Use Wired Ethernet On Your iPad or iPhone
iPads and iPhones do not have an Ethernet port, but there are cases where you might want to use a hardwired connection. You can actually run your iOS device over Ethernet with some adapters. This is useful for quickly downloading large iOS updates or if your wireless is slow or you want to take advantage of a gigabit Ethernet port on your router.
Requirements
Setting it up is a bit weird and kind of hacky, but it works. You’ll need a few parts and adapters, which are listed below:
- iOS device
- Ethernet cable
- Apple Lightning to USB cable
- Apple iPad or iPhone A/C adapter
- Apple USB Ethernet adapter (MC704LL/A)
- Apple Lightning to USB 3 Camera Adapter (needs to be this newer model: MK0W2AM/A) or a powered USB hub
How To Set Up An Ethernet Connection On Your iDevice
- Plug the USB-to-Ethernet adapter into the camera adapter
- Plug an Ethernet cable into the USB-to-Ethernet adapter
- Plug the Ethernet cable into your router
- Plug the lightning cable into the camera adapter
- Plug the lightning cable into the power adapter (or powered USB hub)
- Plug the power adapter (or powered USB hub) into the wall
- Connect the camera adapter (or the powered usb hub) to your iOS device
If you plug in the adapter before hooking it up to power, you will get a message on your iOS device saying that this is not a supported USB device (but even Apple themselves use this trick so it’s kind of ironic 😁).
Please note, it is necessary to use the A/C adapter or a powered USB hub. This is because the Ethernet connection takes more power than the iPad can handle.