On diymore WiFi Kit 32 ESP32 WiFi with OLED without extern antenna
When WiFi.begin(ssid, password); have never worked,
it may due to hardware problem of the onboard wifi antenna.
After putting a finger on the antenna board and reset : it’s connecting in less than 5 second.
you may use a alligator clip, or braze a wire instead of
Hope helping
Do you have more detailed instructions on how to correct this fault? Video? Photos?
I have three boards with this same problem, and just came here to find out how to get replacement boards.
I think a spring or extern antenna would have been better,
but there is no connector for it in this ESP32 version.
It may be an issue for a good Lora communication,
I haven’t check yet.
In a way, it’s not logic for a board doing long distance communication, not having an extern antenna
At least the ESP32 board, in station mode, is connecting to my smartphone in close range.
After hours of searching, like all of us. Winning in the end 
Thanks for the photo 
That’s all it is?! 
I thought for sure it was a cold solder joint on the board or something like that. When I press the board at the back the Wi-Fi connects right away. This explains why it works better when I connect a battery cable to the back of the board.
I tried the alligator clip, and it works!!! 
I have soldered a 13cm solid copper wire on to the antenna and it works great now.
Thanks so much Joss, I was ready to toss these boards and buy from another manufacturer.
I’ll have to test the range now> I was considering LoRa for my project, as the range for ESP-Now on these boards wasn’t very good, and was unreliable until now.
I’m so happy it works also for you Russel.
Thank you for your feedback, this confirms an issue on some board that the manufacturer should already know, but continue to sell
The trick is too much to be true, but it’s working.
It would have been a Mc Guyver legacie (series in the 80’s), if using a staple 
It would be interessing to see your post on long range communication.
I hope it’ll reach others who are stucke in this situation. If that the case, feed the post.
Have fun Russel !
Thank you Ross & Russel! I’ve been struggling with this for like ages and just now touched my finger to the antenna and it conected immediatly! Thanks again! (and yes, an external antenna connector would be a great addition on these boards).
Hi Russel, do happen to have a picture of the wire soldered on? I’d like to try that but it looks like a bit of a dicey soldering job for me. thanks in advance!
@tbrown13 Here’s a couple photos.
Before I added the wire, I had maybe 7m range. Now I have about 75m range.
You will probably need to scrape the coating off the on-board antenna prior to soldering or at least abrade it.
@Joss is a star for posting this, I was having so much trouble with WiFi on my boards that I nearly threw them away.
This length of solid copper wire is about 13cm long, and seems to work best when it is coiled up. I didn’t try any other lengths.
Be sure not to cause a short with the bare wire, I think I will leave the insulation on in future.
As I am using ESP-Now protocol on most of my ESP32’s. So I am now adding a DIY external antenna to all my boards.
@Russell Thank you! That does not look that hard at all. Yeah, I almost tossed mine as well but then saw the alligator trick and they are working fine now. I just got a couple of the V3 boards hoping they would fix the issue but i cannot even get the factory test code to compile and it seems a lot of people are seeing the same issue. Thanks again!
I have some simple sketches on github if you want to test your boards.
There is also CanAir.io, they have an online web installer that works for Heltec Boards.
Simple way to test your WiFi+Bluetooth connectivity, or even create your own IOT weather station.
