While Pixel users are pretty used to experiencing issues after an update, it looks like some iPhone owners are having concerns as well.
According to users from Reddit and MacRumors, after the iOS 26.4 update, their iPhone 17 series handsets started having issues hotspotting to other devices.
Hotspot / Tethering Issues on iOS 26.4
by
u/PrimeTime89 in
Rogers
On the Reddit post, the user appears to be with Rogers and indicates it’s an issue with IPv6. However, a user who opened a ticket with Apple reported on MacRumors that the issue is with IPv4 connectivity. In the MacRumor post, the user described the issue as this:
“Description
After updating to iOS 26.4, devices connected to the iPhone Personal Hotspot via Wi-Fi lose all IPv4 connectivity. IPv6 works correctly.The issue was not present on iOS 26.3.
SYMPTOMS:
– Tethered Mac connects to hotspot successfully (DHCP assigns 172.20.10.x)- All IPv4 TCP connections fail immediately with “Network is unreachable”- IPv6 connections succeed normally- Issue affects all destinations regardless of VPN state (reproduced with and without Cloudflare WARP active)- Direct IPv4 connectivity to public IPs fails (Cloudflare, GitHub, etc.)
REPRODUCTION STEPS:
1. Update iPhone to iOS 26.4
2. Enable Personal Hotspot
3. Connect a Mac via Wi-Fi4. On the Mac, run: curl -v –max-time 10 –ipv4 https://github.com → Fails: “Network is unreachable”
5. Run: curl -v –max-time 10 –ipv6 https://github.com → Succeeds”
Similarly, I’ve also had issues with my iPhone 17 Pro Max, and I haven’t been able to hotspot to my PS5 or my friend’s iPhone. This definitely started happening to me after the recent update.
The issue seems to affect both the iPhone 17 and the iPhone 17 Pro smartphones.
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