# Reach Desktop

> Reach Desktop streams a Mac's real screen to an iPhone, iPad or another Mac over a hardware video pipeline (ScreenCaptureKit capture, GPU H.264 and HEVC encoding, WebRTC transport), with tap-to-click exactly where you touch, server-side zoom sharp enough to read small text, voice that types into any Mac field, and App Focus to stream one app only. It draws a dedicated interface for each screen size it runs on. Free on your home network; Pro reaches your Mac from anywhere. Slipstream brings single windows from another Mac over as native windows, and an agent interface lets AI tools work with the Mac.

Requirements: iPhone or iPad on iOS / iPadOS 18 or later; the Mac being reached is an Apple Silicon Mac (M1 or later) on macOS 15 or later with the Reach Desktop menu-bar host installed. Android phones and Windows PCs reach the Mac through a browser viewer with touch control.

## Features

Picture
- Real screen as hardware video: ScreenCaptureKit capture, GPU H.264 and HEVC encoding, WebRTC transport
- Full 4:4:4 HEVC color where the viewer can decode it, with Stream Quality and a bitrate ceiling
- Measured picture speed: median 68.1 ms glass-to-glass (51.7 ms to 73.5 ms, 10th to 90th percentile) at 49.9 frames per second delivered, measured September 1, 2026 on Reach Desktop 0.58.119, one 46.5-second run, MacBook Air 15-inch (M5) viewing a MacBook Pro with an M1 Max chip over Wi-Fi on the local network at 3456x2234; method on the Capabilities page
- Time to a usable picture, from the connect action to the first decoded frame: median 1.70 s (95th percentile 2.21 s) on the local network and 3.55 s (95th percentile 4.52 s) through the relay, connecting cold; measured October 9, 2026 on Reach Desktop 0.60.20, a MacBook Pro with an M1 Max chip viewing a MacBook Air 15-inch (M5) over Wi-Fi, 20 of 20 attempts decoded; method: qa/bench/time-to-picture.sh, the decoder's own first-picture stamp
- Server-side zoom: pinch and the Mac re-crops the stream at native resolution
- Every monitor, with a live thumbnail picker (Pro)
- Mac audio streamed with the video (Pro)
- More Space: adds an extra display to the Mac in the shape of the viewing iPhone or iPad. Reach it by pinching in past the whole screen or using the quick action. It works with a second monitor or mirrored external monitor and restores the original screen arrangement when the session ends.

Control
- Tap-to-click at the touched point, relative trackpad with momentum scroll, full keyboard with chords, quick-actions dock
- Voice input into any Mac text field; the voice bar follows the focused field
- Virtual Mac keys on iPad for the shortcuts iPadOS reserves

Windows
- Slipstream: bring one app window from another Mac over as its own native window on your Mac; it resizes like a real window, typing goes to it, and the window reshapes on the far Mac to the size you give it
- Buttons, checkboxes, radio buttons, disclosure triangles and links in a Slipstream window are pressed through Accessibility on the far Mac: its pointer stays where it was, the window is not raised, and a covered window still takes the press; text, drawing, drags, menus and modifier-clicks go through as ordinary input
- Slipstream Dock icons: right-click a window in the picker and choose Make a Dock icon; a click reconnects to that Mac and brings the same app's window over
- A Settings switch on the Mac being reached, Let paired devices bring a window from this Mac, sets what a paired device may take; a device asks for one window by name

Lock and unlock
- Reach Lock (Mac): covers every Mac screen with a lock that only the Mac password or Touch ID can open. Underneath, the Mac stays awake and unlocked, with apps running and full live control from an iPhone, iPad, or another Mac. Enable it in Settings > Access with Use Reach Lock while I'm away after 1, 5, 15, or 30 minutes without keyboard or mouse use, or use Lock Now in Settings, the menu-bar panel, Control-Option-Command-L, or your iPhone. It runs on the charger at 75% or more, or on battery down to 40% while someone is connected; otherwise it uses the macOS lock. The viewer displays a Reach Lock on chip.
- Remote Unlock (iPhone to Mac): unlocks a Mac on the macOS lock screen from an iPhone by sending the login password sealed with AES-256-GCM under a pairing key. The Mac enters the password using local Screen Sharing. Repeat unlocks use Face ID. The Mac locks again 10 minutes after the viewer leaves. Measured on macOS 15.7.7 and macOS 27.0 virtual Macs: a wrong password is refused, the right password unlocks in about 10 seconds, and the Mac locks again at 10 minutes.

Agents
- Agent interface on each Mac (127.0.0.1, port 9786): an AI agent such as Claude Code lists windows including covered ones, captures one still frame of a window, finds controls through Accessibility, presses a button or menu item by label, sets a field's value, types text, sends key chords to a chosen app, and clicks at a point inside an app
- Controls are pressed through Accessibility without moving the cursor, and the frontmost app stays as it was; each acting reply reports the frontmost app before and after
- You switch it on in ~/.config/reachmymac/agent-verbs.json; every request carries a token replaced at each launch; acting runs after five minutes without input or when the Mac is locked, or any time with actWhilePresent set; every action is one line in ~/Library/Logs/ReachDesktop/agent-actions.jsonl

Focus and session lock
- App Focus: stream one app, everything else masked black on the Mac before encoding; Phone Shape resizes that app's window to the screen in hand
- Face ID session lock on iPhone and iPad; direct local-network connection at home, encrypted relay away from home

Connection
- Direct at home; automatic relay failover on cellular and away from home (Pro); Reach Anywhere puts your Macs and home network in your pocket from any connection (Pro)
- Menu-bar host that starts at login, shows Off, Ready or Connected, and restarts itself
- One sign-in with Google or Apple; devices and the Pro unlock belong to your account
- Pairing: the Mac's QR code is its pairing code; any phone camera opens Reach on it, or the right download when Reach is not installed yet, and an approved code adds the device to the whole account
- Browser viewer with touch control for Android phones and tablets and Windows PCs
- Metered-network cap: on a metered link, such as a phone hotspot, a session window without its own ceiling asks the host for 10 Mbps and returns to the full picture when the network changes.
- Battery rest: on battery with nobody connected, the host rests at a measured 0.2% of a core with 0 sockets open and wakes when a viewer asks.
- Tile sizes: the Mac computer list includes Mini tiles at half the height of a small tile. Tile size settings follow your account across Macs.
- Welcome back: after you move to a new Mac, a Welcome back screen guides setup, and a single pairing QR on the main window approves the whole account at once.

Pricing
- Free on your home network: full mirror, tap-to-click and trackpad, keyboard and voice, server-side zoom, quick actions, the menu-bar host, Face ID lock
- Pro: $7.99 a month billed annually ($95.88), $9.99 month to month, or $249 once for Lifetime; adds reach from anywhere, every monitor, Mac audio, unlimited quick actions
- Business: $12.99 per seat per month billed annually, three-seat minimum
- Every paid plan carries a 30-day money-back guarantee

## A dedicated layout for every device

- 6.9-inch iPhone: iPhone 18 Pro Max, iPhone 17 Pro Max, iPhone 16 Pro Max
- 6.7-inch iPhone: iPhone 16 Plus, iPhone 15 Plus, iPhone 15 Pro Max
- 6.5-inch iPhone: iPhone Air
- 6.3-inch iPhone: iPhone 18 Pro, iPhone 17 Pro, iPhone 17, iPhone 16 Pro
- 6.1-inch iPhone: iPhone 17e, iPhone 16e, iPhone 16, iPhone 15, iPhone 15 Pro
- Foldable iPhone: iPhone Duo (5.4-inch cover screen gets the iPhone layout, 7.6-inch inner screen gets the iPad mini layout)
- Older iPhones on iOS 18 or later: iPhone 14, 13, 13 mini, 12, 12 mini, 11, SE (2nd and 3rd generation), XS, XS Max, XR
- iPad Pro 13-inch (M5, M4) and iPad Air 13-inch (M4, M3, M2): a remote MacBook; the space under the MacBook-shaped picture (about 138 points) becomes a keyboard deck: the full Mac control ribbon with a row of labeled virtual Mac keys below it
- iPad Pro 11-inch (M5, M4), iPad Air 11-inch (M4, M3, M2), iPad 11-inch (A16), iPad 10.9-inch: the same interface as one slim function row of Mac keycaps (about 57 points) between two corner buttons, clear of the Mac's screen
- iPad mini 8.3-inch (A17 Pro) and iPad mini (6th and 5th generation): the Mac fills the screen, the Mac control ribbon runs as a slim upright rail along the right edge, and two corner buttons hold everything else
- Older iPads on iPadOS 18 or later: iPad Pro 12.9-inch (3rd generation and later), iPad Pro 11-inch (all generations), iPad Air (3rd generation and later), iPad (7th generation and later)
- Mac reached: MacBook Air 13-inch and 15-inch, MacBook Pro 14-inch and 16-inch, MacBook Neo, iMac, Mac mini, Mac Studio, any Apple Silicon Mac on macOS 15 or later; every display streams
- Mac reaching from: MacBook Neo, MacBook Air, MacBook Pro, iMac, Mac mini, Mac Studio or Mac Pro with a Studio Display, Studio Display XDR, Pro Display XDR or any monitor; each reached Mac opens in its own window, size and full screen remembered per Mac, pixels requested at the display's Retina scale

How the fit works: Phone Shape asks the Mac to resize the focused app's window to the exact aspect ratio of the screen in hand, portrait or landscape. Current MacBook panels measure about 1.54:1 (MacBook Air 13-inch 2560x1664, MacBook Pro 16-inch 3456x2234); iPads are close to 4:3, so Reach places controls in the space that difference leaves. On iPad, virtual keys send the Mac shortcuts iPadOS reserves: Command-Tab, Mission Control, Spotlight, Show Desktop, Screenshot, Right Click, Clipboard.

## Pages

- [Home](https://reachdesktop.com/): features, pricing, comparison with VNC and Screen Sharing, FAQ
- [Capabilities](https://reachdesktop.com/capabilities): every capability with how it works and how to check it
- [Every iPhone, iPad and Mac](https://reachdesktop.com/devices): the per-device layouts in full
- [Reach Anywhere](https://reachdesktop.com/anywhere): reaching your Macs and home network from any connection
- [What's new](https://reachdesktop.com/changelog): release notes with measured results
- [Support](https://reachdesktop.com/support)
- [Privacy](https://reachdesktop.com/privacy)