Hello.
I’m looking for a solution to send text from my PC to my phone, but also the other way around. Big plus if I can send files too in both ways. I already use pairdrop which is nice (while not 100% reliable from my experience) for files, and ntfy is good to send a notification (so basically text) to my phone but the android app won’t let me send from my phone to my pc.
I used to use airdroid a while back, but I don’t want to use proprietary software if I can.
Any idea ?
Solution: snapdrop or pairdrop. For text, right click on PC, long press on phone.
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For smaller smalle text snippets I use QR codes. I use Binary Eye on android, I’m sure there is an open source tool for Windows too. For anything larger, I use syncthing.
If you want persistent messages, use a messaging app like another poster posted. KDE connect should work, but it doesn’t work for my setup for some reason.
If you just need transient messages, which is more of my usecase, and lightweight sending, use pairdrop.
snapdrop and pairdrop app from fdroid for Android, pairdrop website in desktop.
You can just use the website instead of app on phone too.
Sending over LAN is local - it doesn’t go outside your own network.
If devices are on same WiFi, no pairing required.
You can also send across networks by pairing.
Project GitHub repository
Have you tried KDE connect? It has Linux & Windows clients and can send clipboard/files/notifications/etc. seamlessly in either direction between Android and PC.
Thanks for your answer. I remember having tried it twice before. If I remember correctly, I ditched it because it was too complicated for my use case. But as everyone is suggesting it here, I shall give it another try :)
It really doesn’t work well for me. I can’t get the clipboard feature to work no matter what I do. And I can see all my SMS messages there, but when I send one, it never sends and there’s no error message.
It works for notifications, which is one of the most important features for me, but idk. I feel like there’s gotta be something better. Something where half the features aren’t broken.
I used it many years ago with a different phone and laptop and had kind of a similar experience. Sometimes it would update and a feature would be broken for 6 months, then it would update again and it would start working. But at least SMS worked, which is probably my second most important feature.
That’s strange, I can’t say I’ve experienced any of that over the past few years I’ve been using it. I have seen small differences in how windows and Linux handle the connection, but I think that has more to do with my Linux network settings than the app.
KDEConnect works great, you can share every form of content I’ve run across between desktop and mobile device. Runs on Linux, Windows and Android. Not sure if there’s a Mac client.
Thanks for your answer. I remember having tried it twice before. If I remember correctly, I ditched it because it was too complicated for my use case. But as everyone is suggesting it here, I shall give it another try :)
If you run Tailscale on your phone and PC, they can sync from anywhere (Tailscale is a private mesh network client).
Any vpn into your home network should work right? And that would include other solutions intended for local transfers mentioned here
I use Snapdrop. Works like a charm.
Localsend has clients for all OSs.
KDEConnect
Thanks for your answer. I remember having tried it twice before. If I remember correctly, I ditched it because it was too complicated for my use case. But as everyone is suggesting it here, I shall give it another try :)
I use this one: https://www.f-droid.org/packages/com.ismartcoding.plain/
Signal messenger has a note to self function that can be opened on the phone and windows that will do text and small files