Configure wifi on Raspberry Pi

Configure wifi by editing the wpa_supplicant.conf file

1. Load the SD card containing the OS on a Laptop/PC
2. Open the wpa_supplicant.conf file in a text editor We shall use nano text editor.
3. sudo nano rootfs/etc/wpa_supplicant/wpa_supplicant.conf

A typical wpa_supplicant.conf file looks like this

ctrl_interface=DIR=/var/run/wpa_supplicant GROUP=netdev
country=<IN
update_config=1

network={
 ssid="rpi_lab"
 psk="12345"
}

Add the entries of the new wifi connection so that the modfied file is as below

ctrl_interface=DIR=/var/run/wpa_supplicant GROUP=netdev
country=<IN
update_config=1

network={
 ssid="rpi_lab"
 psk="12345"
}

network={
ssid="EC204"
psk="cet@123"
}

Press ctrl + s to save the file

Press ctrl + x to exit the editor

Load the SD card into Raspberry Pi and power up

Configure wifi headless

The rpi-imager allows one to configure the wifi from GUI while flashing the OS on to SD card. But sometimes you may have configure the wifi on Raspberry Pi in headless mode (ie, without a monitor). This is done by creating a wpa_supplicant.conf file in the boot folder of SD card. You can also create a default user with password as explained in this post below. A template wpa_supplicant.conf is also provided.

Configure wifi on Raspberry Pi headless

A template wpa_supplicant.conf file