📡 How I Easily Connected My Raspberry Pi to the Internet Using a Waveshare SIM7600E-H 4G HAT

Getting your Raspberry Pi online using a 4G HAT might sound complicated — but with the Waveshare SIM7600E-H 4G HAT, it turned out to be surprisingly simple. In this post, I’ll walk you through my quick setup and share some helpful links and tools I used along the way.

🔧 What You Need

  • A Raspberry Pi (I used a Pi 4 with Raspberry Pi OS Bookworm Lite)
  • Waveshare SIM7600E-H 4G HAT
    👉 Official Wiki
  • SIM card with mobile data
  • USB connection from HAT to Pi (the USB port is used for networking, not the serial GPIOs)
  • Some patience (but not too much 😄)

⚡️ Step 1: Attach and Power the 4G HAT

  1. Insert your SIM card into the slot on the HAT.
  2. Connect the main and auxiliary antennas.
  3. Plug the USB cable from the HAT to your Pi.
  4. Use the GPIO 5V headers or USB to power the module.
  5. Wait for the NET LED to start blinking regularly (meaning it’s registered on the network).

🌐 Step 2: Let Linux Recognize the Device

Boot up your Pi and check if the device is recognized. Run:

lsusb

You should see something like:

Bus 001 Device 004: ID 2c7c:0125 Quectel Wireless Solutions Co., Ltd.

If that appears, you’re good to go. The HAT acts like a USB modem/NIC.

🧙‍♂️ Step 3: Use nmcli to Connect

The easiest way to establish a mobile connection is with nmcli (NetworkManager CLI). I followed the exact steps described in this helpful blog post:
👉 WimsWorld - SIM7600G-H on Bookworm

Enable the modem interface:

sudo nmcli device

Look for something like wwan0 or cdc-wdm0.

Create a connection:

sudo nmcli connection add type gsm ifname "*" con-name "4G" apn internet

Note: Replace "internet" with your carrier’s APN if different.

Bring up the connection:

sudo nmcli connection up "4G"

And that’s it — your Pi is now online via mobile data! 🎉

🛠 Troubleshooting Tips

  • If nmcli complains about the device being locked, try:
sudo mmcli -m 0 --unlock
  • No device showing up in nmcli? Try:
sudo apt install usb-modeswitch modemmanager
  • To monitor interfaces:
ip link show

🧵 Resources That Helped Me

🚀 Final Thoughts

The Waveshare SIM7600E-H HAT has proven to be a solid and reliable way to get mobile internet on a Raspberry Pi. It’s plug-and-play if you’re using NetworkManager — and once set up, it can run headless in remote setups, perfect for IoT or field deployments.

Let me know if you’re using a different HAT or want to auto-start the connection on boot. Happy hacking! 💻📶