A wireless device has a WiFi transceiver and a WWAN transceiver. A programmed processor is configured to connect the WiFi transceiver to an access point and while connected, operate in a learning mode in which WWAN signals are characterized at a location of the WiFi access point and stored as an access point characterization. When a connection to the AP is lost, operating in a monitoring mode in which WWAN signals are compared to the stored access point characterization with the WiFi transceiver disabled. When the WWAN signals match the WiFi AP characterization the WiFi transceiver is enabled to reconnect to a WiFi AP.