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How to stop the blinking wifi LED on Ubuntu laptops with Intel wireless cards

Apparently Intel has decided that people using Ubuntu (and Linux in general) on laptops with an Intel wireless card simply must know when data is being transferred over the connection. To that end, Intel wifi cards constantly blink the LED whenever data is being transferred. I think every other wireless card on the planet just has a solid LED light to indicate the wireless is on (or off, using the physical switch), but not Intel cards. Personally I find the constantly blinking lights pretty annoying.

There’s no easy-to-find setting to change the LED to always-on. But there is a solution: create a little script to change the LED to solid whenever you connect to a new wireless network. It’s pretty easy to do, too. Here we go:

  1. Create a new file using Nano:

    sudo nano /etc/network/if-up.d/wifi-led-noblink
  2. Paste the following into your new file using ctrl + shift + v

    #!/bin/sh
    # This script prevents the wifi light from blinking when on.
    # To enable this script, create a soft link to it in /etc/network/if-up.d/
    echo none > /sys/class/leds/iwl-phy0::RX/trigger
    echo none > /sys/class/leds/iwl-phy0::TX/trigger
    echo none > /sys/class/leds/iwl-phy0::radio/trigger
    echo none > /sys/class/leds/iwl-phy0::assoc/trigger

    Press ctrl + x to quit Nano, then y to save your script.

  3. Make the script executable:

    sudo chmod u+x /etc/network/if-up.d/wifi-led-noblink

That’s it! Next time you connect to a network, your wifi LED should remain solid. This works in 9.10 Karmic. And next time you find yourself cursing the guys at Intel, just remember: at least you don’t have a Broadcom card!

2010-07-21 Update!

As of kernel 2.6.34 this solution no longer works for me. However, commenter DM has suggested an alternative that does seem to work again.

Run the following command to create a file called /etc/modprobe.d/wlan.conf with a setting to disable the light:

echo "echo \"options iwlcore led_mode=1\" >> /etc/modprobe.d/wlan.conf" | sudo bash

Restart your laptop after running that command. This different solution should work if the above solution doesn’t.

2012-11-25 Update!

Commenter silli suggests an alternate solution for 12.04 Precise that’s similar to DM’s solution:

echo "echo \"options iwlwifi led_mode=1\" >> /etc/modprobe.d/iwlwifi.conf" | sudo bash

This has been reported to work on 12.04 Precise. Make sure to restart your laptop after running that code!

Comments

  1. Cesar

    Thank you! This worked like a charm in a Hp nx7300 laptop.

  2. michael

    Worked great for my 8530w. Other “solutions” didn’t, but yours did. Man, that was annoying! Thank you!

  3. bbrujulo

    Thanks a lot!! Woow… The blinking led was driving me crazy :D.

  4. Jorge L

    Thanks a lot.
    Great solution for a annoying problem.

  5. Patrick

    Thank you so much! Worked like a bomb on my HP 8710w, was really driving me nuts!

  6. Emily

    Thanks a lot!! Woow… The blinking led was driving me crazy :D.

  7. Brandon

    Thanks, mate.
    Worked great on my inspiron under Lucid.

  8. Avinash

    thanks a lot mate. it worked great on my HP g60. It was quite annoying.

  9. J

    Great solution. worked right away on my HP dv3 running ubuntu 10.04. Thx!

  10. alpha0

    works great on compaq presario a900. using ubuntu 10.04

  11. dm

    My solution is to add the following in /etc/modprobe.d/99-local.conf (it’s opensuse 11.3; for other distributions, I think it is /etc/modprobe.d/options):

    options iwlcore led_mode=1

    For more info: modinfo iwlcore

  12. Alex Cabal

    Thanks DM, that also seems to work. The file to put it in for Ubuntu is /etc/modprobe.d/wlan.conf
    (options.conf works too, it doesn’t matter).

  13. shing

    Using a Dell E4200 with an Intel 5100 wifi card. This killed wifi till I rm’d the wlan.conf file.

  14. shing

    I suppose I should add I’m using lucid.

  15. lum

    Second solution works fine on ubuntu 10.04.

    Thanks a lot!

  16. Chris G

    The first solution worked on my HP Compaq nw8440. Thank you, that was a major annoyance.

  17. Mb

    Stopped my wifi too, how do I remove the wlan.conf file?

  18. kumar

    Thank you Alex. Your “2010-07-21 Update!” worked on my Dell inspiron E1505 running Ubuntu Maverick Meerkat (10.10)

  19. Nick

    Thanks! The revised code worked on 10.10 for my Intel card in my HP dv2700.

  20. Matt

    Thank you, thank you, thank you! Second solution worked on 10.10. 🙂

  21. João

    Thanks! My HP nx9420 is now a different machine without the Wifi annoying blinking led…

  22. Rene

    Thanks this works on HP-530 Notebook, Ubuntu 10.10

  23. Bob

    Thank you!! The update worked on my Dell D620 with Fedora 14.

  24. Francesco

    Thank you very much for your solutions!
    The second work on Hp notebook dv2760el, ubuntu 10.10.

  25. Chao

    Thanks a lot! Your second solution worked on Fedora 14.

  26. Amoor Avakian

    This was amazingly helpful. It solved my Ubuntu wi-fi blinking disaster. What was Intel thinking?

    Especially because the button is ‘touch’ you could no longer disable it just by touching it because it was on a blinking frenzy.

  27. Pdinc

    Thanks! Second solution worked on Dell Inspiron 6400; Ubuntu 10.10.

  28. Drew

    The second variant works perfectly on a HP EliteBook 2530p under 10.10. Thanks!

  29. Lau

    Perfect!
    Ubuntu 10.10
    Dell Latitude D630

  30. Stephen Hau

    No more blinking blinking LED, thank you Alex!!!
    (Ubuntu 10.10 64bit, Thinkpad T410)

  31. Alex

    Thanks for this, works perfectly on Natty too!

    If you want to avoid rebooting you can do ‘modprobe -r iwlagn && modprobe iwlagn’ instead, which simply reloads the module.

  32. Michael

    Second solution worked great on the HP2530p

    Thanks to all!

  33. Matt

    For Ubuntu 11.10 replace iwlcore with iwlagn in the line above, so that it reads:
    options iwlagn led_mode=1

  34. Lau

    Upgraded today to Ubuntu 11.10
    Flashing wifi LED is back 🙁
    Vainly tried above 2 solutions

    Ubuntu 11.10
    Dell Latitude D630

  35. SRG

    Thanks Matt, on 11.10, “iwlagn” did the trick.

    How is it possible that somebody on the Ubuntu side had this “brilliant” idea of the blinking wifi LED ? That’s madness. And moreover it’s quite complicated to deactivate (when you don’t know this exact parameter).
    As times passes : Ubuntu becomes worse and worse. I’m seriously considering all my Linux boxes to something else.

  36. Martin

    For me, using “wlagn” instead of “iwlcore” did not work on Ubuntu 11.10. I used “iwl_legacy” instead which did work. Apparently, iwlcore is renamed since kernel 3.0

  37. Moe

    instead of restarting you can also

    # rmmod iwlcore
    # modprobe iwlcore

    in kernel 3.0 this module is called iwlwifi, so you have to change iwlcore to iwlwifi if youre using kernel 3.0 and above

  38. silli

    For Ubuntu 12.04:

    $ sudo nano /etc/modprobe.d/iwlwifi.conf

    paste

    options iwlwifi led_mode=1

    Then reboot your laptop / reload module.

    (Source: http://www.emmolution.org/?p=235)

  39. Matt

    Was looking into the blinking wifi led on a dell D630 running fedora 16 and found the led_mode option for the module iwlegacy:
    cat <> /etc/modprobe.d/solid_led.conf
    option iwlegacy led_mode=1
    EOF

  40. Hombibi

    Thank you,

    Silli’s solution worked perfectly on a Dell E6400 with Ubuntu 12.04 x64

  41. MS

    silli’s solution posted on April 29th, 2012 worked on an HP Elitebook 6930. You saved my eyes, thanks.

  42. SWL

    Solution worked on a Thinkpad T420 with Xubuntu 12.04.1 x64.
    Thanks.

  43. anon

    For Ubuntu 12.10 and an older network card (intel 4965 in my case) the line in your /etc/modprobe.d/scriptname.conf should read:

    options iwlegacy led_mode=1

  44. jomo

    Thank You very, very much 🙂
    Works in Mint 14

    options iwlegacy led_mode=1

  45. Michal Ambroz

    Thank you. It was really giving me headaches.

  46. Matt

    Wonderful! Thank you!

  47. Aniqua

    it worked! great. thank you 🙂

  48. Hisham

    Worked great on my HP 6530b

  49. Jan

    Works like a charm on: HP 6530b with Linux Mint 14

  50. Stryder

    This Post Works GREAT!!!! on hp 2540p!!!!!With Kubuntu 13.10
    Thanks 2 All!!
    2012-11-25 UPDATE!

  51. Jose

    The “2012-11-25 UPDATE! ” worked grate on my EliteBook 2530p with kubuntu 13.10

  52. halim

    Thanks man. from one reboot to another my wifi hard block was driving me crazy. then i got it working with connman but the led kept blinking and blinking.
    coool solution 🙂

  53. halim

    using arch btw. so for all you arch people out there: this works for us, too 😀

  54. halim

    simply “none” to the trigger file works

  55. Anonymous

    Solution worked on HP Elitebook 6930p with Ubuntu 13.10

  56. Arjen

    I used to do it manually until I reinstalled my ubuntu and didn’t know anymore what I did (I did it from history, but forgot to save it somewhere first)

    Now I used:

    options iwlegacy led_mode=1

    And it works like a charm! Thx! 😀

  57. Arjen

    On a HP/Compaq 6710b

  58. Sergio

    Worked! Kubuntu 13.10 HP HDX
    It started to happen when I installed connman to run Enlightenment, and continue even after I removed connman. This script solved it.
    Thank you

  59. Neikius

    The latest solution works for me on kubuntu 13.10, thanks for saving my sanity!

  60. dpeach777

    Would someone please do a step by step for me, the newest of newbies? I have Ubuntu 13.04 on my dell d620 and the blinking WiFi light is on as soon as I open the lid and wake up the old beast. I want to stay quit of Windows! I went cold turkey to Ubuntu….. and now I need major help! Thanks in advance.

  61. candy

    This solution didn’t work on ubuntu 13.10

  62. MasterOfTheHat

    Worked on my EliteBook 8540w with Linux Mint 16 (Ubuntu 13.10)

  63. dpeach777

    I havetried all of the above, to no avail. BCM 4311, dell d620, Ubuntu 13.04. Does someone out there in Linux world have a fix for us poor newbies? a step by step as asked above would be great! Thank You!

  64. dpeach777

    So persistance paid off finally, thank you all for the clues above. I’m running Ubuntu 13 04 on my dell d620

    $ sudo nano /etc/modprobe.d/iwlwifi.conf
    options iwlegacy led_mode=1
    save the file and exit
    reboot
    no more flashing wifi light!

  65. kinchan

    thanks you! work on debian wheezy.

  66. Ubabarauma

    Running the 12.04 here, and the WLan LED from my HP 6730b was changing from blue (on) to orange (off) like mad.
    The instructions from the “2012-11-25 Update!” solved the problem alright.
    Big thanks to Alex and silli for showing the way!

  67. Mirkster

    This worked with Xubuntu 13.10 on Dell E6400 using a Intel 5100 Wifi link

    $ sudo nano /etc/modprobe.d/iwlwifi.conf
    options iwlwifi led_mode=1
    save the file and exit
    reboot

  68. Steve O

    Thank you!

  69. El

    Works a treat on ubuntu 13.10 on HP EliteBook 6930p.

    Cheers much.

  70. Ano

    Unfortunately none of these worked on my Elitebook 8530w with Ubuntu 12.04 LTS. I guess I will have to keep on looking.

  71. theasm

    No need to reboot your device after this, just restart the WiFi interface:

    sudo ifconfig wlan0 down; sudo ifconfig wlan0 up

    That’s it.

  72. Antonino

    Ciao, ho installato ubuntu 13.10 su un hp 6530b.
    La connessione wireless non è attiva ed il led della scheda rimane arancione.
    Con XP funzionava regolarmente e premendo il pulsante della scheda wireless la scheda si attivava e disattivava regolarmente.
    Adesso il led rimane arancione nonostante si agisca sul pulsante nel medesimo modo.
    Gli altri pulsanti, a sfioro, funzionano come l’esclusione dell’audio ed il controllo del volume.
    Da terminale il comando iwconfig restituisce:
    lo no wireless extensions.
    eth0 no wireless extensions.
    Ringrazio anticipatamente per suggerimenti/indicazioni

  73. ToddK

    Ano: I just tried this on my Elitebook 8530w and it worked great. Added “options iwlwifi led_mode=1” as the last line of /etc/modprobe.d/iwlwifi.conf

    ubuntu 14.04 LTS

  74. philgood

    Bonjour, cette solution (ajout de echo “echo \”options iwlwifi led_mode=1\” >> /etc/modprobe.d/iwlwifi.conf” | sudo bash) fonctionne parfaitement sur mon Elitebook 6930p. Ubuntu 14.04 LTS. MERCI!!!!

  75. tom

    Hi
    funzt mit Latitude E6400 und Mint 13 Maya
    Danke

  76. Grampy

    Mint 17 — Dell latitude E6400, just added “options iwlwifi led_mode=1” to end of /etc/modprobe.d/iwlwifi.conf, all good after reboot.

    Usually see this issue on laptops with no bluetooth adapter or BT disabled.

  77. Keith

    Perfect. Works great on Linux Mint 17 on a HP 8530w

  78. FALaholic

    Worked! Dell E1505 Inspiron running Mint 17 like a champ. Linux has certainly come a long way since I first started working with it. Back then most hardware “kinda worked”.

    Im doing everything better and faster with this old Dell than my beast of a machine running Windows 7.

  79. deyan

    Great post! Third variant works on HP EliteBook 6930p with Debian Mint LMDE
    “options iwlwifi led_mode=1”
    Thank you 😉

  80. Michael

    Thanks! The third solution worked for me on my HP Elitebook 8530w with Crunchbang Linux based on Debian Jessie.

  81. KH

    The 2012-11-25 solution:

    echo “echo \”options iwlwifi led_mode=1\” >> /etc/modprobe.d/iwlwifi.conf” | sudo bash

    worked on a Thinkpad T-420 with Ubuntu 14.04. I did have to reboot.

  82. Pawel

    Works for HP EliteBook 8440p running Linux Mint 17.
    Thanks!

  83. Abdulrahman

    Great solution. worked right away on my HP-Ellitebook 8840p, running Ubuntu 14.04 LTS.

  84. Marcel Burkhard

    Worked on my Elitebook 8530p running Ubuntu 14.04 LTS

  85. Andy

    Thanks! It worked on my HP EliteBook 2540p running Ubuntu 14.04 LTS

  86. Gluttton

    Thanks! it wokrs good on HP EliteBook 8540p with KUbuntu 14.10 Linux 3.13.0-40-generic x86_64.

  87. Gluttton

    Ops… I’ve made mistake in my previous post KUbuntu 14.10 => KUbuntu 14.04.
    Thanks again!

  88. clrn0979

    Worked for me on an HP Elitebook 8440p running Ubuntu 14.10. It was just slightly annoying having to see that blinking light all the time. Not critical but annoying.

  89. Lepsa

    Had blinken for one day then I found U guys.
    Thanx.

  90. Lepsa

    Elitebook 6930p

  91. Milan

    Thank you.. worked perfectly

  92. Terrence

    This worked for Linux EvolveOS1 3.18.5 #1 SMP PREEMPT Sat Jan 31 16:09:16 UTC 2015 x86_64 GNU/Linux running on an HP EliteBook 6930p

  93. Jdog

    THANK YOU!!!

  94. Horsty

    works on my elitebook 8740e
    vielen Dank

  95. Boiken Simixhiu

    Worked for me too.The last code made the difference.
    Mine is HP Elitebook 6930p
    Thanks

  96. Johnny Lark

    options iwlwifi led_mode=1 worked on my EliteBook 8440p as well. Thanks.

    (you could probably remove the Ubuntu part from the title, it applies to any Linux (this was on Debian))

  97. Dave Stahr

    Thanks! Adding that line to /etc/modprobe.d/iwlwifi.conf worked great on my HP Elitebook 6930p with Linux Mint. I was looking at this thing going …… really? I was already looking for the electrical tape.

  98. Filip

    Ubuntu MATE 14.04LTS – Dell latitude E4200, just added “options iwlwifi led_mode=1″ to end of /etc/modprobe.d/iwlwifi.conf, all good after reboot.

    Thank you for this post.

  99. Gus

    Worked on HP 6530b, LED stays solid, not disabled. Thanks!

  100. Bob

    thank you dude

  101. roman

    Not work for me on Debian Jessie and HP EliteBook 8540p. Just turn ON bluetooth solved that problem for me.

  102. sonwmanseye

    Hi to all,
    I entered all of the recommendations into all “.conf” files of my Dell Studio 1537 and: NO BLINKING.

    Thx to all contributors

  103. Kevin

    The last solution seems to have done the trick in my 14.04 LTS install. Thank you very much!

  104. Drew

    Thank you SO much. Picked up a 2540p on ebay for 110 bucks. Those lights were going to drive me insane. Works on Antergos (Arch).

  105. flo

    The recommendation for Precise works perfectly fine for Ubuntu (Mate) 15.10 on a ThinkPad X201 as well.

  106. Bernhard

    Adding “options iwlwifi led_mode=1” to the end of “/etc/modprobe.d/iwlwifi.conf” works perfect on my HP Elitebook 2530p with Xubuntu 16.04.
    Thank you !

  107. Colla

    Worked like a charm on (L)Ubuntu 16.04 LTS, Dell Latitude 2100. Thank you!

  108. MeTo

    Mint Cinnamon 18, Lenovo w530 still good with
    echo “echo \”options iwlwifi led_mode=1\” >> /etc/modprobe.d/iwlwifi.conf” | sudo bash, thanks

  109. Al Jones

    After trying other solution from other sites that did not work, your’s did. Thank you.

    echo “echo \”options iwlwifi led_mode=1\” >> /etc/modprobe.d/iwlwifi.conf” | sudo bash

    Ubuntu 16.04 on HP DV4-1412tx

  110. NothingCtrl

    Thanks, work on Ubuntu 16.04 HP 8540w.

  111. Ubuntu 16.04

    This worked with Ubuntu 16.04 on HP 6930p

    $ sudo nano /etc/modprobe.d/iwlwifi.conf

    —add this to the end of the file

    options iwlwifi led_mode=1

    —save the file and exit
    —reboot

  112. Alex

    HP Copmaq nx7400 — Ubuntu 16.04 / 17.04. The trick to set led_mode=1 has no effect. LED starts blinking when bluetooth turned OFF. Just left it ON (saw the same solution at Roman comment above)

  113. nitro2k01

    HP EliteBook 8540w, Debian 9.1. I found that the first method would work, almost, except that the path was changed. My laptop has a blue/red bi-color LED. This worked for making the LED a solid color:

    sudo echo none > /sys/class/leds/phy0-led/trigger

    However, I wanted to put that LED to good use by making it indicate whether the network was connected. I couldn’t find a way to set it to a specific color, but fortunately that functionality is built-in:

    sudo echo phy0assoc > /sys/class/leds/phy0-led/trigger

    Now it’s blue when connected and red when not. So, to make this change permanent… I tried putting it in if-up.d (it’s just changing a setting so that place should be as good as any, right?) but that would make it miss indicating the first connection, whereas it showed further connects/disconnects correctly. Presumably because the setting is set after the first connect trigger. Putting it in if-pre-up.d seemed to solve that. So the finally recipe becomes:

    1) Create and edit the file:
    sudo nano /etc/network/if-pre-up.d/wifi-led-noblink

    2) Enter the following:
    #!/bin/sh
    #This script makes the wifi light indicate the connection status.
    echo phy0assoc > /sys/class/leds/phy0-led/trigger

    3) Make the script runnable.
    sudo chmod +x /etc/network/if-pre-up.d/wifi-led-noblink

    Of course, none would still work instead of phy0assoc.

  114. Phillip Remaker

    I thought you might like to know that this problem also exists in Windows, starting in Windows 10. The fix is to find all instances of the key “LedMode” in the registry and set it to “1.” (The Windows driver uses the same vales as the Linux driver, unsurprisingly.)

    I wrote my own blog on it at http://lab.remaker.com/2017/10/wi-fi-led-keeps-blinking-on-hp-ww8440.html. which also points to all the good Linux info on the topic, including your site.

    An answer by izx and Arjen Buising at https://askubuntu.com/questions/12069/how-to-stop-constantly-blinking-wifi-led covers a lot of extra detail including driver variations in other Ubuntu versions.

  115. Briain

    Hi
    Thank you for taking the time to post these tips! Yesterday, I updated my antique HP 8440p laptop from Debian Jessie to Debian Stretch and the flashing 802.11 LED was starting to get just a little bit irritating, but the ‘2012-11-25 Update!’ version (which was the first one that I tried) has worked a treat; most appreciated!
    Briain 🙂

  116. Anonymous

    I have same problem with HP G60-647NR model it bit too old model with Intel® Pentium(R) Dual CPU T3200 @ 2.00GHz × 2 but I have followed similar step described below but it does not working can anyone help me?

    Steps I have followed:

    step 1:
    > sudo ls /etc/modprobe.d/
    alsa-base.conf
    blacklist-firewire.conf
    blacklist-oss.conf
    blacklist-ath_pci.conf
    blacklist-framebuffer.conf
    blacklist-rare-network.conf
    mlx4.conf
    blacklist.conf
    blacklist-modem.conf
    intel-microcode-blacklist.conf

    step 2:
    > create iwlwifi.conf
    sudo nano /etc/modprobe.d/iwlwifi.conf

    step 3:
    > add following line to the file
    # /etc/modprobe.d/iwlwifi.conf
    # iwlwifi will dyamically load either iwldvm or iwlmvm depending on the
    # microcode file installed on the system. When removing iwlwifi, first
    # remove the iwl?vm module and then iwlwifi.
    options iwlwifi led_mode=1

    step 4:
    save and reboot.