Connecting to wireless networks with nmcli in CentOS 7

For this tutorial I'll be using a USB wifi dongle - so we'll firstly check the kernel - ensuring that its picked it up OK:

dmesg | usb

If detected - we should see it with:

nmcli device show

To check the device radio / check for available wireless networks we can issue:

nmcli device wifi list

Let's say that our SSID is 'WirelessNetwork' - in order to connect to it we will use the 'connection add' switch:

nmcli connection add ifname wlp2s0 type wifi ssid WirelessNetwork

to delete a connection - find out what it's been named with:

nmcli connection show

and delete with:

nmcli connection del wifi-wlp2s0

You can also use the 'con-name' switch if you wish to have connections to different wireless network e.g.:

nmcli connection add con-name WirelessNetwork ifname wlp2s0 type wifi ssid WirelessNetwork

We can then add authentication information (in our case we're using a pre-shared key):

nmcli con modify wifi-wlp2s0 wifi-sec.key-mgmt wpa-psk
nmcli con modify wifi-wlp2s0 wifi-sec.psk <password>

Ensure wifi is turned on with:

nmcli radio wifi

and if needed turn it on with:

nmcli radio wifi on

To review our wifi connection in more detail we can issue:

nmcli connection show wifi-wlp2s0

Finally to activate our configuration we should issue:

nmcli connection up wifi-wlp2s0

Running 'nmcli connection' you will notice that it's now green - indicating that you have successfully connected to the network.