Many of us want to get back into the habit of traveling this summer once vaccinated and after spending a year and a half “locked up” in our cities or regions. And for these trips, many iPad users are looking to record videos locally on the device itself without having to log in (train or plane travel typically has little or no data coverage).
We know we can use downloads from services like Netflix, but what if the video we want to save is a file on our computer? What if the iPad model was rather old and AirDrop didn’t fix this file transfer? We will see a simple method to transfer videos to iPhone or iPad completely for free
A local website and server to move videos from PC to iPhone or iPad wirelessly
For this we will need the computer on which we have stored these files (it can be a Mac or a PC with Linux or Windows), our iPad or iPhone with the VLC player free installed in it and a Wi-Fi connection to which both terminals are connected. The better the Wi-Fi network, the less the transfer will take.
Open the VLC app on the iPad or iPhone and click on the “Network” section that you have in the bottom bar of the interface:
We are interested activate the option ‘Share via WiFi’, which will give us a local IP address just below its title, as you can see in the screenshot above. Now, on the computer where you stored the videos, open any modern web browser (Edge, Firefox, Safari, Chrome …) and enter this IP address as the URL. A website like this will load you:
All you have to do now is drag and drop any video you have on your computer on the web to seamlessly switch to the VLC video library on iPhone or iPad:
VLC never has a problem with modern video formatsSo you don’t have to worry if your files are in formats like MKV or even MPG or AVI or if you need to embed subtitles in SRT format. The video takes up local storage space on your iPhone or iPad, but you can delete it from the same device without a problem after you’re done watching it. You have it in the ‘Video’ section of the bottom bar of its interface.
Other options to transfer videos to iPhone or iPad without cables
Alternatively, we can use other applications and services to be able to do this same operation. Two of these apps are the most popular Plex or his rival Infuse, which provide the ability to easily sync content between devices through their apps.
Of course, both options will require you to subscribe to be able to do this. Infuse asks for a monthly package of 0.99 dollars or an annual license of 9.99 dollars (or we can buy a lifetime license for 79.99 dollars). For its part, Plex requires a Plex Pass subscription to 4.99 dollars per month. It may be that at the interface level it offers more options, but there is the free VLC to save you the hassle without having to spend money.
Image | Daniel Canibano
