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Connecting a Sony Camera over Wi-Fi

Sony spreads the settings across three places: joining Wi-Fi, turning access authentication off, and switching PC remote on. Miss any one of them and the connection fails.

What you need

An Android phone that can share a hotspot, a Sony Alpha camera, and the CamCon app. No cable and no router.

Indoors with a router available, joining the camera and phone to the same router works exactly the same way. In that case skip the first step and start from the second.

This brand has not been verified on real hardware yet

The connection path is in place, so following the steps below has a good chance of working. We simply have not been able to test it on a camera of this brand ourselves. Telling us either way helps a lot.

Connecting

Five steps. Most people get stuck on the third and the fifth, so pay attention to those two.

Turn on the hotspot on your phone

The camera joins your phone directly, so nothing passes through a router. In CamCon, the Wi-Fi connection screen has a button that opens the hotspot settings for you.

Turning on the hotspot usually switches your phone Wi-Fi off automatically. That is expected, so just leave it.

You will type this name and password into the camera in the next step.
Open configure and you can see the name and password. These are what you type into the camera.
If the band is on 5GHz, a camera that only does 2.4GHz cannot find this hotspot. The phone warns you about exactly that. When the camera will not show up, switch to 2.4GHz here.

Join that hotspot from the camera

In the network menu, switch Wi-Fi connect on, open the access point settings, pick your phone hotspot and enter the password.

MENU ▸ Network ▸ Wi-Fi ▸ Access Point Set.
Camera screen
My phone hotspot name
Other nearby Wi-Fi
You can look up the exact menu location for your model in the maker's official manual. Official manual
The camera has a Wi-Fi frequency band setting

The same Wi-Fi screen has a band selector. If it is on 2.4GHz, your phone hotspot has to be on 2.4GHz too or it will not appear in the list. If one side is on 5GHz they simply cannot see each other, so match these two values first when the camera is not found.

In the network menu, open Wi-Fi.
Switch Wi-Fi connect on and check the frequency band.
In access point set., pick your phone hotspot.
Once joined, it reports completion along with the SSID.

Turn PC remote on and access authentication off

Under PC remote function in the network menu, switch PC remote on. Then, in network options, turn access authentication off. The two items live on different screens.

With access authentication on, the connection is refused

This is an authentication scheme added in recent Sony firmware. While it is on, any program connecting the standard way is blocked. If you would rather not leave the camera open, switch it back on after the shoot.

In the network menu, open network option.
Access authentication is on. This is what has to go off.
The settings screen also holds a user name and password.
Switch access authentication to off.
A warning says communication will be unencrypted. Press OK.
Access authentication now reads off.
In the network menu, open smartphone connection / PC remote.
Choose PC remote function.
Turn PC remote on. It also tells you to run an application that supports remote operation.

Search for the camera in CamCon

Open the Wi-Fi connection screen in the app, select the phone hotspot tab and tap search. If the camera has joined the hotspot, the model name appears within a few seconds.

With the hotspot on, the app says so here. Tap search for camera and it starts looking.
Cameras found
My camera name
Auto discovery · maker confirmed
The model name and maker are identified before connecting. Check that it is your own camera before selecting it.

Select the camera in the app to finish

Inside PC remote function there is a pairing entry. Press it and the camera waits for the other device; select the camera in CamCon at that point and the connection completes. The camera screen shows its device name and MAC address.

Press pairing and the camera waits for the other device.
Once connected, a PC marker appears on the shooting screen alongside the Wi-Fi indicator.
Once connected

Photos land on your phone the moment you press the shutter. If a film simulation is on, they arrive with the look already applied. Live view and shooting settings can be controlled from the phone as well.

If it does not connect

Work down the list in order. The first three solve most cases.

  • Is PC remote switched off?

    If you only joined Wi-Fi without turning PC remote on, the camera will not accept control requests. Check PC remote function again in the network menu.

  • Is access authentication still on?

    If the camera shows up in the search but every connection attempt fails, this setting is usually the reason. Turn it off in network options.

  • Has the camera actually joined the hotspot?

    Check that your phone hotspot is the selected entry in the camera Wi-Fi list. A single wrong character in the password prevents the connection.

  • Has power saving switched the camera radio off?

    Cameras switch their radio off on their own after a while without input. Half press the shutter button to wake it, then search again.

  • Is the phone hotspot still on?

    Battery savers sometimes switch the hotspot off on their own. Also check the option that turns it off after a while when no device is connected.

  • Still nothing? Turn the camera off and on again

    A previous session can linger on the camera and block a new one. Power cycling clears it.

You can also connect with a cable

All you need is a USB cable, and it works with far more models than Wi-Fi. Use this route if wireless will not hold, or if you need the originals on the card as well.

Connecting with a Cable