How to share files between devices without an account or app
Last updated: July 29, 2026
You want to hand someone a file. They want the file. Somewhere between those two facts, most tools insert an account, an app install, an email address, or all three. This guide covers how to move a file between two devices with none of that — and what you give up by avoiding it.
Why so many tools want an account
It is not arbitrary. If a service stores your file, it needs to know whose file it is, how long to keep it, and who is allowed to download it. Accounts also make the service a product: an email address is worth something, and a signed-in user can be shown an upgrade prompt.
An app install is usually the same logic in a different form — it gets the service onto your home screen and, often, gets it access to your contacts and photo library.
Both requirements disappear the moment nobody stores the file. If the transfer is a live handover between two browsers, there is nothing to attribute to an account and nothing to keep.
How to send a file with no account and no app
- Open sharebetweendevices.com on the device with the file. No sign-up, no email prompt.
- Choose Send and pick the file, or drop it onto the page on a computer.
- You get three ways to hand it over: a link you can paste anywhere, a QR code the other phone's camera can read, and a short PIN for typing on a computer.
- The other person opens the site, and the file transfers directly between the two browsers.
Neither side installs anything. Neither side identifies themselves. The browser both devices already have is the entire requirement.
What "no account" actually buys you
- No copy of your file exists anywhere else. It was never uploaded, so there is nothing to leak, scan, retain, or hand over later.
- No email address to be marketed to, and none to be exposed in a future breach.
- Nothing to uninstall. Particularly useful on someone else's device — you are not asking a colleague to install an app to receive one PDF.
- No expiry to plan around. The file arrives now rather than sitting on a link that dies in seven days.
What you give up
The honest trade: both people have to be present at the same time. A direct transfer is a handover, not a drop box. If the recipient is asleep, there is no server holding the file for them, and the transfer simply does not happen until they open the page.
There is also no history. Once the transfer finishes, there is no record you can go back to and re-download — that is the point, but it does mean the recipient should save the file properly rather than assuming they can fetch it again.
Keeping it private in practice
Not needing an account does not make a transfer automatically private. A few things worth doing:
- Treat the link like a key. Whoever opens it first becomes the recipient, so send it directly to the person and not to a group chat or anywhere public.
- Prefer the PIN or QR code in person. If you are in the same room, reading a short PIN aloud beats sending a link through a third-party messenger entirely.
- Rename revealing filenames before sending — the name is the one piece of information the coordinating server necessarily handles.
- Start the transfer when they are ready, rather than creating a link in advance. Sessions expire quickly by design.
What is and is not protected is explained properly in is browser file transfer safe.
When this is the right tool
It fits best when you are handing something to a person who is available now: a photo to a friend across the table, a document to a colleague on a call, a video from your own phone to your own laptop. It fits badly when delivery has to wait for someone, which is what storage-based services are for. See the comparison with WeTransfer, AirDrop and Send Anywhere for where each one wins.
Send a file without signing up — it takes about ten seconds.