IEEE 802.11 Reason codes to identify network issues

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 codeMeaning
1Unspecified reason
2Previous authentication no longer valid
3Deauthenticated because sending station is leaving (or has left) independent basic service set (IBSS) or extended service set (ESS)
4Disassociated due to inactivity
5Disassociated because access point (AP) unable to handle all currently associated stations
6Class 2 frame received from nonauthenticated station
7Class 3 frame received from nonassociated station
8Disassociated because sending station is leaving (or has left) basic service set (BSS)
9Station requesting association or reassociation not authenticated with responding station
10Disassociated because of unacceptable information in the power capability element
11Disassociated because of unacceptable information in the supported channels element
13Invalid information (Doesn’t follow 802.11 standard)
14Message integrity code (MIC) failure
154-way handshake timeout
16Group-key handshake timeout
17Information element in 4-way handshake different from association request, reassociation request, probe response, or beacon frame
18Invalid group cipher
19Invalid pairwise cipher
20Invalid authentication and key management protocol (AKMP)
21Unsupported robust security network (RSN) information element version
22Invalid RSN information element capabilities
23IEEE 802.1X authentication failed
24Cipher suite rejected because of security policy
32Disassociated for unspecified quality of service (QoS)-related reason
33Disassociated because QoS AP lacks sufficient bandwidth for this QoS station
34Disassociated because excessive number of frames need to be acknowledged, but are not acknowledged due to AP transmissions or poor channel conditions, or both
35Disassociated because station is transmitting outside limits of its transmission opportunities (TXOPs)
36Requested from peer station as station is leaving or resetting the BSS
37Requested from peer station as it doesn’t want to use the mechanism
38Requested from peer station as station received frames using the mechanism for which a setup is required
39Requested from peer station due to timeout
45Peer 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 codeMeaning
0Successful
1Unspecified failure
2Tunneled direct link setup (TDLS) wakeup schedule rejected but alternative schedule provided
3TDLS wakeup schedule rejected
5Security disabled
6Unacceptable lifetime
7Not in same basic service set (BSS)
10Can’t support all requested capabilities in capability information field
11Reassociation denied due to inability to confirm that association exists
12Association denied due to reason outside scope of this standard
13Responding station doesn’t support specified authentication algorithm
14Received authentication frame with authentication transaction sequence number out of expected sequence
15Authentication rejected because of challenge failure
16Authentication rejected due to timeout waiting for next frame in sequence
17Association denied because AP unable to handle additional associated stations
18Association denied due to requesting station not supporting all data rates in the BSSBasicRateSet parameter, where BSS refers to basic service set
19Association denied due to requesting station not supporting short preamble option
20Association denied due to requesting station not supporting packet binary convolutional code (PBCC) modulation option
21Association denied due to requesting station not supporting channel agility option
22Association request rejected because spectrum management capability required
23Association request rejected because of unacceptable information in the power capability element
24Association request rejected because of unacceptable information in the supported channels element
25Association denied due to requesting station not supporting short slot time option
26Association denied due to requesting station not supporting direct sequence spread spectrum orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (DSSS-OFDM) option
27Association denied because requesting station doesn’t support high throughput (HT) features
28Pairwise master key (PMK-R0) Key Holder (R0KH) unreachable
29Association denied because requesting station doesn’t support phased coexistence operation (PCO) transition time required by the AP
30Association request rejected temporarily; try again later
31Robust management frame policy violation
32Unspecified. Quality of service (QoS)-related failure
33Association denied because QoS AP has insufficient bandwidth to handle another QoS station
34Association denied due to excessive frame loss rates or poor conditions on current operating channel, or both
35Association (with QoS BSS) denied because the requesting station does not support the QoS facility
37Request declined
38Request not successful as one or more parameters have invalid values
39Traffic 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
40Invalid information element (doesn’t follow 802.11 standard)
41Invalid group cipher
42Invalid pairwise cipher
43Invalid authentication and key management protocol (AKMP)
44Unsupported robust security network element (RSNE) information element version
45Invalid RSNE information element capabilities
46Cipher suite rejected because of security policy
47TS 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
48Direct link not allowed in the BSS by policy
49Destination station not present within this BSS
50Destination station not a QoS station
51Association denied because ListenInterval too large
52Invalid fast transition (FT) action frame count
53Invalid shared key (pairwise master key identifier or PMKID)
54Invalid mobility domain element (MDE)
55Invalid fast transition element (FTE)
56Requested traffic classification (TCLAS) processing not supported by AP
57AP has insufficient TCLAS processing resources to satisfy request
58TS not created because request can’t be honored; however, HC suggests station transitions to other BSSs to set up TS
59Generic advertisement service (GAS) advertisement protocol not supported
60No outstanding GAS request
61GAS response not received from advertisement server
62Station timed out waiting for GAS query response
63GAS response larger than query response length limit
64Request refused because home network doesn’t support request
65Advertisement server in network not currently reachable
68Request refused because AP doesn’t support unauthenticated access
73Unscheduled Automatic Power Save Delivery (U-APSD) coexistence not supported
74Requested U-APSD coexistence mode not supported
75Requested interval or duration value can’t be supported with U-APSD coexistence
76Authentication rejected because anti-clogging token is required
77Authentication rejected because the offered finite cyclic group not supported
78The Target Beacon Transmission Time (TBTT) adjustment request not successful because station couldn’t find alternative TBTT
79Transmission failure
80Requested TCLAS not supported
81TCLAS resources exhausted
82Rejected with suggested BSS transition
93Association or reassociation refused because of memory limits at AP
94Association or reassociation refused because emergency services not supported at AP
95GAS query response not yet received
101Request failed due to exceeded MCCA access fraction (MAF) limit
102Request failed due to exceeded MCF coordinated channel access (MCCA) track limit, where MCF refers to mesh coordination function

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