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UniFi Hotspots and Captive Portals

UniFi’s Hotspot Portal allows you to create a professional, custom-branded landing page with flexible authentication options, enabling secure guest connections to your network.

Enabling a Hotspot and Captive Portal

A Hotspot isolates connected clients from the rest of your network, ensuring security and segmentation. You can configure a Hotspot for either a WiFi SSID or an entire network (VLAN):

WiFi Only

  1. Go to UniFi Network > Settings > WiFi.
  2. Select or create a WiFi SSID.
  3. Enable Hotspot Portal > Captive Portal.

Entire Network (VLAN) 

  1. (Optional) Create a new Network in UniFi Network > Settings > Networks.
  2. Navigate to Settings > Security Firewall.
    1. Note: This requires Zone-Based Firewalling, as part of Network v9.0 and later.
  3. Select the Hotspot Zone.
  4. Select the desired Hotspot Network.

Once enabled, go to Insights > Hotspot and click on Landing Page to configure a Captive Portal with branding options, including welcome text, logo, and color scheme.

Authentication

Easily select one or multiple ways for your guests to connect, including:

  • Facebook: Guests can authenticate using a Facebook account.
  • Password: Guests must enter a password to connect.
  • Payment: Guests must pay to use the WiFi. This is currently supported by Stripe.
  • Vouchers: Provide guests with vouchers that can be used to authenticate. Customize vouchers to support various expiration times, bandwidth limits, or data consumption quotas.
  • RADIUS (advanced): Preconfigure guest authentication via a RADIUS server.
  • External Portal Server (advanced): Integrate with a third-party portal server.

Configuring Public Guest WiFi

To learn more about public WiFi best practices, including how to enhance security and optimize performance, click here.

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