14 DAY TRIAL // Microsoft has substantially improved Windows 10 in these almost five years since its launch, but what the company hasn’t added is a refresh button in the Wi-Fi selection flyout.
In other words, whenever you attempt to connect to a Wi-Fi and click the network icon in the system tray to launch the said flyout, Windows 10 automatically scans for the available networks. After a short scan, it waits for input, meaning that you should just pick a network to connect to.
This flyout comes with an auto-refresh time, so it automatically re-scans for new networks at a pre-defined time. So why no refresh button that would allow users to restart the scanning faster without waiting?
This is the thing that’s apparently super-frustrating for so many users, so a request for a refresh button in the Wi-Fi selection screen went viral this week on reddit, with lots of users calling for Microsoft to just make it happen.
A refresh button for Wi-Fi networks? Not so fast
More than 1,000 users upvoted this feature request, and many of them say that in the meantime, they just stick with clicking the network icon again to relaunch the Wi-Fi flyout, which apparently triggers the rescan faster.
Redditor TehFrozenYogurt, however, says a refresh button wouldn’t make any sense, simply because this isn’t how Wi-Fi networks work. Neither Android nor iOS come with a refresh option in the Wi-Fi selection screen because wireless access point broadcast the SSID every one in a while, they say, so operating systems just scan for networks and lists them as available when they are detected.
“Since the way it works has Windows listening for WiFi access points, having a refresh button doesn't make sense, right? Having a refresh button would mean giving the user some placebo button to click. Yes, refresh buttons make sense from a UX point of view, but it doesn't fit with the WiFi protocol,” they say, adding that more complex approaches do exist, waiting for a specific timeout is the best way to go.
If there’s anything Microsoft could add to resolve this issue, it’s probably a message to tell users Windows 10 is searching for Wi-Fi networks, rather than having them wait without knowing something’s happening in the background.