Questions and answers

Tailscale builds a private, encrypted network between your own devices. Awaydesk uses it so your phone can reach your Mac from anywhere (home, office or cellular) without opening ports on your router or sending your screen through our servers. On your Mac, Awaydesk only listens on your Tailscale network, so nothing on the open internet can even see it. Tailscale has a free plan for personal use.

Yes. Sign in to Tailscale on your Mac and on each phone or tablet with the same Tailscale account. When a device connects, your Mac checks who it belongs to and only lets in devices signed in to the Mac's own account. A device signed in with a different account, even one on a shared tailnet or a tagged device, is turned away with a message saying so.

1. Tailscale is on and connected on your phone.
2. Your phone and your Mac are signed in to the same Tailscale account.
3. Your Mac is awake and the Awaydesk agent is running.

• A Mac with macOS 14 Sonoma or later, running the Awaydesk agent.
• An iPhone or iPad with iOS 15 or later, or an Android phone or tablet with Android 7.0 or later.
• Tailscale on the Mac and on every phone or tablet, signed in to the same account.

Your Mac, wherever you are, built for a phone. See live previews of all your screens and tap one to take control. Switch apps and windows from a list, run your own one-tap actions, and copy on one device to paste on the other. Type in any language, including Vietnamese with Telex or VNI. Drive the pointer like a trackpad or tap exactly where you want.

Screen Sharing is built for controlling a Mac from another computer with a mouse and keyboard. Awaydesk is built for your phone: live previews of every screen, an app and window list to switch with a tap, a trackpad mode for precise pointing, your own one-tap actions, and typing in any language, including Vietnamese with Telex or VNI. It streams at up to 120 fps and adjusts itself when you move from Wi-Fi to cellular.

Yes. Awaydesk shows a live preview of every display connected to your Mac. Tap one to stream it, and switch between displays with a three-finger swipe or the display chip. Tap a window in the app list and you land on whichever display it's on. You control one display at a time.

On Wi-Fi, Awaydesk streams your display at its full resolution at up to 120 fps. The frame rate can't exceed your display's refresh rate, so a 60 Hz monitor streams at up to 60 fps. It uses H.265 when your Mac and phone both support it, and H.264 otherwise (up to 60 fps and 4K).

Your display's full resolution, tested up to 3840×2160 (4K). With H.265, used when your Mac and phone both support it, Awaydesk streams at your display's native resolution at up to 120 fps. With H.264 it streams up to 3840 pixels wide at up to 60 fps. On cellular it uses Light: up to 2560 pixels wide at up to 60 fps.

Awaydesk adjusts on its own, in two ways:

• It follows your network. On Wi-Fi it uses Full quality (native resolution, up to 120 fps). On cellular it switches to Light (up to 2560 pixels wide, up to 60 fps, at most 8 Mbps) to save data. When you move from one network to the other, it switches while you keep working.
• It adapts to your connection, moment to moment. Within either level the stream measures the connection and raises or lowers its bitrate. When bandwidth drops, it lowers the frame rate first and keeps the resolution, so text stays sharp. When the connection recovers, it climbs back up.

You can override this in the Quality menu: Auto, Full or Light.

No. Your screen, keystrokes and clipboard go straight from your Mac to your phone over your own Tailscale network, encrypted by Tailscale's WireGuard tunnel and again by the stream itself. Our servers only handle your account and subscription. If your devices can't reach each other directly, Tailscale may pass the encrypted traffic through one of its relay servers, which can't read it.

Only devices signed in to your Mac's Tailscale account can connect. Awaydesk doesn't listen on your home or office network or the internet, only on Tailscale, and it turns away every device that isn't yours.

Yes, if you turn on Screen Sharing on your Mac (System Settings → General → Sharing → Screen Sharing, allowed for your account only). Awaydesk asks for your Mac password, signs in to Screen Sharing over Tailscale and types it on the lock screen. The password is used only for that unlock and never stored. Note that macOS Screen Sharing also listens on your local network; add a firewall rule if that matters to you.

While your phone is connected, your Mac won't sleep, dim or lock from inactivity. To reach a Mac that nobody is connected to, set macOS not to lock or sleep when idle, in System Settings → Lock Screen and Energy (on a MacBook, Battery → Options).

One at a time. If another of your devices is connected, Awaydesk asks whether to take control, and the other device is disconnected.

Not yet. Awaydesk streams video and sends your touch and typing; audio isn't included today.

Coming soon. Today Awaydesk controls Macs.

$4.99 a month, billed through the App Store or Google Play. Cancel anytime in your store account.

In your App Store or Google Play account settings. Deleting your Awaydesk account doesn't cancel the store subscription.