The trackpad in your pocket

Glidemote turns your phone into a trackpad and keyboard for your Mac or Windows PC. Click, drag, scroll and type from across the room, and play, pause or turn up whatever's on, all over your own Wi-Fi.

Works with iPhone and Android, with nothing to install on the phone. It pairs with a QR code and stays on your own network.

Trip notes
Beach.mov
Videos
Living-Room-Mac · 6 ms
Try it: drag on the phone to move the pointer, tap to click.

Gestures

Glidemote reads your touches the way a Mac trackpad does.

Move

Slide one finger. Slow movements stay precise and quick flicks cross the screen.

Click

Tap anywhere on the pad. Tap twice to double-click, or three times to triple-click.

Drag

Tap, then touch again and slide to pick something up and move it.

Scroll

Slide two fingers. Flick and the page keeps gliding, the way it does on your phone.

Right-click

Tap with two fingers to open a context menu.

Middle-click

Tap with three fingers, for example to open a link in a new tab.

A label at the top of the pad names each action as it happens, in its colour: blue to move and click, purple to scroll and right-click, teal to middle-click and orange to drag. The ? button at the top of the app shows the gestures on the pad again.

Keyboard

Tap the keyboard button at the top of the app and type on your computer with your phone's own keyboard.

Type

Words appear on the computer as you type, with autocorrect, predictions, dictation, emoji and paste. Return and backspace do what you'd expect.

Keys your phone lacks

Esc, tab and the arrows sit above the keyboard, and ••• has the function keys, home, end, page up and down, and forward delete. Hold an arrow to repeat it.

Shortcuts

Tap a modifier for the next key, the way Shift works on your phone: ⌘ then C copies. On a PC they're Shift, Ctrl, Alt and Win.

Hold one down

Double-tap a modifier to lock it on. Lock ⌘ and tap tab to go through the app switcher, or lock ⇧ to select with the arrows.

Modifiers and clicks

⇧ then a tap on the pad is a Shift-click. The trackpad stays usable while the keyboard is up, so you can click where you want to type next.

Your layout

Shortcuts use the keys of your computer's keyboard layout, so ⌘Z is still ⌘Z on a German or French Mac.

Typing a password, code or a command? Turn off Autocorrect when typing in the app's settings.

Buttons under the trackpad

Play, pause, skip and turn it up from the couch, without getting up to reach the computer.

Search. Opens Spotlight on a Mac or the Start menu on a PC, and brings up your phone's keyboard to type what you're looking for. Return opens the top result.

Full screen. Makes the app in front fill the screen, or go back. On YouTube or Netflix, type f to fill the screen with the video itself.

Mute and volume. They change the computer's volume, just as its own keys do.

Play, pause and tracks. These are your computer's own media keys, so they work with whatever is playing: Music, Spotify or a video in the browser.

Skip back and forward. They press the left and right arrows, which skip through YouTube, Netflix and most video players.

Hold a volume or skip button to keep going. The buttons step aside while you type, and settings can hide them if you'd rather have a bigger trackpad.

Setup

You do this once. After that, open Glidemote on your phone and it connects.

  1. Install Glidemote on your computer

    On a Mac, drag it from the disk image to Applications. On Windows, run the installer. Its window opens with a QR code for pairing, and a Mac asks you to let it control the mouse and keyboard.

  2. Scan the code with your phone

    Point the camera at it. Glidemote opens in your browser, already paired with your computer.

  3. Add it to your Home Screen

    On iPhone, tap Share, then Add to Home Screen, and Glidemote opens full screen. On Android, choose Add to Home screen from the browser menu. It stays paired and reconnects on its own.

Details

Menu bar app. No Dock icon and no Terminal: Glidemote sits in the menu bar on a Mac and by the clock on Windows. Its window shows the pairing code and the phones connected, turns Glidemote off and on, starts it when you log in and comes in light or dark. Close it and Glidemote keeps running.

Real mouse and keyboard events. Glidemote sends native mouse and key events on macOS and Windows, so double-clicks, drags, smooth scrolling and shortcuts work the way they do with your own mouse and keyboard.

Every display. The pointer moves across all your connected displays and never gets lost off the edge.

Connection status. The phone shows your computer's name and the response time in milliseconds. If the Wi-Fi drops, Glidemote reconnects by itself.

Settings. Adjust pointer speed, acceleration and scroll speed. Turn natural scrolling, momentum, tap to click, haptics and autocorrect on or off, and hide the buttons under the trackpad. The app is light or dark to match your phone, or whichever you pick.

Pairing. Only phones that scanned your computer's code can connect, and your touches and typing never leave your local network.

Updates. Glidemote keeps itself up to date. It downloads a new version in the background and installs it when you restart it, and your phone stays paired.

Pricing

One purchase for your computer. The phone app comes with it, straight from your computer, with nothing to download from an app store.

Glidemote for Mac and Windows

$9one-time

The full multi-touch trackpad, the keyboard, the buttons under the trackpad, QR pairing, the Home Screen app and all the settings.

Buy Glidemote

Needs a Mac or Windows PC and a phone on the same Wi-Fi network.

Questions

Do I need to install anything on my phone?
No. Glidemote runs in your phone's browser. Add it to your Home Screen and it opens like any other app.
Does my phone need to be on the same Wi-Fi?
Yes. Your phone talks straight to your computer over your local network, so nothing goes through the internet.
Can anyone else on my network control my computer?
Only phones that scanned your computer's pairing code can connect. You can reset the code at any time, and phones that used the old one have to scan again. The connection isn't encrypted yet, so use Glidemote on networks you trust, like your home Wi-Fi.
Which phones does it work with?
iPhone and Android phones. On iPhone, haptic clicks need iOS 18 or later.
Does it work with Windows?
Yes. On Windows, Glidemote sits by the clock, with the same window and menu as on a Mac.
Can I type with it?
Yes. Tap the keyboard button and type with your phone's own keyboard, autocorrect and dictation included. Keys for esc, tab, the arrows, the function keys and the modifiers sit above it, so shortcuts like ⌘C and Ctrl+C work too. More about the keyboard.
Can it control music and videos?
Yes. The buttons under the trackpad play and pause, skip tracks and change the volume with your computer's own media keys, and skip back and forward in YouTube, Netflix and most video players.