Table of Contents
How it works
The phone app sends a tap (“next slide”, “previous slide”) to a small companion app running on your Mac. That app presses the same keyboard shortcut you’d press yourself (Right Arrow, Left Arrow, etc.), so it works with PowerPoint, Keynote, Google Slides, and PDF viewers without any setup inside those apps.
One-time setup
On your Mac
- Download Slide Remote for Mac and drag it into your Applications folder.
- Open it. It lives quietly in your menu bar (top of the screen), not in the Dock.
- The first time it runs, it’ll show you one button: “Open Accessibility Settings.” Tap it, then switch Slide Remote on in the list that appears. This is the one permission the app genuinely needs — without it, taps from your phone will arrive but nothing will happen on screen, with no error message, so don’t skip this step.
- Optional: turn on “Launch at login” in the app so you never have to open it manually again — it’ll just be running whenever you open your laptop.
On your phone
Install Slide Remote from the App Store (iPhone) or Play Store (Android). That’s it — no extra setup on the phone.
Before each talk
- Make sure your Mac and phone are on the same Wi-Fi (see the venue Wi-Fi note below if you’re at a conference).
- Open the Slide Remote icon in your Mac’s menu bar — it shows a QR code.
- On your phone, open the app and tap Scan to connect, then point it at the QR code. (Or, if your Mac shows up automatically under “Nearby devices,” just tap its name instead — no scanning needed.)
- The status dot turns green once you’re connected.
- Open your slides on the Mac and make sure that window is the active one.
You only need to redo steps 2–4 each time you restart the server or switch networks — there’s nothing to type, ever.
Using the remote
The app talks to whichever app currently has focus on the Mac — so make sure your slides are the active window before you start tapping.
- NEXT: Advances to the next slide (same as pressing →)
- PREV: Goes back a slide (same as pressing ←)
- Black screen: Toggles a black screen (PowerPoint’s “B” shortcut)
- End show: Exits the slideshow (same as pressing Esc)
The permission prompts you’ll see, and why
- Accessibility (Mac, one time): lets the app press keys on your behalf when you tap a button on your phone. Without this, the app can’t do anything.
- Local Network (phone, one time): lets the app find and talk to your Mac over Wi-Fi. It never sends anything outside your local network.
- Camera (phone, only if you use “Scan to connect”): used only to read the QR code shown on your Mac — nothing is recorded or stored.
Important: conference/venue Wi-Fi
Many venue and conference Wi-Fi networks have client isolation turned on, which blocks devices on the same network from talking to each other — even though your phone and Mac both show as “connected.” This is the #1 reason this kind of app stops working on the day of a real talk, and no setting in this app can fix it, because it’s a restriction on the network itself. It also breaks both the auto-discovery and QR-scan connection methods, since those still rely on your phone and Mac actually being able to reach each other.
The reliable fix: don’t use the venue Wi-Fi for this at all. Instead, have your Mac create its own Wi-Fi network and connect your phone directly to that:
System Settings → General → Sharing → Internet Sharing on the Mac, then connect your phone to the network it creates.
If you have the option, test this at the venue during setup time, not minutes before you go on stage.
Troubleshooting
- Slides don’t change, but the phone shows “Connected”: almost always the Accessibility permission (see One-time setup above). Open the Mac app and confirm it’s switched on in System Settings.
- Phone can’t find the Mac / scanning doesn’t connect: confirm both devices are actually on the same network, and try the venue-Wi-Fi workaround above. If scanning fails repeatedly, use the manual entry fields shown below the QR code as a fallback — they contain the same IP and a short code you can type in by hand.
- Works at home, fails at the venue: this is almost always client isolation — see the section above.
- “Slide Remote can’t be opened” / Gatekeeper warning on the Mac: make sure you downloaded the app from the official source — a properly signed copy opens without any warning.
What this does not do
- It does not require an internet connection — everything happens over your local network (or the Mac’s own hotspot).
- It does not work over Bluetooth or USB — Wi-Fi only.
- It’s Mac-only on the laptop side for now.
- Anyone who doesn’t have your Mac’s current QR code or pairing code cannot connect to it — each session uses a fresh code, so a stranger’s phone with the same app installed can’t take over your slides.
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