Hotspot

The Hotspot section covers WiFi zone management — an alternative to PPPoE that lets customers connect and authenticate through a captive portal directly from their devices, without any router configuration on their end.

What This Section Covers

ISPBills Hotspot integrates with the MikroTik Hotspot Server and FreeRADIUS to deliver a fully managed WiFi captive-portal experience:

• Customer self-registration via a branded splash page
• Package-based sessions — customers buy a time or data package and their device is automatically authenticated
• MAC-based re-authentication — returning customers on the same device are recognised and reconnected without re-registering
• Multi-router support — manage hotspot zones across multiple access points from a single dashboard

Pages in This Section

• Hotspot Setup — Step-by-step guide to configuring MikroTik routers for hotspot mode and connecting them to ISPBills.

Key Concepts

How Hotspot Authentication Works

Customer connects to WiFi
        ↓
Browser redirected to captive portal (Walled Garden)
        ↓
Customer registers / logs in → selects and pays for package
        ↓
ISPBills creates RADIUS session → router grants internet access
        ↓
Session expires → customer prompted to renew

Walled Garden

The Walled Garden is a whitelist of URLs accessible before authentication (e.g., your payment gateway and the ISPBills portal). ISPBills can push Walled Garden rules directly to the MikroTik router from the admin panel.

SSID Consistency

For MAC-based re-authentication to work seamlessly across multiple access points, all hotspot routers in a zone must broadcast the same WiFi SSID. Customers moving between access points will be recognised by their MAC address and reconnected without needing to re-authenticate.

Accessing the Hotspot Section

Navigate to Hotspot in the left sidebar.