
Depending on the network card manufacturer of your computer, you have to install the correct firmware. If you are using a laptop of popular brands such as Lenovo, Acer, Samsung or Asus, which usually use Atheros network card, it could be a little daunting to find the right version of the firmware to install.
I ran into this issue a little while ago and couldn't find a quick solution so I thought maybe share the fix, so others do not have to face what I went through. Let's cut to the chase and see the steps involved:
- First, identify the manufacturer of your Wi-Fi network card.
- Install the firmware matching your network card manufacturer.
See how to complete these two steps below.
Step 1: Identifying Wi-Fi Network Card Manufacturer on Debian
There is a CLI utility called lshw which can help you identify all the hardware installed on your computer, including the network card. A very good chance is that it will be pre-installed. If not, then you will have to install it by connecting your PC to an Ethernet connection. You can use your Android phone as an Ethernet device via USB tethering.
Install lshw like this:
sudo apt install lshw
It is now time to use lshw to find out the network card vendor. Run the command below and wait for it to generate the HTML report.
lshw -html > lsh.html
Open the generated HTML report(lsh.html) in the browser and search for network or network controller. You will find the result something like this:
From this screenshot, it is now evident that the vendor of my network card is Atheros! But it can also be Intel. It all depends on the PC/laptop manufacturer. Never mind, it doesn't matter because, firmware for both these cards available for Debian. See in next section, how to install it.
Step 2: Installing firmware matching your network card manufacturer on Debian.
In the last step, you will know what network card is installed on your system. So, based on what card it is, you need to install the correct firmware.
For Atheros Card:
On my Lenovo Ideapad 300-15ISK, it was Atheros card, as evident from the snapshots above.
So, to install the firmware for Atheros, you issue the following command.
sudo apt install firmware-atheros
After the firmware installs, you can try restarting your computer. You will now see that it will detect the available Wi-Fi networks nearby.
Alternatively, you can download the DEB file for the same firmware on some other device, transfer to the Debian PC, and manually install it.
Find and get Atheros firmware here: firmware-atheros (20190114-2) [non-free]
After getting the DEB file, you open the terminal in the Downloads directory and issue this command.
sudo dpkg -i firmware-atheros*
After it completes, successfully, you will have both; wla0 will start showing along with the Wi-Fi network.
For Intel Card:
To install the firmware for Intel network controller, you issue the following command.
sudo apt install firmware-iwlwifi
After it installs successfully, restart your computer. You will now see that it will detect nearby Wi-Fi networks.
Alternatively, you also download the DEB file for the same firmware on some other device, transfer to the Debian PC, and install it manually.
Find and get Intel Wireless firmware here: firmware-iwlwifi (20210315-3) [non-free]
After getting the DEB file, you open the terminal in the Downloads directory and issue this command.
sudo dpkg -i firmware-iwlwifi*
After it completes, successfully, you will have both; wlan0 will start showing along with the Wi-Fi network.
These are the only two steps you have to perform. If you follow them correctly, I am sure you will get Wi-Fi access on Debian in easy way. Although, I hope that they make this process a bit smoother by restoring these back to the installation ISO.