Find free wi-fi spots

Posted under Business Related, Free Resources, Resources, Tools by ltruex

I’ve decided I’d like to go to France for two weeks next summer. While I have time to prepare and find someone to help manage my business while I’m gone, I can’t imagine that I’ll be able resist checking in with my business for that long. Fortunately everything I do can be done online. But that means finding free wi-fi spots.

Its easier and easier to find places to work no matter where you go. Locations like Panera Bread offer free wi-fi and in a bind you can get fee-based access at Starbucks or Barnes and Noble. But occasionally I still get stuck without wi-fi, or at least free wi-fi. A couple of weeks ago my daughter flew to California. We drove up to DC the night before because her flight was leaving at 7 am. The hotel was really nice, but charged to use the in-room wi-fi (I find it odd that low and mid-range cost hotels offer it for free but more expensive hotels don’t). The area is a business area but was low on cafes. I ended up having to use one of the hotel’s computers in its business office for guests to get my work done. Had I been thinking ahead, I could have found out where the best free wi-fi spots are just by going online.

There are many online resources you can use to find free wi-fi and all seem to yield different results. None of the few I tried were able to find the free spots where I live. I know I have at least 2 but my area is rural so maybe its not worth listing on the map. Here’s a few you can try.

Hotspotr can search using your address and will provide other nearby city options on a Google Map.

Jiwire can search worldwide although Paris wasn’t on the France list and I don’t remember enough about France to know what region its in. When searching my local area, it had a few options that didn’t come up on Hotspotr but was also missing a few that had been on Hotspotr. It provides results on a list with an option to click on a map for specific locations.

OpenWiFiSpot at first had no options when I searched the larger city near me. But then there was a list of other options that included the zip code I initially searched with. Clicking on that I got a list with some of the same options offered on Hotspotr and Jiwire. It gives an option to get results by list or on a map.

Free Wifi Spot doesn’t have a search option. Instead you select your state and city for a list of options. It does offer world-wide options and I was able to get a long list of free wi-fi locations in Paris.