Delete Saved Preferred Wireless Network Profiles On Windows Vista, 7 and 8


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Windows OS has the ability to remember WiFi profiles on your computer once you join the network. We call preferred networks to denote these saved WiFi profiles which consist of details like SSID, wireless key, encryption etc. When you are back in range of a saved profile, your PC will automatically connect to it. Though this feature is helpful, rarely it makes some issues too.

In case if admin changed the wireless key, your PC will try to use the old information to join it and cause connectivity issues. In that case we need to delete the old saved profile. On Windows 7 and Vista we can do it from Graphical User Interface (GUI) but there is no such option available on Windows 8.

If your PC runs on Windows 8, you must use Command Prompt to see the preferred network and you must delete any of them from there only. This tutorial explain how to view and remove any preferred networks on your system.

Delete Saved Wireless Networks On Windows 8

This operating system does not offer any straight ways to remove preferred WiFi details from GUI and we should go to Command Prompt to perform it.

  • Type cmd on Search and Open Command Prompt.
  • Type netsh wlan show profile and press Enter to view all saved preferred profiles.
  • Type netsh wlan delete profile name=name of the one you want to delete and press Enter.

This procedure will delete all information stored on your PC related to that profile.

View or Edit Saved wireless networks On Windows 7

Here we can use GUI to find list of preferred networks stored on a laptop.

  • Click on Start
  • Click on Control Panel
  • Click on Network and Internet
Delete Saved Preferred Wireless Network Profiles On Windows Vista, 7 and 8

Delete Saved Preferred Wireless Network Profiles On Windows Vista, 7 and 8

Click on Network Status and Tasks. Then click on Manage Wireless Networks panel.

Delete Saved Preferred Wireless Network Profiles On Windows Vista, 7 and 8

Delete Saved Preferred Wireless Network Profiles On Windows Vista, 7 and 8

Now the all stored WiFi details will be shown. You can select the anyone from the list (preferred profiles) and click on Remove. After this, your computer no longer remember that network.

You can use the same command prompt procedure to perform this task on Windows 7 too. Since it is already explained, I am not repeating the same steps. You can use same steps to view and remove any expired wireless profile from your computer from Command Prompt using the command netsh wlan delete profile name=name of the profile.