Some things only need a tap.
The AI on your Mac stops halfway through some code and waits for your approval. A message needs a one-line reply. The iPad in your hand is enough for these.
Afar Window
Leave the Mac on the desk. Take the app to bed.
Afar Window lets you carry on with your Mac's work from your iPad, wherever you are. Every app adapts to the size of the iPad's screen.
Requires iPadOS 26 and macOS 26.
A full desktop isn't always the best view.
A Mac's screen is larger than an iPad's and a different shape. Shrunk to fit, its text often needs zooming to read, and other areas need dragging into view.
Tap an app, and it fills the iPad.
A typical remote desktop shrinks the Mac's whole screen onto the iPad. The screens are different shapes, which leaves black bars, and the text comes out small.
Afar Window brings over only the app you choose, and its window adapts to the iPad's size and shape. Text stays the size it was on the Mac.
Tap another app on the left to switch. The previous window returns to its place on the Mac, and the new one adapts to the iPad, whatever its original shape.
The app's menus, dialogs and new windows appear on the iPad as well.
Work the Mac with your fingers.
Common gestures map to actions on the Mac, such as a two-finger tap for a right-click, or touch and hold, then drag, to select text. Trackpad mode adds a pointer, and Magic Keyboard is supported. Text in any language typed with the iPad's input methods reaches the Mac unchanged.
The clipboard is shared between the two. Text copied on the Mac can be pasted on the iPad, and the paste button sends the iPad's clipboard to the Mac.
A keyboard?
Just say it.
One tap hands the iPad's microphone to a dictation app on the Mac. Another tap enters the recognised text in the current app.
Dictation needs a separately installed third-party dictation app on the Mac, such as Spokenly. Before first use, set the dictation app's microphone to Afar Window Microphone. The keyboard and other input methods stay as they are.
The Mac's sound can be sent to the iPad as well, with an option to keep sound and picture in sync.
Shortcuts at your fingertips.
A tap on the button starts dictation by default, or runs another action you choose. Holding it opens a ring of buttons around your finger; sliding onto one and letting go runs it.
The ring can be customised with keyboard shortcuts, media keys and key combinations of your own. The button can be placed anywhere on the screen.
Touch and hold the button
Choose any desktop.
Besides single apps, you can choose a full-screen virtual desktop, or show what's on any of the Mac's displays.
Each Mac can have its own theme colour, shown around the edges of the picture while connected, so different computers are easy to tell apart.
Try a colour
Your iPad connects straight to your Mac.
Macs on the same network appear on the iPad automatically. From other networks, they can be reached through a tool such as Tailscale.
All data between the two is end-to-end encrypted and travels only between the iPad and the Mac, with no account required. On first connection, both screens show the same six-digit code; once it's allowed on the Mac, later connections are automatic.
Always on the fastest path.
A Mac can be reached over more than one path, such as the local network and Tailscale. While connected, the iPad keeps measuring each one and switches to a faster path when it finds one, without interrupting the picture.
The sidebar shows picture latency, frame rate and bandwidth in real time, and the path diagnostics list the measurements for each path.
One app for each side.
iPad
Afar Window
- From
- The App Store
- Requires
- iPadOS 26 or later
Lists the Mac's apps and displays, and shows whichever you select.
Coming to the App StoreMac
Afar Window Host
- From
- This website
- Requires
- macOS 26 or later
Sits in the menu bar and shares the Mac.
Download for Mac