How to Find and View Your Wi-Fi Password on Mac

When you connect your Mac to a Wi-Fi network and enter its password, it will be saved so that you don’t have to re-enter the password every time you want to connect to that network. In this way, whenever your Mac is within the range of a known Wi-Fi network, it will get connected automatically. Most other devices, including iOS devices, work in a similar manner.

Since you’re not required to enter the Wi-Fi password every time you connect, you’d most probably forget the password as time passes on. This becomes problematic when you have to re-enter the Wi-Fi password on another device or share it with a friend.

Fortunately, Mac saves your Wi-Fi passwords to the Keychain, which is a secure and reliable password management tool for macOS. You can easily obtain your saved Wi-Fi passwords with Keychain Access.

Another alternative would be to use Terminal to view your saved Wi-Fi passwords, which is usually recommended for advanced users and people who are familiar with UNIX commands.

In this tutorial, we’ll show you how to access and view your saved Wi-Fi passwords on Mac using either Keychain Access or Terminal.

How to View Your Wi-Fi Password Using Keychain Access

1. On your Mac, press the Cmd+Space keys to bring up Spotlight, then search and open Keychain Access.

2. In the sidebar, click on System, then select Passwords from the Category section.

   

3. On the right, you’ll find a list of all the saved Wi-Fi passwords. Find your Wi-Fi network in the list, then double-click on it to open.

4. Tick the box that says Show password.

   

5. Enter your Mac’s password as prompted, then press the OK button.

   

6. You can now view your Wi-Fi’s password next to the Show password box. Take note of the Wi-Fi password so that you won’t forget it again.

How to View Your Wi-Fi Password Using Terminal

1. In addition to the Keychain Access method shown above, you can also use Terminal to view your saved Wi-Fi passwords. If you’re not familiar with Terminal and any of its commands, then I would recommend that you follow the previous method as it’s much easier and safer. Otherwise, here’s how you can view your WiFi password using Terminal.

   Press Cmd+Spacebar keys to bring up Spotlight, then search and open Terminal.

2. Enter the following command in Terminal, then press Enter:

   security find-generic-password -ga “NameOfWiFi” | grep “password:”

   You have to replace “NameOfWiFi” with the exact name of your WiFi network. For instance, if your Wi-Fi’s name is “Cisco”, then the command would look like this:

   security find-generic-password -ga “Cisco” | grep “password:”

3. A prompt will appear to enter your Mac’s username and password. Go ahead and enter them, then press the Allow button.

4. Terminal will now display the password of your Wi-Fi network.