Wifi Inspection Tool For Mac



NetSpot is a wireless site survey and Wi-Fi Analyzer tool that works well on Mac OS X and Windows. It is compliant with any 802.11 networks. Check for Wi-Fi recommendations. When your Mac tries to connect to a Wi-Fi network, it checks for issues that affect its ability to create a fast, stable, and secure connection. If an issue is detected, the Wi-Fi status menu in the menu bar shows a new item: Wi-Fi Recommendations. Choose it to see recommended solutions. Mac Wireless Diagnostics Tool — a built-in Mac WiFi analyzer that’s included in all version of macOS. InSSIDer — the basic version of this WiFi analyzer allows Mac users to collect all essential information about nearby WiFi networks. AirRadar 5 — this free-to-try WiFi analyzer for Mac is great for performing large-scale WiFi site surveys. OS X: Want to know how good your Wi-Fi network really is? If you have OS X 10.7 or above (Lion or Mountain Lion), a handy but hidden built-in utility can monitor your network's performance. Using this tool you can display exactly who is on your WiFi network. You can see the Mac and IP addresses as well as the signal strength for all connected clients. This information assists in identifying security breaches of your network so you can make improvements if needed.

Today, one can only imagine what they would do without the internet and WiFi. While wired connections are still pretty much prevalent, nothing really beats the convenience of WiFi and wireless networks are also catching up in terms of speed. In this article, we are going to talk about how you can get the most out of your WiFi network by monitoring the performance of your network and improving it with these Wi-Fi analyzing tools for macOS.

Note: Most of these apps only work with the built-in WiFi adapter of your Mac and do not work with an external adapter.

Also Read: 10 Best WiFi Analyzer for Windows 10/8/7

1. macOS WiFi Analyser

macOS itself comes with a Wireless Diagnostics tool which you can use to scan all available wireless networks and get a summary of all the channels that your device can connect to. From the summary, it is able to suggest the best 2.4 GHz or 5GHz channel or network suitable for you. It can also be used to monitor the network performance, get log information and even as a sniffer to capture WiFi traffic.

To access it, while holding the Option key click on the WiFi icon in the menu bar and you should see an option as “Open Wireless Diagnostics” which should take you to your built-in WiFi analyzer. Or simply you can also open Spotlight Search and type in “Wireless Diagnostics”.

Pros:

  • Network Scanner
  • Monitor performance of connected WiFi
  • Log Info
  • Channel Suggestions

Cons:

  • Non-intuitive UI
  • No graphical representations

Verdict:

You can get away with the Wireless Diagnostics tool if you need to troubleshoot some minor issues in your personal network. Although it is not very powerful, given it comes built-in and free, you can’t really complain.

2. WiFi Signal

WiFi Signal is one of the more simpler apps on this list which provides all the information you need about your wireless network in a compact and elegant card fashion. The app lives on your menu bar, the icon of which can be fully customized and clicking on it gives you everything from the Signal to Noise Ratio (SNR) to the max data rate and MCS index of your connection. There is a real-time graphical representation of the signal rate and noise rate and the app can also recommend the best channel.

Read: Create a WiFi hotspot from Android which is already connected to WiFi

Pros:

  • Customizable menubar icon with live signal rate
  • Simple at a glance information
  • Notifications support
  • Channel recommendations

Cons:

  • Info of only connected network
  • No WiFi scanner

Verdict:

Wifi Inspection Tool For Mac Download

If you are someone who needs to check the strength or quality of your current network from time to time, this app provides you all the info in an elegant card fashion along with a customizable menu bar icon.

Download WiFi Signal ($4.99)

3. WiFi Explorer

WiFi Explorer is one of the highest rated WiFi analyzer apps on the Mac App Store and rightfully so. The app does a great job at scanning, monitoring, and troubleshooting wireless networks.

The app provides various real-time graphs for network details, signal strength, and spectrum which makes it much more intuitive for even a normal person to effectively use the app. Apart from the details of your connected network, the graphs also display all the networks your device can connect to, along with all their details which comes in really handy for choosing the strongest access point for your computer. A bonus feature of this app is that you can save all the results for a later review and even export all the network details as a CSV file.

Pros:

  • Graphical visualizations of the WiFi environment
  • Detailed descriptions of access points
  • Exportable to CSV format

Cons:

  • Pricey for the number of features it offers
  • No menubar icon

Verdict:

Wi-Fi Explorer is great for quickly identifying channel conflicts, signal overlapping or configuration problems that may be affecting the connectivity and performance of your home, office or enterprise wireless network.

Download WiFi Explorer ($19.99)

4. Wifi Scanner

The next app on our list is WiFi Scanner which adds a number of nifty features to the standard WiFi analysis tool.

Like the previous apps, it comes with various real-time and color co-ordinated graphs of the various available networks and provides details about them. But it doesn’t stop there as WiFi Scanner also brings a built-in WiFi speed testing feature that showcases the ping, download and upload speeds of your network to troubleshoot WiFi networks. There is also an extremely useful IP Scanner feature which will give you a list of all the devices that are connected to your network which is great for finding those WiFi “piggybackers”.

Pros:

  • Real time graphs and detailed network parameters
  • Speed Testing tool
  • IP Scanner
  • Exportable to CSV format

Cons:

  • No menubar icon or way to quickly glance at any info without opening up the app

Verdict:

Personally to me, WiFi Scanner seems the most bang for your buck and with all its features it functions like an all-in-one from scanning available networks and their performances to seeing which devices are connected to my network.

Download WiFi Scanner ($19.99)

5. NetSpot

NetSpot offers the convenient visual heat maps so you can easily catch any dead spots and how you can optimize access points locations; it is a WiFi analyzer tool like no other!

The app allows you to directly upload a map of your area or draw one using NetSpot’s map drawing tool. Once you have completed that, you can select between several visualizations like signal level, noise level, and access points which show you everything throughout the whole map in the form of heat maps. You can then identify the areas with low signal strength or problems and troubleshoot them.

Pros:

  • Full Network analysis and surveys
  • Support for area plan or map
  • Heat map visualizations
  • Suitable for commercial use

Cons:

  • Very pricey for personal use

Verdict:

NetSpot feels like a well polished complete WiFi analyzer app. It does feel a little redundant for personal use but with its commercial licensing, it should work great for commercial use or large office areas to detect dead zones and improve the overall connectivity of the area.

Download NetSpot (Freemium)

6. Honorable Mentions

Wifi Inspection Tool For Mac

WireShark is an open source and very powerful network analyzer used mainly by network admins and developers. Although it comes with a steep learning curve, it is one of the best packet analyzer apps available. WireShark is also capable of working in monitor mode, thereby letting you see what other devices are browsing/watching on your network. While normally you’d need an external WiFi adapter to these kinds of things, most Macs have a network card that supports monitor mode which overall works out pretty well.

JamWiFi is another free little tool which can not only analyze devices connected to your wireless network, but you can also disconnect them from using your WiFi. But it also comes with a downside which is it will also disconnect you and you have to reconnect again.

Wifi inspection tool for macbookWifi inspection tool for mac os

WiFi Signal Strength Explorer is a handy little utility which unlike the normal WiFi icon, shows you the strength of connection via dots/percent in the menu bar and by clicking it, you can access some basic details about your current network.

Wrapping Up: WiFi Analyser for Mac

So these were the best WiFi analyzer applications available for macOS and here’s a little recap. For casual use or not too deep analysis, the Wireless Diagnostics seem to work just fine. If you need something quick that shows you details about your connected network just from your menubar, check out WiFi Signal. As a WiFi analyzing tool, WiFi Explorer has got everything you might need. However, if you are a sucker for extra features, WiFi Scanner provides the most for your money. For large organizations or commercial purposes, nothing comes close to NetSpot. Did we miss anything? Which one do you use? Let us know in the comments below.

Read: 10 Step by Step Fix to WiFi Connected But No Internet Access

7,197 downloadsUpdated: August 9, 2019Ad-supported

Scan your wireless network automatically or by setting an IP range to detect all hosts connected to it and spot the ones unknown

What's new in WiFi Network Monitor 6.0:

  • Mega 2019 edition with enhanced easy to use GUI version & HTML report
Read the full changelog

WiFi Network Monitor is a simple, yet efficient application whose main purpose is to conduct a discovery operation for your Wi-Fi connection(s). It is able to scan a given IP address range in order to detect all the hosts connected to a wireless network so that you can identify intruders.

Quickly perform a network scan

The scan process takes very little time and the results can be exported locally, for later reference. All audiences can make use of it, on account of its simplicity and user-oriented interface.

You are advised to pay attention during the installation process, as the setup may include third-party applications that are not related to the program’s functionality. The best course of action, in this case, is to decline these offers.

Automatic scanning or by setting an IP range

The program automatically detects the network you’re currently connected to and calculates its range, however, if you want to specify a different interval, this is also possible. The duration of the scan process depends on the size of the range, however, the operation is carried out within acceptable time limits.

Once a scan is finished, the program displays a popup that specifies the number of hosts connected to the current network. More information is made available in the main window, where details such as host name and corresponding MAC and IP address are listed. This report can be exported locally, to TXT, HTML, XML or CSV format.

Conclusion

To sum it up, WiFi Network Monitor conducts network scans and insofar as monitoring options are concerned, we couldn't find any. It does not automatically detect the presence of a new host inside your Wi-Fi network, nor does it provide notifications or the possibility to reject connections.

Filed under

WiFi Network Monitor was reviewed by

Wifi Inspection Tool For Mac Os

Andreea Matei
3.0/5
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WiFi Network Monitor 6.0

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portable version
This is the portable version of the application. An installable version is also available: WiFi Network Monitor
runs on:
Windows 10 32/64 bit
Windows 2008
Windows 2003
Windows 8 32/64 bit
Windows 7 32/64 bit
Windows Vista 32/64 bit
Windows XP
file size:
3.5 MB
main category:
Network Tools
developer:
visit homepage

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