In iOS 18 and macOS 15 Sequoia, Apple added a function referred to as iPhone Mirroring. This offers you a digital model of your iPhone which you can work together with on any Apple silicon or Intel Mac with a T2 safety chip. It’d appear to be the function is not notably helpful; why use a digital iPhone when you have got the true one at hand?
It seems there are many useful ways in which I exploit iPhone Mirroring every day.
Authenticating Funds From Banking Apps
After I make funds with financial institution or bank cards, I’m typically requested to confirm the funds utilizing the banking or bank card apps on my telephone. By signing into these apps with a passcode, I can then affirm that I’m making a cost, which protects me from different individuals utilizing my playing cards fraudulently.
If I am paying for one thing on-line on my Mac, nonetheless, then it may be a bit of irritating. I’ve to cease utilizing the pc, discover my iPhone, open the banking app, authenticate with Face ID, affirm the cost, after which return to my Mac to finish the method. There aren’t any Mac variations of those apps, so the one approach to authenticate is utilizing the iPhone apps.
Utilizing iPhone Mirroring, nonetheless, I can do all of it from my Mac. After I must authenticate a cost, I can open the cost app utilizing iPhone Mirroring, signal into the app with my passcode (since I can not use Face ID by iPhone Mirroring), and ensure the cost straight from my Mac. The entire course of might be finished from my Mac with out touching my iPhone as soon as.
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Dropping Information Instantly Into Apps
AirDrop is a very great tool that I exploit on a regular basis. It nonetheless looks like magic that I can faucet AirDrop and a file will wirelessly switch from my iPhone to my Mac or my Mac to my iPhone.
I may also use iPhone Mirroring to switch information from my iPhone to my Mac or vice versa. All I must do is drag and drop information from my Mac into the iPhone Mirroring window or drag them from the digital iPhone onto my Mac desktop, and they’ll robotically be transferred.
There is a key purpose why this technique might be extra helpful than utilizing AirDrop. When utilizing AirDrop, I’ve little or no management over the place the file being transferred finally ends up. If I switch a file from my iPhone to my Mac, for instance, it would find yourself in my Downloads folder, even when this is not the place I want it to go. After I AirDrop a photograph from my Mac to my iPhone, it is robotically despatched to the Photographs app even when I wish to use it some place else.
Utilizing iPhone Mirroring, I’ve far more management. Transferring information from my iPhone to my Mac, I can drag them from the digital iPhone into any folder I need, reasonably than them all the time going to the Downloads folder. After I’m transferring information from my Mac to my iPhone, it may be much more helpful as a result of I can drag and drop information straight into apps.
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GIFs Are Neat, but I Want Clips With Sound
GIFs are like silent movies: that they had their second, nevertheless it’s time for the complete expertise.
For instance, if I am sending a WhatsApp message, and I’ve the proper response GIF saved on my Mac, I may AirDrop the GIF to my iPhone, the place it will be saved to the Photographs app, after which manually add the GIF to my WhatsApp message earlier than sending it. With iPhone Mirroring, I can drop the GIF straight into the WhatsApp dialog and ship it with out having to fiddle with AirDrop in any respect.
I can use Universal Clipboard to copy and paste files between my Mac and iPhone, but when I attempt to copy a GIF from my Mac and paste it into WhatsApp, all that will get pasted is the identify of the file. Utilizing iPhone Mirroring lets me paste the GIF itself straight into the chat.
Producing 2FA Codes From My Mac
One other factor that I usually use iPhone Mirroring for is two-factor authentication. I exploit two completely different 2FA apps (Duo and Google Authenticator), each of which supply iPhone apps however haven’t got Mac apps. It means if I am signing into an account with two-factor authentication on my Mac, I’ve to drag out my iPhone, open the related app, generate the code, copy it, paste it into my Mac, after which proceed to log in.
Utilizing iPhone Mirroring, I can generate the codes straight on my Mac, regardless of the authenticator apps not providing Mac apps. It means I can do all the things I must log in from my desktop with out having to modify backwards and forwards to my iPhone.
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Making Journal Entries Utilizing a Keyboard
Apple’s native Journal app is an excellent free journaling app. It gives helpful ideas based mostly on my exercise, can robotically choose images so as to add to my entries, offers helpful writing prompts if I can not consider what to say, and even permits me to log my way of thinking within the journal and have it robotically saved to the Well being app.
There’s one main flaw, nonetheless. The app is at the moment solely obtainable on iPhone and iPad, which is not supreme for typing out my journal entries. When you have an iPad keyboard, it is a bit of simpler, however having to faucet out your innermost ideas on an iPhone display is much from supreme.
Fortunately, with iPhone Mirroring, I can open the Journal app on my Mac and sort out my journal entries utilizing my bodily Mac keyboard like a civilized human being. It makes including entries a lot faster and simpler that iPhone Mirroring is sort of value it for utilizing Journal alone.
The Journal app is lastly coming to the Mac in macOS 26, however not till September or October of 2025. Within the meantime, I will be utilizing iPhone Mirroring for typing up all my journal entries.
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Taking part in Slay the Spire With out Squinting
It is a enormous one for me. I’ve become hopelessly addicted to the superb roguelike deck-building recreation Slay the Spire, which I used to be capable of obtain without spending a dime on my iPhone with my Apple Arcade subscription. I moved on to Slay the Spire after having fun with the vaguely comparable Balatro.
The difficulty with Slay the Spire on iPhone, nonetheless, is that a number of the textual content is simply far too tiny for my ever-deteriorating eyesight. I discover myself squinting to attempt to see what the three playing cards I am being provided on the finish of a brutal spherical of fight are. I can use iPhone accessibility features to zoom in on the screen, however doing so implies that different elements of the display exit of body, so it is not likely workable.
Having put in the Balatro on my Mac for the same purpose, I assumed that I might be capable to do the identical with Slay the Spire, however sadly, there isn’t any Mac app obtainable by way of Apple Arcade. I may purchase the Steam model, however it will imply paying out one other $25, and I would not be capable to keep on the identical run on my iPhone. It is not all unhealthy information, nonetheless, as a result of I can play Slay the Spire on my Mac utilizing iPhone Mirroring.
The dimensions of the textual content utilizing iPhone Mirroring is similar as on the iPhone. Nevertheless, after I improve the zoom on my Mac display (utilizing Cmd+Choice+=), there’s sufficient display actual property for all the recreation to stay seen. It means I can play Slay the Spire on my Mac with textual content that is really sufficiently big to learn, which provides me even much less excuse for dying on one more run.
When iPhone Mirroring was first launched, I believed it was actually spectacular, then stopped utilizing it nearly instantly as a result of I could not consider something that I may do with it that I could not simply do with my iPhone. Nevertheless, over time, I’ve began to make use of it increasingly more, and now I discover it exhausting to think about how I lived with out it. For those who’ve been sleeping on iPhone Mirroring, I like to recommend taking it for one more spin; it’s miles from good, however it may be genuinely helpful.
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