AirPlay option disappeared? I have the AppleTV connected via WiFi. I tried AirPlay via WiFi using my iPhone and it mirrored perfectly. The next day, the AppleTV was sleeping before I turned it on using the Apple Remote. However, the option to mirror my iPhone (or even my iPad and MacBook) is not there anymore! I tried using the AppleTV via the remote and works fine, it's just that the AirPlay option is gone.

Why is that?

Unplugging the AppleTV from the power source and plugging it back in got the AirPlay option back. Is there a way to make sure this doesn't happen again ?

Edit: Using an Ethernet cable fixes the problem, however I do not wish to keep it wired. Why would the AppleTV have problems only on wireless?
It's hard to say for sure, but I'm guessing there was a problem with the network discovery service. Apple uses Bonjour to advertise various network services (iTunes sharing, file sharing, AirPlay support) without the need to manually input configuration data. Unfortunately it can be a bit prickly at times, so if somewhere along the way the "Hey, I'm an Apple TV" message got lost, didn't get sent or received by your iPhone or Mac, it won't show up as an available device.

Unfortunately, the way Bonjour broadcasts the data seems to be a bit temperamental at times. I'm not aware of any real fix, but a restart almost always seems to fix it. If you're on a Mac, you can try restarting the daemon responsible by running the following two commands in Terminal:


sudo launchctl unload /System/Library/LaunchDaemons/com.apple.mDNSResponder.plist
sudo launchctl load /System/Library/LaunchDaemons/com.apple.mDNSResponder.plist


But that will only fix things if the problem is the Mac not receiving the messages properly - if it's on the Apple TV's end, then restarting that is the best fix.