DNS_PROBE_FINISHED_NO_INTERNET: Causes and the Fix

DNS_PROBE_FINISHED_NO_INTERNET is Chrome saying it could not reach a single DNS server, and drawing the obvious conclusion. Most of the time that conclusion is right. The interesting cases are the ones where it is not, because those look identical on screen and have completely different fixes.

What Chrome actually tested

When a name lookup fails, Chrome runs its own probe: it tries to resolve something it knows should always work. If that fails too, it stops blaming the site and reports that there is no internet connection. So this error is not about the domain you typed - by the time you see it, the browser has already established that DNS is failing generally.

The thirty-second triage

Three commands separate the three possible states. Run them in order.

# 1. Do you have an address and a gateway at all?
ip addr show          # or: ipconfig /all

# 2. Can you reach the internet by IP, bypassing DNS entirely?
ping -c 4 1.1.1.1

# 3. Can you resolve a name?
nslookup google.com 1.1.1.1

• No address, or a 169.254.x.x address - the adapter never got a lease. This is a router or cable problem, not a DNS one.
• Ping fails - the connection is genuinely down. Chrome was right; the fix is upstream of DNS.
• Ping works, nslookup fails - this is the case worth knowing. You have internet and your DNS configuration is broken. Nothing about your connection needs fixing.

On a phone (Android or iPhone)

Most people who see this error are on a phone. The same split applies, connection down or DNS unreachable, but the checks are different:

1. Try another app. If WhatsApp or YouTube won't load either, the phone has no working connection. Switch from Wi-Fi to mobile data (or the other way round). If the page loads on the other network, the problem is that Wi-Fi network or its router, not your phone.
2. Toggle airplane mode on for ten seconds and off again. The phone rejoins the network and asks for a fresh address.
3. On Android, check Private DNS. Settings > Network & internet > Private DNS (on Samsung: Settings > Connections > More connection settings > Private DNS). If it is set to a hostname, switch it to Automatic and reload. A private DNS server that this network can't reach makes every lookup fail, while the connection itself is fine.
4. Turn off any VPN, ad blocker or DNS app. Many filter DNS on the phone itself. On Android a key icon in the status bar means one is running; on iPhone look under Settings > VPN, and Settings > General > VPN & Device Management for installed DNS profiles.
5. On public Wi-Fi (café, hotel, office), a sign-in page may need to open first. If it hasn't appeared, forget the network and join it again.

If the connection is genuinely down

Work outward from your device.

1. Confirm on a second device. If a phone on the same Wi-Fi also fails, the router or the line is at fault and there is nothing to do on the computer.
2. Power-cycle the router properly. Off for thirty seconds, not a quick reboot - this clears held state that a warm restart preserves.
3. Try a cable. Ethernet working while Wi-Fi does not narrows it to the wireless side immediately.
4. Check for a captive portal. On any public network, open an http:// address rather than an https:// one. Portals can only intercept plain HTTP; an HTTPS request just fails, which is exactly what you are seeing.

If the connection works and DNS does not

This is the case people spend the longest on, because the connection indicator says everything is fine. The resolver being handed out by DHCP is unreachable, or is answering with nothing.

Set a public resolver by hand. Point the adapter at 1.1.1.1 and 8.8.8.8. If names start resolving immediately, the router's DNS was the problem - some consumer routers advertise themselves as the resolver and stop forwarding correctly after an uptime of weeks.

Flush the caches. Chrome's, at chrome://net-internals/#dns, and the operating system's:

ipconfig /flushdns                                       # Windows
sudo dscacheutil -flushcache; sudo killall -HUP mDNSResponder   # macOS
resolvectl flush-caches                                  # Linux

Check for a VPN or proxy. A disconnected VPN can leave DNS settings pointing at a server inside a tunnel that no longer exists. Disconnecting properly, rather than just losing the connection, restores the original configuration.

On Windows, reset the network stack. Third-party software inserts itself into Winsock and does not always remove itself cleanly:

netsh winsock reset
netsh int ip reset
ipconfig /release && ipconfig /renew

Reboot afterwards - those do not take effect until you do.

What this error is never about

It is not about the website. If you are seeing this, no request ever left your machine for the site you were trying to open, so its server, its DNS records and its certificate are all irrelevant. If you run a site and a visitor reports this code, the honest answer is that their connection or resolver is failing and there is nothing on your side to change.