iTerm2 Buddy vs Sill

iTerm2 Buddy connects your iPhone or iPad to iTerm2, the popular terminal for macOS. Once paired with your Mac, it lets you keep an eye on your terminal and act on it from the couch or on the go. REQUIRES A MAC iTerm2 Buddy is a companion app. It works only after pairing with iTerm2 and the free companion plugin on your Mac. Pairing takes a few seconds: your Mac shows a QR code, you scan it, and confirm a short code on both devices. WHAT YOU CAN DO - Live terminal: watch a session update in real time, exactly as it looks on your Mac, including colors, inline images, and full-screen apps like vim, htop, and less. - Type and control: bring up a keyboard with the terminal keys you need (Esc, Control-C, Tab, arrows, function keys) and send input to a session. A composer lets you write longer commands and send them all at once. - Chat with an AI agent: message an assistant that runs on your Mac and can act on your sessions, open windows, run commands, review changes, and report back. Approve sensitive actions right from your phone. - Notifications: get a push when the agent replies or needs your approval, so you can step away and return when it matters. - Voice input: dictate messages with on-device transcription. Your audio never leaves your phone. PRIVACY AND SECURITY Terminal content shared between your Mac and your phone is end-to-end encrypted with the Noise protocol, so only your own devices can read it. There is no account and no advertising, and the app includes no third-party tracking. FREE iTerm2 and iTerm2 Buddy are free.

Sill puts your Mac on your iPhone and iPad. Pick any window, or the whole desktop, and use it with touch, a trackpad, a keyboard or Apple Pencil. Your apps keep running on your Mac. Sill shows them and sends back what you do. Sill needs the free Sill for Mac on the Mac you want to use. Get it at getsill.app. It runs on a Mac with macOS 14 or later. Get started • Open Sill for Mac and allow Screen Recording and Accessibility. • Open Sill on your iPhone or iPad. Your Mac shows up. Tap it. The first time, scan the code your Mac shows. • Pick a window from the Apps list, or tap Desktop to see the whole screen. • The first time, a short tour shows you the controls. Made for touch • Tap to click. Touch and hold to right-click. Drag to scroll. • Apple Pencil works as a mouse, with hover on iPad models that support it. • Hold your device upright for a laptop layout: the picture on top, a trackpad and a row of keys below. On iPhone, turn on Larger Picture to give a window’s picture more of the screen. • On iPhone Duo, open it flat and your Mac fills the inner display. Half open, it’s a laptop: the picture above the fold, a trackpad and keys below. Closed, Sill runs on the cover display. • Type with the on-screen keyboard, or on a hardware keyboard as soon as you connect, with shortcuts and Esc. A trackpad or a mouse scrolls the window under the pointer. • Copy text on your Mac and paste it on your iPhone or iPad. To paste on your Mac what you copied on your device, tap Paste in Sill: it goes where your Mac’s cursor is. • Swipe and pinch with three fingers for Mission Control, App Exposé, Spaces, Apps and Show Desktop. • Use the menus of the app you’re in: tap Menus in the bar, or on iPad with iPadOS 26 or later, use the menu bar at the top of the screen. • Switch windows from live thumbnails in the bar. Touch and hold one to close, minimize or go full screen. Drag it to reorder. • When the mouse moves on your Mac, its pointer shows on your iPhone or iPad too. • Aa makes text larger or smaller. Smooth and sharp • Up to 120 frames per second on displays that support it. • Set quality, resolution and frame rate from your iPhone or iPad. • Hear sound from your Mac in step with the picture, a beta feature that is on unless you turn off Send Audio in Sill’s settings, on your Mac or your iPhone or iPad. Mute it on any device in Sill’s settings. Your Mac, your network • Connect over Wi-Fi, or over a USB cable. • Mac nearby but on another network? Turn on Direct Wireless Connection on the Mac and connect straight to it. • Pair each device with your Mac once by scanning a code. Over a USB cable it pairs by itself. By default your Mac lets in only the devices you paired, and every connection is encrypted. • Away from home, reach your Mac through your own VPN. Sill starts at a quality a slower connection can carry, tells you when the connection can’t keep up, and moves back to your home network by itself when you get home. Private • No account, no ads, no tracking. • Sill has no servers and collects no data. The picture and what you type go between your devices and your Mac, and to no one else. • Sill is free and open source (Apache 2.0): https://github.com/Saffsanity/sill Good to know • Sill shows one window, or the whole desktop, at a time. • Sill for Mac comes from getsill.app, not the Mac App Store.