Mac – specify WiFi network AP to connect to using MAC address

mac addressNetworkwifi

I would like to connect to a specific AP in a mesh network of 12 APs. My Mac automatically connects to the AP with the highest signal strength, but this unit is misconfigured and can't connect to the internet.

Since every AP node in the mesh uses the same BSSID, I can only tell them apart by their hardware MAC address.

Is there a way to tell MacOS to connect to WiFi by MAC instead of by BSSID?

I've looked at the "networksetup" command and don't see how to do it.

Thanks!

Best Answer

Open up the Terminal application, and try the following:

/System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/Apple80211.framework/Versions/Current/Resources/airport --associate=XXX --bssid=YYY

Where XXX is the SSID/network name and YYY the MAC address of the access point you want to connect to.