Android File Transfer is gone. Here is what to use on a Mac instead

For more than a decade the answer to "how do I get photos off my Android phone onto my Mac" was one small app from Google: Android File Transfer. In early 2024 the download quietly disappeared from android.com, and the support page followed. The app was never open source, so nobody can maintain it, and it breaks a little more with every macOS release.

This page compares what is left, as plainly as we can. We make Conduit, so read our column with that in mind. Where a competitor does something better, we say so.

The short version

• You want zero setup on the phone: OpenMTP. Free and open source, the same MTP approach as Android File Transfer, without the 4 GB limit.
• You want the fastest, most Mac-like tool and can spend five minutes once: Conduit. Free, native, USB or Wi-Fi, previews, search, background transfers, cameras and SD cards in the same window.
• You want it inside Finder and are ready to pay: MacDroid or Commander One mount the phone as a drive. Both are paid.

Side by side

	Android File Transfer	Conduit	OpenMTP	MacDroid
Status	Discontinued by Google, no download	Maintained, free	Maintained, open source	Maintained, paid (free tier limited)
Protocol	MTP	adb (Android Debug Bridge)	MTP	MTP or adb
Connection	USB only	USB or Wi-Fi	USB only	USB, Wi-Fi in paid plan
File size limit	4 GB per file	None	None	None
Setup on the phone	Pick "File transfer" in the USB notification	Enable USB debugging once, allow the Mac	Pick "File transfer" in the USB notification	Depends on mode
Setup on the Mac	Install the app	Install the app and Google's platform-tools (the app walks you through it)	Install the app	Install the app
Preview before copying	No	Photos, video streamed from the phone, text and code	No	Through Finder
Search across the phone	No	By name, with type, size and date filters	No	Through Finder
Transfer queue	One modal progress bar	Background queue, cancel any single item	Progress per transfer	Finder copy dialog
Overwrite protection	Silent	Replace, Keep Both or Skip, per item	Asks	Finder
Cameras, SD cards, USB sticks	No	Same window as the phone	No	No
Account or cloud	None	None, no analytics either	None	Licence account
macOS	Unmaintained, fails on recent versions	10.15 Catalina and later, universal, notarized	10.13 and later	10.13 and later
Price	Free	Free	Free	Paid subscription or lifetime

Why Android File Transfer kept failing

Android File Transfer speaks MTP, the Media Transfer Protocol. MTP was designed for cameras and music players, one file at a time, with no concept of a file bigger than 4 GB. It also depends on the phone's USB mode being set exactly right every time you plug in. Newer Android versions changed those defaults, newer macOS versions changed the USB stack, and Google stopped shipping fixes. The familiar "Could not connect to device. Try reconnecting or restarting your device" is what that looks like from the outside.

What Conduit does differently

Conduit skips MTP and talks to the phone through adb, the same channel Android Studio uses. That is the reason for everything in its column above: no 4 GB ceiling, transfers that run at full USB speed, Wi-Fi pairing with a QR code on Android 11 and later, previews streamed straight from the phone, and a search box that covers the whole device.

The price of that choice is honest and worth stating: you install Google's small platform-tools package once, and you enable Developer options and USB debugging on the phone. Conduit's first-run screen walks you through both steps, and the Homebrew route is one line:

brew install --cask android-platform-tools
brew install --cask KirsuLab/tap/conduit

If that setup is a deal-breaker, OpenMTP is the right pick. It is free, open source, and needs nothing on the phone beyond the usual "File transfer" tap.

What Conduit does not do

It does not mount the phone as a drive in Finder. If your workflow is "drag from the phone in a Finder sidebar", MacDroid or Commander One do that, for a price. Conduit gives you its own window instead, with drag from Finder to upload and Copy to Mac to pull the other way.

It also does not sync. Conduit is a file manager, not a backup tool. For continuous photo backup, the phone's own cloud service is still the better fit.

Get Conduit

Conduit is free. Download the notarized disk image from the Conduit page, install it with Homebrew, or pick it up on Ko-fi if you would like to support the work. It runs natively on Apple Silicon and Intel Macs on macOS 10.15 Catalina and later.