Four years after picking Wayport to unwire its U.S.-based restaurants, McDonald's now has approximately 10,300 domestic locations with Wi-Fi to go with your fries. That makes McDonald's Wireless Connectivity (the service's official moniker) the biggest network of hotspots available state-side.

Starbucks has the second biggest hotspot network, and as it transitions from T-Mobile to AT&T the coffee shop hotspots come under Wayport control as well, since Wayport is the managing provider for AT&T's hotspot network. No doubt about it, Wayport is having a pretty good year.

Actually, only about 9,500 of those unwired McDonald's locations let customers utilize the Wi-Fi. The rest limit use for communication with the corporate mothership, handling credit card transactions, and the like. In fact, most of those Wi-Fi-ed Mickey Ds that skip the delicious hotspot aspect are, according to a Wayport spokesman, inside Wal-Mart department stores.

Access at the Golden Arches is free with select devices, specifically the Sony Mylo Com 2 and the Zipit Wireless Messenger Z2. AT&T DSL customers can also get free access on laptops (but no free service for iPhone users, even though they're paying for AT&T's EDGE service? C'mon, AT&T, show the poor iPhoners some love). If you've got an account with a roaming hotspot aggregator like Boingo or iPass, you can sign in at no extra charge. Other users will have to pay $2.95 for a couple hours of use.

There's about 12,800 total McDonald's locations in the U.S. alone, so that leaves around 2,500 to unwire. Wayport wants to get to them all, but despite having a corporate contract with the company, Wayport has to make separate deals with each franchise owner. Plus, some are located where there's no chance of getting a broadband connection to backhaul the Wi-Fi network to the Internet. The advent of faster 3G and WiMAX might solve that problem.