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Pocket Homelab
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Install Pocket Homelab

Requirements, download links and what to expect the first time you open the app on iPhone, Mac and Android.

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Requirements

Platform Minimum OS Notes
iPhone iOS 18 Universal purchase with the Mac app.
Mac macOS 15 Apple silicon and Intel; sandboxed, hardened runtime.
Android Android 9 64-bit ARM phones. In testing, not on Google Play yet.

Network access to your services is up to you: the same Wi-Fi, a VPN, a Tailscale tailnet or a public HTTPS endpoint. Pocket Homelab never configures a VPN for you.

Download

Download on the App StoreMac App Store

The Android app is in testing and is not on Google Play yet. See The Android app.

First launch on iPhone

The app opens on Home. With nothing connected, Home is a welcome screen, “Your homelab in your pocket”, with three ways in:

  • Look around first: a made-up homelab, no server needed. See Sample workspace.
  • Connect a service: the service catalogue, titled “What do you run?”. Pick one to fill in.
  • Bring your configuration: an env file, or an encrypted export from another iPhone or Mac. See Connect your services.

How it works under the three opens a short sheet: addresses and keys stay in this device’s Keychain, the app talks to your servers directly, a service that only answers at home or over your VPN needs that connection here too, and the free plan keeps three services active.

  1. Press Connect a service and pick one. Search matches names and what the services do: torrents, budget, dns.
  2. Enter its address and credentials. Each field has its own help underneath, saying where to find the value.
  3. Press Connect. The app tidies the address, saves it and checks the connection in one go.
  4. On success you see Connected, what the check found, and Also show as a tab for the tabs that service brings. Connect another service goes back to the catalogue.
  5. If the check fails, Not connected yet says what went wrong in words (““nas.example.com” did not answer.”) with the likely fixes, and the raw error underneath.

The first connection replaces the welcome screen with the real Home.

Getting started

A device that saw the welcome screen keeps a Getting started card at the top of Home until its four steps are done or you press Hide:

  1. Connect your first service
  2. Connect the rest of what you run
  3. Arrange Home: starts the card editor.
  4. Widgets, Shortcuts and your other devices: tips for widgets and Shortcuts, and a way into Move to another device.

The first two follow the number of connected services, so an import ticks both. Erase all settings starts the card over.

First launch on Mac

  1. The main window shows the same welcome screen, “Your homelab in one window”, with the same three ways in. Settings no longer opens by itself.
  2. Connect a service opens the catalogue and the guided form; Bring your configuration takes an env file or an encrypted export from your iPhone. Later, the same import is in Settings → Move & Restore → Import env file….
  3. Workspaces appear in the sidebar as their services become configured, and the Getting started card sits above the Home widgets. Its last step is “Search, the menu bar and your other devices”.

First launch on Android

  1. The app opens on one screen: paste your configuration. That is an env file’s KEY=value lines, or an encrypted export from Settings → Move to another device on your iPhone or Mac.
  2. For an encrypted export, a Passphrase field appears. Enter the passphrase from the other device and press Unseal and import; for an env file, press Import.
  3. The bottom bar appears and Home loads. Later, More → Settings has a form for each service, and Replace configuration… brings the import back.

There is no welcome screen, catalogue or sample workspace on Android yet. See The Android app.

Permissions

The app asks for nothing at launch. Permissions are requested only at the moment you use the feature that needs them:

  • Camera: scanning a document into Paperless (iPhone only).
  • Photo library: saving an Immich photo or video to your library.
  • Calendars: adding upcoming releases to a “Homelab media” calendar.
  • Local network: reaching services on your LAN.

Background App Refresh is not a prompt but a system switch: with it on, queued changes and playback positions are also sent in the background from time to time. There is no push-notification registration and no analytics SDK in the public build.

On Android, the same rule holds. Android asks when you first use:

  • Notifications: when you turn on notifications (Android 13 and later).
  • Calendars: showing your phone’s calendars in Calendar.
  • Location: Send my location in Location.
  • Microphone: recording a voice memo into a note.