Microsoft to release free RDP Desktop apps for iOS, Android and OS X (updated with screenshots and features)
Yesterday Microsoft announced something pretty significant: later this month they are going to release RDP clients for iOS, Android and Mac. The iOS and Android clients are completely new and the Mac client has gotten a complete overhaul.
You could have missed this amazing news because it was buried deep in this announcement from Microsoft: http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/news/press/2013/oct13/10-07hybridcloudpr.aspx but it is this section:
Further, with Windows Server 2012 R2 Microsoft is introducing the Microsoft Remote Desktop app, available for download in application stores later this month, to provide easy access to PCs and virtual desktops on a variety of devices and platforms, including Windows, Windows RT, iOS, OS X and Android.
Like I said it is a pretty big deal. It will also become apparent that Microsoft is very serious about enabling BYOD by means of desktop virtualization. When you see the clients you'll notice they are pretty sweet and not as basic or as 'v1' as you might expect. The iOS Remote Desktop app should support iOS 6 and 7 and the Android Remote Desktop app is posed to support Android versions as far back as Gingerbread. The OS X Remote Desktop app provides even more functionality that you would expect from a 'desktop app'. Think about 'seamless windows' or 'applications portal'.
Another thing that will be very exciting for customers is that the RDP-level on this Remote Desktop apps is RDP8(.1), meaning you get all the user experience goodness that RDP 8 brought to desktop virtualization.
The Remote Desktop apps should be available later this month from the different appstores.
Check screenshots and some of the new features out here: http://www.thincomputing.net/2013/10/09/screenshots-and-features-of-the-new-remote-desktop-apps-for-ios-android-and-os-x/
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October 8th, 2013 - 16:16
What about WP7/8?
October 8th, 2013 - 17:28
Nothing that I know of.
October 8th, 2013 - 17:23
Does this mean that those devices will play nice with MS VDI? We are currently looking at Citrix and VMWare for this very reason
October 8th, 2013 - 17:30
Yes, the are designed for MS VDI / RDSH. They were not designed specially for Citrix and VMware deployments although I supposed that they will work for those deployments if they chose the RDP deployment option but that will be rare.
October 8th, 2013 - 22:06
Will the iOS and/or the OS X version support Remote Desktop Gateway? If so, this could help us move Mac users off of VPN and over to RDG.
Thanks!
October 9th, 2013 - 09:18
I am fairly certain they will, yes.
October 10th, 2013 - 15:03
Michael — take a look at this notice by iTap:
http://itap-mobile.com/itap-rdp
All of a sudden they’ve discontinued their product and telling customers to use the Microsoft Remote Desktop App when it debuts? Is this writing on the wall that Microsoft bought the iTap RDP client solution?
October 10th, 2013 - 15:23
Hi KC,
I noticed that too. All I can say is that there is a lot of speculation on the web that follow your train of thought. Microsoft has not released any details about this though. Maybe they will.
October 19th, 2013 - 12:50
Finally! I’ve been waiting for this and using teamviewer in the meantime, but it’s not ideal! Do you have a link to the Andoid app please? 😀
October 21st, 2013 - 12:04
I am sure you have seen this by now but here you go: https://t.co/FvwpdOPboo