Secure wireless for students, faculty, and staff: eduroam
eduroam is the encrypted wireless network at UMass Amherst. Use this network for most devices, including laptops, smartphones, and tablets.
Select streaming devices and gaming consoles: UMASS-DEVICES
Unencrypted network for campus guests and events: UMASS
Other networks are not supported and may pose security risks.
Use a Wi‑Fi–certified dual‑band adapter (2.4 GHz and 5 GHz). For best performance and future compatibility, we recommend devices or USB adapters that support Wi‑Fi 6 (802.11ax), but Wi‑Fi 5 (802.11ac) is also compatible. Your device must support 802.1X (WPA2/WPA3‑Enterprise) to connect to eduroam.
If your device lacks a compatible adapter, purchase a dual‑band, Wi‑Fi–certified USB adapter (USB 3.0 recommended) that lists 802.1X/EAP support and current drivers for your operating system.
Your IT Account NetID and password
If you forgot your password, you can reset it in SPIRE.
Where you (and your devices) are in a space matters. Follow our tips to get the best speed and connection quality.
Yes. Campus guests can self-register via SMS to get wireless access, or use a sponsored guest account created by a UMass Amherst student, faculty, or staff member.
Guest wireless instructions
UMass Amherst Information Technology (IT) operates about 10,000 pieces of networking equipment across 375 buildings on campus and at remote research sites. IT operates about 7,000 WiFi access points, all connected to the core network via switches in buildings across campus. More about what goes into the network
UMass Amherst IT designs every area for consistent, reliable coverage. We use industry standard radio frequency planning and onsite surveys to place access points for strong coverage and capacity in classrooms, residence halls, labs, and common areas.
UMass Amherst campus networks are built for heavy use, with a capacity of about 40 gigabits per second of aggregate traffic. Peak usage is typically around 30 gigabits per second from 8 p.m. to midnight. As such, most users do not experience slowdowns due to the speed or capacity of the network itself.
When campus community members do experience reduced speed or connection quality, the cause is often local. For example, trying to connect in an area which is difficult for the wireless network to reach, interference or network congestion from devices nearby, or unexpected heavy use in a space which was not designed for that many devices. UMass Amherst IT monitors performance, plans for occupancy and usage, and expands or retunes coverage as needed.
Personal hotspots, printer WiFi networks, unsupported personal WiFi routers, and other non-UMass networks contribute to interference and congestion – competing for the same channels as university networks, and degrading performance for everyone nearby.
We encourage campus community members to use only official UMass Amherst networks, and to turn off hotspot features on phones, printers, and other devices whenever possible.
There is no fixed number. Performance depends on shared radio airtime. In a crowded room, many devices share the same channel, so each gets a smaller share. UMass Amherst IT designs each area for expected occupancy and adjusts channels, power, and the number of access points as needs change.
eduroam is a secure, global Wi-Fi service for higher education and research. Students, faculty, and staff sign in with their UMass Amherst credentials and can connect automatically at any participating campus, including the Five Colleges, Harvard, MIT and many institutions worldwide. Visit eduroam.org/where to find compatible hotspots around the world.
UMass Amherst’s networks support about 150,000 connections each day – connecting not only the campus community's devices, but also research systems, building controls, and health and safety equipment. Reliability is essential.
On the technical side, our campus networks provide up to 40 gigabits per second of internet bandwidth. The equipment includes multiple layers of physical and logical redundancy, supported by about 400 miles of fiberoptic cabling that reaches every street and building, plus backup power systems and contingency plans.
Operationally, a team of 12 professional staff members maintains and monitors the network around the clock, so issues are identified and resolved quickly.
Scale and time. We support spaces ranging from brand-new labs to a building first constructed in 1728, and they all need reliable wireless. We also have tight maintenance windows. Our team often starts work at 6 a.m. on weekdays to finish changes before the first classes of the day begin.
Class periods are not our peak usage. The busiest moments are transition times - when every classroom and hallway can double its number of devices for about 15 minutes. PVTA buses create short bursts as they pass buildings, and riders’ devices briefly connect. We place access points to handle those bursts. The usual peak is from 8 p.m. to midnight at about 30 gigabits per second out of our 40gigabit connection. If we approach that limit, we will increase capacity. UMass Amherst also operates as its own internet service provider (ISP), so traffic goes directly to the services you use. For major events such as commencement, large athletic events, and move-in, we add temporary coverage and coordinate with organizers.
Residence areas come first in our upgrade cycles, which occur during the summer when residence halls are not occupied. Every few years, a crew of approximately 30 student workers replaces access points building by building. We choose hardware with next generation features to extend service life. We also use radiofrequency planning tools to match capacity to each room. For example, Mahar Auditorium seats 400 and has 13 access points because we may see roughly 1,200 devices in that space during a class. A small classroom in Herter may share one access point across three rooms.
Many issues that affect campus WiFi start elsewhere. For example, a cloud provider outage, such as the recent Amazon Web Services incident, can affect a supporting system even though campus Wi-Fi was not the source of the issue. Power blips can also damage equipment despite backup batteries, and a short bump can create about 13 staff hours of recovery work. A small, dedicated team responds quickly and works until the issue is fixed.
In other cases, perceived WiFi issues can be caused by local conditions – such as the device being in an area that is difficult for the wireless network to reach, radio interference or congestion caused by devices nearby, or unexpected heavy use.
We continue to monitor the performance of equipment and upgrade components as necessary. In fall 2025, we upgraded a core component that was experiencing congestion. We also worked with our vendor to identify and patch a software bug on access points and deployed the fix on a Friday night in September. Additionally, based on student troubleshooting, we enabled a new feature that improves how Apple devices connect.
UMass Amherst’s IT networking team has a large suite of monitoring tools which in many cases can identify and help to resolve issues before end users see them. We monitor and actively respond to outages 24/7/365.
Wireless coverage is designed using industry standard radio planning tools which allow us to create heat maps of every building. Our campus wireless provider tunes access points to provide the best overall coverage. When there are gaps that we identify through feedback from campus users, we can individually tune the access points to meet needs.
We are here to help. If something is not working in a classroom or residence hall, submitting a ticket reaches a real person who will investigate and follow through. Sometimes the fix is simple. When it isn’t, we will keep working with you until it is resolved.