I’ve noticed that the captive portal often does not show up with Linux when accessing public WiFi.

A captive portal is a web page that pops up when you first access that public WiFi.

The workaround is to access a site which just uses HTTP. In the background, operating systems such as Mac OS hit http://captive.apple.com. In my case, I just memorize the URL neverssl.com.

To manually trigger the captive portal, follow these steps:

  • Connect to the Wi-Fi network.
  • Open your web browser.
  • Navigate to neverssl.com.
  • This should redirect you to the captive portal login page, allowing you to complete the login process and gain internet access.