Mac everywhere.
On whatever display.
Use your iPhone or iPad as another display for your Mac — and control the Mac right from it.
Website · Features · Setup · Support · Privacy
MeowDisplay mirrors or extends your Mac onto an iPhone or iPad, then turns that device into a way to work the Mac: touch, a trackpad-style pointer, multi-finger gestures, a keyboard, and trays of modifiers and shortcuts all travel back to the Mac. Connect over USB, local Wi-Fi, or a private network you control, with devices paired and every session encrypted.
No MeowDisplay account is required, and there is no MeowDisplay-hosted relay or server in the middle.
Public release builds are being prepared. There is no public download or App Store release yet. The source is available here and can be built from source.
| Display | Mirror an existing Mac display · Extend with a separate virtual workspace · clamshell and headless workflows |
| Control | Direct Touch · Trackpad · Precise Control in both modes · Smart Touch (Experimental) · keyboard · Apple Pencil · Mac gestures |
| Devices & permissions | Active Display · Known Devices · Nearby pairing · connection policies · Allow Input and per-session control requests |
| Picture in Picture | Keep a view-only window of the live Mac on screen while you use other apps (iPhone and iPad) |
| Shortcuts | Main Control Tray · Function Tray · Chords and modifier palettes · customizable actions · profiles · Auto-hide |
| Connections | USB · local Wi-Fi · Remote Access · Auto-Reconnect · Wake & Connect |
| Audio | Mac system audio on the receiver · Mac keeps playing locally · A/V sync and Resync |
| Security | Trusted pairing with a matching code · TLS 1.3 · pinned peer identity |
| Receivers | iPhone and iPad · another Mac with the display-only Mac Receiver |
MeowDisplay isn't trying to be the most powerful remote desktop. It's trying to make one common moment take as little thought as possible: you pull out your iPhone or iPad, your Mac is there, and you can use it.
That shapes where the effort goes:
- Interaction feel. Touch, pointer and gesture handling are designed for fingers on glass, not a mouse emulated on a phone.
- Mirror and a real Extend. Show a Mac display as it is, or give the Mac a separate virtual workspace, with clamshell and headless workflows.
- iPhone first. The iPhone is the main receiver, with iPad fully supported.
- Your own devices and networks. USB, local Wi-Fi, or a private network you control. No MeowDisplay account and no MeowDisplay-hosted relay.
- Quick access, not administration. It's for using your own Mac from a nearby screen, not for managing fleets of machines.
Many good tools cover neighboring ground — Sidecar, Luna, Astropad, RustDesk, AnyDesk and others — each with different strengths. MeowDisplay is simply focused on this one experience.
- Mirror shows an existing Mac display on the receiver. With multiple physical displays connected, choose which one to share. Mirror needs an active display to copy.
- Extend creates a separate software virtual display. Move windows onto it and arrange it alongside your other displays in macOS. Where supported, Extend shape controls include Use Full Display.
Choose the mode on the Mac, or request a switch from the receiver's Settings; the Mac confirms the change. Extend also supports clamshell and headless workflows without a dummy display adapter. Keep a closed MacBook connected to power; headless compatibility is still being tested across Mac models.
Remote control requires Allow Input on the Mac, Accessibility permission, and permission for the current session. Pausing the stream also pauses input. Choose an input mode in the receiver's Settings:
- Direct Touch — a touch maps to the matching position on the Mac screen.
- Trackpad — the pointer moves relatively, like a MacBook trackpad. Touching doesn't jump the cursor to that spot. Trackpad Sensitivity is adjustable, and multi-finger gestures keep working.
Allow Input is the Mac-wide master switch. Receivers can stay connected and view the Mac while it is off. Every new logical session starts with input off; connecting never grants control.
Use Request Control in the receiver's Settings. The device's Input Requests policy on the Mac decides what happens:
- Ask prompts on the Mac.
- Always Allow Requests skips the prompt, but the receiver still has to ask each session. It never bypasses Allow Input.
- Never Allow Requests rejects requests.
Until effective input is allowed, the receiver's control tray is unavailable; the Settings gear stays reachable. The Mac can Revoke Control in the device's settings, or the receiver can Turn Off control. These permissions are separate from permission to connect.
Precise Control works in Direct Touch and Trackpad. Keep one finger down and use another to fine-tune and click at the pointer. There's nothing to turn on.
- In Direct Touch, the first touch places the pointer at that position. Keep it down for a moment, then add another finger: movement becomes relative for the rest of that touch sequence. Move either finger to fine-tune; the pointer never snaps back under it. Lift every finger and the next Direct Touch starts normally again.
- In Trackpad, movement is already relative from the first touch. Rest one finger, then use another to click or drag at the existing pointer location. There is no absolute-to-relative transition, and Trackpad Sensitivity still scales pointer movement.
- In either mode, tap the added finger to click, double- or triple-tap for multiple clicks, or tap, then hold and move, to drag. With one finger resting, tap two more fingers together to right-click.
See Precise Control for the full gesture details.
Smart Touch (Experimental) is an optional addition to Direct Touch, off by default. It uses the Mac's Accessibility information to recognize supported scrollable areas and window title bars:
- Swipe a scrollable area with one finger, with momentum in either axis.
- Hold a standard window's title bar or empty toolbar space, then drag to move the window after the confirming haptic.
- Hold still before moving in a scrollable area to use ordinary Direct Touch instead. Smart Touch Haptics controls the hold feedback.
It works best with standard macOS accessibility information and falls back to Direct Touch when it cannot identify the target. It has no effect in Trackpad mode. Reliability and stability are still being improved; it does not understand every interface. More on Smart Touch.
| Gesture | On your Mac |
|---|---|
| Tap | Click |
| Double tap | Double-click |
| Triple tap | Triple-click |
| Tap, then hold and move | Left drag |
| Two-finger tap | Right-click |
| Two-finger tap, then hold and move | Right-button drag |
| Two-finger pan | Scroll, with momentum |
| Pinch / spread | Viewport, App, or Disabled |
| Two-finger rotate | Viewport, App, or Disabled, with optional Snap Rotation |
| Two-finger double tap | Reset or restore the viewport zoom and pan |
| Gesture | On your Mac |
|---|---|
| Three-finger swipe up | Mission Control |
| Three-finger swipe down | App Exposé |
| Three-finger swipe left / right | Next / Previous Space |
| Three-finger tap | Spotlight |
| Four- or five-finger spread | Show Desktop |
| Four- or five-finger pinch | Launchpad |
Full details are on the Features page.
Use Apple Pencil for precise input on supported iPad models:
- Pencil strokes reach the Mac as pen-tablet events, separate from finger input
- Tilt is passed through with each stroke
- Hover moves the pointer before the tip touches, on iPads that support Pencil hover
- Strokes are sent at the iPad's full touch sample rate
- Fingers resting on the screen are ignored while the Pencil tip is down
- Tap and double-tap with the tip to click and double-click
Apple Pencil support is still evolving, with additional capabilities and refinements planned for future releases.
Turn Video off and keep using MeowDisplay for pointer and keyboard input. The connection, trays and selected input mode stay active, so the receiver works as a trackpad and keyboard for the Mac.
Tap the tray's Keyboard button for the on-screen keyboard, or use a hardware keyboard connected to the iPhone or iPad. Latched modifiers from the Control Tray combine with the keys you type.
The keys a touch screen is missing, close at hand: Command, Option, Control, Shift, Escape, Tab, Dock, Keyboard and Settings. Reorder controls, show or hide each one, and keep several setups as profiles. Haptics, a landscape tray side, and Avoid Notch let it fit the device you're holding.
Hold or latch a modifier and a palette of matching shortcuts appears beside it. Combine modifiers and the palette changes with the chord — for example ⌘ for Copy, Paste and Undo, ⌘⌥ for Force Quit and Hide Others, ⌘⇧ for Redo and Screenshot. Pick commands without reaching for a physical keyboard, and choose which actions each palette offers.
A separate tray of one-tap actions — Zoom In, Zoom Out, Undo and Redo by default. It's customized independently of the Main Control Tray, with its own profiles, and can sit on the same or the opposite side.
There when you need it. Out of the way when you don't. With Auto-hide, the control trays retreat after a period of inactivity and interacting with the receiver brings them back. Manual Collapse stays separate, and Auto-hide can be turned off.
Pair a receiver once, then manage it in Devices on the Mac:
- Active Display shows live receiver/display sessions and connection state, with Pause and Disconnect.
- Known Devices includes paired receivers that are Connected, Paired · Nearby, or Paired · Offline. When reachable, connect with Mirror or Extend. Open device settings or Forget a pairing.
- Nearby lists unpaired discoverable receivers ready to pair.
Connection permissions decide whether a paired device can start sharing. Automatically Allow Connections is on by default. Each device can use Default (follow that switch), Always Allow, or Block. Blocking keeps the pairing. These choices never grant remote control.
Either side can start a session, and the Mac sender always streams. When connection approval is required, an explicit Connect waits for acceptance; background reconnects never prompt.
Receivers include iPhone, iPad, and the display-only Mac Receiver. The Mac Receiver does not forward its keyboard or trackpad to the other Mac. More on Devices.
- USB — plug in a data-capable cable and trust the Mac. A direct, reliable path with no network setup.
- Local Wi-Fi — receivers are discovered over Bonjour on your network, including nearby peer-to-peer Wi-Fi.
- Remote Access — reach a paired Mac through a private network you control, such as Tailscale. The address only routes the connection; pairing still authenticates it.
- Network Transport — on Wi-Fi and Remote Access, each device can use Auto (the default), QUIC or TCP (Mac Settings → the device). Both use the same pairing and encryption; Auto uses QUIC when both apps support it and uses TCP if QUIC can't get through. USB is unaffected.
- Auto-Reconnect restores the session whenever the connection becomes available again.
- Wake & Connect can wake a supported paired Mac on its network and reconnect when it becomes available. It needs Wake for Network Access and compatible hardware, and is designed for a logged-in Mac that has gone to sleep or locked. See Setup for networking limitations.
Mac system audio can stream to the receiver while the Mac keeps playing locally. Turn it on with the receiver's Audio toggle; if sound and picture drift apart, adjust A/V Sync or tap Resync.
On iPhone and iPad, the Mac can stay in view while you do something else. MeowDisplay uses the system's own Picture in Picture window, fed by the same stream the receiver is already showing.
- Automatic or manual. With Picture in Picture on (the default), a live session can enter the system floating window when you leave the app, when supported and available. Receiver Settings also offers Start Picture in Picture and Stop Picture in Picture.
- For glancing, not controlling. The window is view-only: it shows what your Mac is doing, but touches in it never reach the Mac. All interaction stays in the full receiver.
- One tap back. The window's restore button returns you to the full receiver, and opening MeowDisplay again does the same.
- Audio. If the receiver's Audio is on, Mac audio can keep playing while the window is showing. Leaving the app without Picture in Picture still silences the receiver as before.
- Your choice. Turn Picture in Picture off in the receiver's Settings and leaving the app never starts it.
Picture in Picture is new; physical-device validation is not yet complete.
- Devices pair explicitly, confirming a matching verification code (SAS) on both screens.
- Every session is encrypted and mutually authenticated with TLS 1.3 against the pinned peer identity you trusted.
- There is no plaintext media fallback.
More in SECURITY.md and the Privacy page.
- Run MeowDisplay on your Mac.
- Open the MeowDisplay receiver on your iPhone or iPad.
- Connect over USB or Wi-Fi, and pair the devices by confirming the matching code.
- Choose Mirror or Extend.
- Grant Screen Recording and Local Network permissions as requested. For control, also grant Accessibility, enable Allow Input on the Mac, and use Request Control in the receiver's Settings.
The Setup guide covers permissions, pairing, USB & Wi-Fi, Remote Access and troubleshooting.
git clone https://github.com/raiseCatError/meowdisplay.git
cd meowdisplay
echo "DEVELOPMENT_TEAM=YOURTEAMID" > .env
./generate.shOpen MeowDisplay.xcodeproj and run the OpenSidecarMac (Mac) and
OpenSidecariOS (iPhone/iPad receiver) schemes. Signing, permissions and
troubleshooting are in SETUP.md; release process in
RELEASE.md.
- Features · Setup · Support · Privacy
- SETUP.md — building, signing and local setup
- SECURITY.md — security model and reporting issues
- PROTOCOL.md and COMPATIBILITY.md — wire protocol and versioning
- ARCHITECTURE.md — how the apps fit together and where to start in the code
- TECHNICAL_NOTES.md — virtual displays, sleep and wake, and other internals
Issues and pull requests are welcome, especially testing on iPad, different Mac models, external-display setups and networks. Please open an issue before starting large architecture work.
See CONTRIBUTING.md and the Code of Conduct. Report security vulnerabilities privately as described in SECURITY.md, never in a public issue.
Want to translate MeowDisplay? Community translations are welcome. Human-written translations only, please — no AI or machine-generated localization. See Translations in CONTRIBUTING.md for how to get started.
MeowDisplay started as a fork of OpenDisplay by Philip Poloczek. OpenDisplay already had a working low-level foundation — Mac screen capture, virtual displays, video encoding and an iPhone/iPad receiver — and there was no good reason to rebuild a working open-source base just to say every layer was written from scratch. Thank you to OpenDisplay for it.
Most of MeowDisplay's own work since then has gone into what happens on top of that foundation: Direct Touch, Trackpad and gestures, Smart Touch, Precise Control, the control trays, Remote Access, pairing and security, the session lifecycle, clamshell and headless use, audio, Picture in Picture, and a lot of polish.
If you only need the core second-display experience, or compatibility that the upstream project serves better, OpenDisplay is well worth a look.
MeowDisplay is intended for devices you own or are authorized to use. Don't use it to watch, access or control someone else's device without their permission.
MeowDisplay is licensed under GPL-3.0. It began as a fork of OpenDisplay by Philip Poloczek, which provided the original display, capture, encoding and receiver foundation. Original work Copyright (c) 2026 Philip Poloczek; this fork's changes are contributed under the same license. If you distribute a modified version, it must remain open source under the same license with attribution intact.
Independent open-source software, not affiliated with Apple.
Made by raiseCatError