IEEE 802.11 is a set of standards for wireless LANs, and it defines various codes that can be used to identify network issues. These codes are typically found in debug logs or network analyzer reports.
Understanding the Codes
This Reason Code field explains why certain network management messages, like Disassociation, Deauthentication, DELTS, DELBA, DLS Teardown, or Mesh Peering Close, were sent without being requested. It is part of the Mesh Channel Switch Parameters to show why the channel was switched. It is also part of the PERR element to explain why there was a path error.
- Association Status Codes: These indicate the reason for a successful or unsuccessful association between a wireless device and an access point.
- Deauthentication Reasons: These codes explain why a device was forcibly disconnected from a network.
- Authentication Failures: These codes provide information about why authentication attempts failed.
Reason codes:
| Reason code | Meaning |
|---|---|
| 1 | Unspecified reason |
| 2 | Previous authentication no longer valid |
| 3 | Deauthenticated because sending station is leaving (or has left) independent basic service set (IBSS) or extended service set (ESS) |
| 4 | Disassociated due to inactivity |
| 5 | Disassociated because access point (AP) unable to handle all currently associated stations |
| 6 | Class 2 frame received from nonauthenticated station |
| 7 | Class 3 frame received from nonassociated station |
| 8 | Disassociated because sending station is leaving (or has left) basic service set (BSS) |
| 9 | Station requesting association or reassociation not authenticated with responding station |
| 10 | Disassociated because of unacceptable information in the power capability element |
| 11 | Disassociated because of unacceptable information in the supported channels element |
| 13 | Invalid information (Doesn’t follow 802.11 standard) |
| 14 | Message integrity code (MIC) failure |
| 15 | 4-way handshake timeout |
| 16 | Group-key handshake timeout |
| 17 | Information element in 4-way handshake different from association request, reassociation request, probe response, or beacon frame |
| 18 | Invalid group cipher |
| 19 | Invalid pairwise cipher |
| 20 | Invalid authentication and key management protocol (AKMP) |
| 21 | Unsupported robust security network (RSN) information element version |
| 22 | Invalid RSN information element capabilities |
| 23 | IEEE 802.1X authentication failed |
| 24 | Cipher suite rejected because of security policy |
| 32 | Disassociated for unspecified quality of service (QoS)-related reason |
| 33 | Disassociated because QoS AP lacks sufficient bandwidth for this QoS station |
| 34 | Disassociated because excessive number of frames need to be acknowledged, but are not acknowledged due to AP transmissions or poor channel conditions, or both |
| 35 | Disassociated because station is transmitting outside limits of its transmission opportunities (TXOPs) |
| 36 | Requested from peer station as station is leaving or resetting the BSS |
| 37 | Requested from peer station as it doesn’t want to use the mechanism |
| 38 | Requested from peer station as station received frames using the mechanism for which a setup is required |
| 39 | Requested from peer station due to timeout |
| 45 | Peer station doesn’t support requested cipher suite |
Association status codes:
Association status codes are numerical values included in an association response frame to indicate the outcome of an association request between a wireless client and an access point (AP). These codes provide crucial information about the success or failure of the association process, helping in troubleshooting connectivity issues.
| Status code | Meaning |
|---|---|
| 0 | Successful |
| 1 | Unspecified failure |
| 2 | Tunneled direct link setup (TDLS) wakeup schedule rejected but alternative schedule provided |
| 3 | TDLS wakeup schedule rejected |
| 5 | Security disabled |
| 6 | Unacceptable lifetime |
| 7 | Not in same basic service set (BSS) |
| 10 | Can’t support all requested capabilities in capability information field |
| 11 | Reassociation denied due to inability to confirm that association exists |
| 12 | Association denied due to reason outside scope of this standard |
| 13 | Responding station doesn’t support specified authentication algorithm |
| 14 | Received authentication frame with authentication transaction sequence number out of expected sequence |
| 15 | Authentication rejected because of challenge failure |
| 16 | Authentication rejected due to timeout waiting for next frame in sequence |
| 17 | Association denied because AP unable to handle additional associated stations |
| 18 | Association denied due to requesting station not supporting all data rates in the BSSBasicRateSet parameter, where BSS refers to basic service set |
| 19 | Association denied due to requesting station not supporting short preamble option |
| 20 | Association denied due to requesting station not supporting packet binary convolutional code (PBCC) modulation option |
| 21 | Association denied due to requesting station not supporting channel agility option |
| 22 | Association request rejected because spectrum management capability required |
| 23 | Association request rejected because of unacceptable information in the power capability element |
| 24 | Association request rejected because of unacceptable information in the supported channels element |
| 25 | Association denied due to requesting station not supporting short slot time option |
| 26 | Association denied due to requesting station not supporting direct sequence spread spectrum orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (DSSS-OFDM) option |
| 27 | Association denied because requesting station doesn’t support high throughput (HT) features |
| 28 | Pairwise master key (PMK-R0) Key Holder (R0KH) unreachable |
| 29 | Association denied because requesting station doesn’t support phased coexistence operation (PCO) transition time required by the AP |
| 30 | Association request rejected temporarily; try again later |
| 31 | Robust management frame policy violation |
| 32 | Unspecified. Quality of service (QoS)-related failure |
| 33 | Association denied because QoS AP has insufficient bandwidth to handle another QoS station |
| 34 | Association denied due to excessive frame loss rates or poor conditions on current operating channel, or both |
| 35 | Association (with QoS BSS) denied because the requesting station does not support the QoS facility |
| 37 | Request declined |
| 38 | Request not successful as one or more parameters have invalid values |
| 39 | Traffic stream (TS) not created because request can’t be honored; however, suggested traffic specification (TSPEC) provided so that the initiating station may attempt to set another TS with suggested changes to TSPEC |
| 40 | Invalid information element (doesn’t follow 802.11 standard) |
| 41 | Invalid group cipher |
| 42 | Invalid pairwise cipher |
| 43 | Invalid authentication and key management protocol (AKMP) |
| 44 | Unsupported robust security network element (RSNE) information element version |
| 45 | Invalid RSNE information element capabilities |
| 46 | Cipher suite rejected because of security policy |
| 47 | TS not created; however, hybrid coordinator (HC) may be capable of creating TS, in response to a request, after the time indicated in TS delay element |
| 48 | Direct link not allowed in the BSS by policy |
| 49 | Destination station not present within this BSS |
| 50 | Destination station not a QoS station |
| 51 | Association denied because ListenInterval too large |
| 52 | Invalid fast transition (FT) action frame count |
| 53 | Invalid shared key (pairwise master key identifier or PMKID) |
| 54 | Invalid mobility domain element (MDE) |
| 55 | Invalid fast transition element (FTE) |
| 56 | Requested traffic classification (TCLAS) processing not supported by AP |
| 57 | AP has insufficient TCLAS processing resources to satisfy request |
| 58 | TS not created because request can’t be honored; however, HC suggests station transitions to other BSSs to set up TS |
| 59 | Generic advertisement service (GAS) advertisement protocol not supported |
| 60 | No outstanding GAS request |
| 61 | GAS response not received from advertisement server |
| 62 | Station timed out waiting for GAS query response |
| 63 | GAS response larger than query response length limit |
| 64 | Request refused because home network doesn’t support request |
| 65 | Advertisement server in network not currently reachable |
| 68 | Request refused because AP doesn’t support unauthenticated access |
| 73 | Unscheduled Automatic Power Save Delivery (U-APSD) coexistence not supported |
| 74 | Requested U-APSD coexistence mode not supported |
| 75 | Requested interval or duration value can’t be supported with U-APSD coexistence |
| 76 | Authentication rejected because anti-clogging token is required |
| 77 | Authentication rejected because the offered finite cyclic group not supported |
| 78 | The Target Beacon Transmission Time (TBTT) adjustment request not successful because station couldn’t find alternative TBTT |
| 79 | Transmission failure |
| 80 | Requested TCLAS not supported |
| 81 | TCLAS resources exhausted |
| 82 | Rejected with suggested BSS transition |
| 93 | Association or reassociation refused because of memory limits at AP |
| 94 | Association or reassociation refused because emergency services not supported at AP |
| 95 | GAS query response not yet received |
| 101 | Request failed due to exceeded MCCA access fraction (MAF) limit |
| 102 | Request failed due to exceeded MCF coordinated channel access (MCCA) track limit, where MCF refers to mesh coordination function |