A native Windows client, not a VNC viewer. Hardware-decoded up to 6K at 120 FPS with synced audio, your Ctrl shortcuts mapped to Cmd automatically — pair once with a code. No Apple ID, no account.
Apple's Screen Sharing has no official Windows viewer, and there's never been an RDP server for macOS — so a Windows PC speaking RDP has nothing on the Mac to answer it. Remio fills the gap with a native C++/WinRT client that streams the Mac up to 6K at 120 FPS, hardware-decoded, with audio in sync. No VNC framebuffer smear, no chroma-subsampled text, no third-party VNC app to configure.
Hardware-decoded H.265 on the PC — a 4K stream costs a few percent of CPU, not a whole core.
macOS uses Cmd where Windows uses Ctrl, so Remio remaps them automatically by default — Ctrl+C on your PC keyboard fires Cmd+C on the Mac, and copy, paste, undo, and save all land where your hands expect. Every key forwards, F-row and modifiers included, and you can turn it off in Preferences → Keyboard → Auto Modifier Remap. Clipboard, file transfer, and monitor switching all ride the same encrypted channel.
Copy on the PC, paste on the Mac — text syncs automatically, in both directions.
Two installs, one PIN, no account. The only platform-specific work is the Mac's two privacy permissions and one Windows firewall prompt.
Download Remio-Host.pkg from remio.net/download — signed and notarized by Apple, so Gatekeeper opens it without warning. Launch the host once, grant Screen Recording and Accessibility in System Settings → Privacy & Security, then quit and relaunch. Apple Silicon is strongly preferred for hardware HEVC at 4K; Intel Macs work for 1080p.
Download the Windows client from the download page and run it (Windows 10 build 17763 or later, or Windows 11). If SmartScreen shows "Windows protected your PC", choose More info → Run anyway — the download is signed and its SHA-256 checksum is published per release on GitHub releases.
Click the Remio Host menu bar icon on the Mac and select Show pairing PIN. Type the six digits into the Windows client — you can rotate the code anytime from the host menu bar. The pairing is permanent until you revoke it — no account, email, or password was ever created.
Select the Mac's name in the Windows client. Remio works out the best route automatically — a direct peer-to-peer connection on the same network (about 8 ms of processing latency), or an encrypted relay if a direct path isn't available. The session opens with the Mac's audio in sync. The benchmarks page documents the latency method.
If the Mac lives somewhere nobody sits, enable unattended access on the host so you can connect without someone clicking accept. Pair it with Wake-on-LAN Linux & Wayland and a sleeping Mac at home still answers. On a desktop Mac, also turn on Wake for network access in System Settings → Energy.
No RDP, no port forwarding, no router homework — just two apps and a PIN.
Remio connects the Windows PC and the Mac directly, and NAT traversal handles the hole-punching — no port forwarding, no VPN, no router configuration. If a direct path is impossible, an encrypted relay carries the session instead.
Every session is end-to-end encrypted. Your screen never touches our servers — keys are negotiated directly between your two machines, and even the relay only ever sees ciphertext.
The processing pipeline — capture, hardware encode, the LAN hop, hardware decode — costs about 8 ms on the same network; the rest is your display's own 60 Hz refresh cadence, so your input lands before the next frame draws (measured internally). Over the internet, same-region sessions typically run low double-digit milliseconds. The connection is peer-to-peer when a direct path exists, relay only when NAT blocks it.
True 4:4:4 color for razor-sharp text is now live — NVIDIA-powered PCs streaming to Mac, more pairs on the way — full color detail per pixel, no smearing on code, spreadsheets, or fine UI. Today's hardware H.265 stream already beats chroma-subsampled VNC.
If one of these looks like your setup, the five-minute install above is all that stands in the way.
The Mac laptop is in the bag; the Windows tower is the machine on the desk. Reach the Mac's apps, files, and messages on the big screen without switching machines — same keyboard, same monitor, one PIN between them.
The Mac mini at the office runs the tools only macOS has; your travel machine is a Windows laptop. Enable Wake-on-LAN and the office Mac wakes and answers from a hotel or a client site, streaming its full desktop back to the PC in your bag.
You run Windows; the person you help runs a Mac. Open their machine from your PC, fix it while they watch, and talk them through it — the use-cases page and the guide to fixing a computer from 500 miles away cover the setup end to end.
Apple's Screen Sharing gives a Windows PC only a VNC-compatible viewer — heavily compressed, low frame rate, color fringing on text, and no audio channel at all. Commercial bridges like Jump Desktop gate cross-platform access behind a one-time purchase plus a monthly subscription. Remio is free, native, hardware-decoded, and audio-complete. See Remio vs Jump Desktop, Remio vs Apple Screen Sharing, or the full compare hub.
Everything that was free before Remio Pro stays free, on every platform — forever.
Five questions the Windows-to-Mac direction tends to raise — honest answers below.
Install Remio Host on the Mac, install the Remio client on Windows, pair once with a six-digit code — free, no Apple ID, no account.