Your Phone app help (including Link to Windows)

Yes, you can use your mobile data to sync with your PC. However, if you’re concerned about the effect on your data allowance, we recommend remaining on a Wi-Fi connection.

On your Android phone:

1. Open the Your Phone Companion app.
2. Tap Settings .
3. Select Sync over mobile data.
4. Turn this option On or Off.
    

Your Windows laptop needs to be plugged in and Battery saver turned Off to keep your devices synced.

The Your Phone app will only ever create temporary files on your PC when viewing copies of your recent photos. It is not possible to transfer other files.

To ensure the fastest, most reliable connection, your Android phone and PC must be connected to the same trusted Wi-FI network. This optimization isn't possible on a public connection, for example, in a coffee shop, hotel, or airport.

When you first connect to a Wi-Fi network through Windows 10, you'll be prompted to set it as public or private (trusted). You can also change it at any time

These changes might not always be possible - for example, if your workplace controls your network connection.

Before we begin to change settings, we recommend quickly running through the following checks:

• Double-check you’re using the same Microsoft Account to sign into both Your Phone apps.
• Ensure Battery saver isn’t running on your PC or Android phone, as this might affect connectivity.
• You have an active Wi-Fi connection. Can you open your browser and navigate to your favorite website?

Still not working? Continue with the following troubleshooting advice.

On your PC:

Check if the Your Phone app can run in the background.

1. Select Start  (or press the Windows logo key on your keyboard), then select Settings  > Privacy > Background apps.
2. In the list Choose which apps can run in the background, ensure Your Phone is enabled.

Ensure nothing is stopping you from sharing across devices.

1. Select Start  (or press the Windows logo key on your keyboard), then select Settings  > System > Shared experiences.
2. If you see Fix now in Accounts, select it and follow the instructions. 

On your Android phone:

Make sure you can receive app notifications.

• Go to your phone Settings  > Apps (or Apps & Notification on some phones) > Your Phone Companion and check that notifications are enabled.

Make sure Do not disturb is turned Off.

• Go to your phone Settings  > Sounds (on some phones this might be Sounds & Vibration or Sounds & Notifications) and check to see that Do not disturb is turned Off.

If you’re still having trouble, follow these steps to unlink your phone.

After updating to Android 10, if you are unable to launch permissions for features (notifications, messages, photos) please complete the following steps:

To get Photos and Messages working:

1. Go to Settings on your Android phone
2. Search for App Info and tap on it
3. Tap on See all apps
4. Find Your Phone Companion and tap on it
5. Tap on Permissions and allow the following:
   1. Storage
   2. Contacts
   3. SMS
   4. Phone

To get Notifications working:

1. Go to Settings  on your Android phone.
2. Search for “Notification access.”
3. Find Your Phone Companion in the list and tap to toggle off/on.
4. A pop-up will appear - select Allow when prompted.

If you’re still having issues, please provide in-app feedback:

Open the Your Phone Companion app on your Android phone:

1. Go to Settings
2. Tap Provide Feedback

Open the Your Phone app on your PC:

1. Go to Settings
2. Tap Send feedback

On your Android phone:

1. Go to your phone Settings  > Apps (or Apps & Notification on some phones) > Your Phone Companion.
2. Tap Force Stop.
3. Tap Storage > Clear Cache > Clear Data.

On your PC:

1. Open your browser and visit accounts.microsoft.com/devices. Sign in with your Microsoft account.
2. You’ll be presented with a list of all your connected devices. For each, select Show details > More actions and then Unlink this phone.
3. Select Start  (or press the Windows logo key on your keyboard), then select Settings  > Phone > Unlink this PC.
4. Select Back to return to Windows Settings Home, and then select Apps.
5. In Apps & features, select Your Phone.
6. Select Advanced options > Reset.

Once these steps are completed, go to the Your Phone app on your PC and follow the set-up process to establish a new link.

It's not possible to connect your phone to multiple PCs at one time. As a workaround, you can disconnect one PC from your phone and re-connect to another.

On your Android phone:

1. Swipe downwards from the top of your screen to reveal your Android Notification panel.
2. Tap to expand the Your Phone Companion notification.
3. Tap Disconnect.
    

On your second PC:

1. Check you’ve completed the Your Phone app set up process to link your phone and PC.
2. Open the Your Phone app – you’ll then receive a notification on your Android phone prompting you to Allow the connection.

That’s it! Your Android phone is now connected to your second PC. Repeat the process to connect to your first PC again.

Updates will be installed automatically if this option is enabled on your Android phone/PC. To ensure a smooth experience to we recommend updating to the latest version where available. Before doing this, ensure both your Android phone and PC are connected to Wi-Fi.

On your Android phone:

1. Open the Your Phone Companion app.
2. Tap Settings .
3. Tap Check for Updates.
4. Wait for the update to complete successfully, then close and reopen the Your Phone app. 

On your PC:

1. Open the Microsoft Store.
2. Search for Your Phone.
3. If an update is available to you, you will see an Update button. Select Update and wait for the update to complete successfully, then select Launch.

You can also try this:

1. Open the Microsoft Store.
2. Select More … (located next to your Microsoft Account picture)
3. Select Downloads and Updates.
4. If a Your Phone update is available, you will see an Update button.  Select Update and wait for the update to complete successfully, then select Launch.

Note: It can take a few minutes for the updates to be recognized by the app. If the Your Phone app is still in an “update state," wait a few minutes, then restart your Android phone. On your PC, close and repoen the Your Phone app. 

To link your iPhone and Windows PC, you will be asked to install Microsoft Edge or Continue on PC as the companion app on your mobile device. Once you're signed in, you'll be able to instantly send web pages from your iPhone to your PC. 

We’re still actively working on making the Your Phone experience the best we possibly can and we welcome your ideas and insights.

On your Android phone:

1. Open the Your Phone Companion app.
2. Tap Settings .
3. Select the Provide Feedback option.

On your PC:

1. Type Feedback hub into the search box on your Windows taskbar.
2. Select Suggest a feature.

The Your Phone app offers several ways to interact with your photos.

Selecting a photo will open it using the Windows Photos app. Here you’ll be able to view your photo or edit it as you like. If you save your changes, they'll be saved as a new file and your original photo will remain unchanged on your phone.

Long-press on a photo (or right-click if using a mouse) to Copy, Share or Save as.

You can copy your photo and paste it into an Office document, an email, your Desktop, but it's not possible to copy a photo into a text message.

To share a photo, select and hold (or right-click) the photo, and select Share.

To minimize network bandwidth and maximize performance, we show your 25 most recent photos and screenshots from your phone.

Also, we only get photos that are in the Camera Roll or Screenshots folders on your Android phone. If you moved or saved your photos to a different folder on your Android phone, they will not appear in the Your Phone app.

No. The Your Phone app only creates copies of your recent photos. These are stored as temporary files on your PC. Deleting the temporary file on your PC will not affect the original on your Android phone.

1. On your PC, in the Your Phone app, select Messages.
2. To start a new conversation, select New message.

The Your Phone app supports messages sent by Short Message Service (SMS). It also supports Multimedia Messaging Service (MMS) group messaging. You can still send favorite photos and your GIFs from your PC.

To minimize network bandwidth and maximize performance, we show text messages that you've received or sent within the last 30 days.

You can't manage or delete messages on your PC.

With the Your Phone app you can view and manage your phone notifications on your PC.

On your PC:

1. Open the Your Phone app and select Notifications.
2. Select Get started.
3. Select Open settings for me. On your phone, you should see a list of apps.

On your Android phone:

1. Find Your Phone Companion in the list and select it.
2. Select Allow on the pop-up that appears on your phone.

Select Notifications. Notifications from your phone will now appear on your PC.

Once you’ve started to receive notifications, then then you can choose which apps you’d like to see notifications from.

On your PC:

1. Select the Notifications menu item.
2. Select Customize. The Settings page will appear.
3. Under Pick which apps notify you, you’ll see a list of all the apps that have sent notifications to your PC. If an app hasn’t sent a notification yet, then it won’t appear here. You can turn notifications Off or On. 

Apart from notifications that cannot be dismissed on your Android phone, all notifications will be displayed on your PC.

Dismissing notifications on your PC will also remove them from your Android phone (and vice-versa).

On your PC:

You can dismiss notifications by pressing the X next to each notification in the list. You can also dismiss all notifications at once by selecting Clear All.

You won’t see any notifications if:

• Your Windows laptop battery is low, or Battery saver has been turned On.
• If Focus assist (previously known as quiet hours) is turned on. Learn how to turn Focus assist off or on  
• If Battery optimization exception is set to Off in Your Phone Companion Settings on your Android phone. 

Notifications work independently to other Your Phone features like Messaging and Photos. When they stop working, resetting the notification permissions should start the syncing process again.

On your Android phone:

1. Go to Settings and search for “Notification access.”
2. Find Your Phone Companion in the list and tap to toggle off/on.
3. A pop-up will appear - select Allow when prompted.

On your PC:

1. Open the Your Phone app and choose Notifications. Wait for your Notifications to refresh – they should now sync as normal.

Phone screen allows you to interact with all your favorite Android apps and phone content directly on your PC. Phone screen uses a Wi-Fi connection between your Windows 10 PC and your Android phone to enable interaction.

• You will need a PC running Windows 10 October 2018 Update or later. However, we always recommend updating to the latest version available - currently May 2019 Update.
  • To check and update your Windows version, on your PC go to Settings  > Updates & Security > Check for update.
  • To confirm you are running Windows 10 October 2018 Update (or later), on your PC go to Settings > System > About and check your version number under Windows specifications. It should read either 1809 or 1903).
• Your phone and PC must be connected to the same Wi-Fi network.
• You will need to have a supported device to use this feature.

Currently the feature is only available on the following Android phones in select markets running Android 7.0 or greater:

• Samsung Galaxy Note10
• Samsung Galaxy Note 10+
• Samsung Galaxy Fold
• Samsung Galaxy S10
• Samsung Galaxy S10+
• Samsung Galaxy S10e
• Samsung Galaxy A30s
• Samsung Galaxy A50s
• Samsung Galaxy A90 

The Phone screen feature in the Windows 10 app only works when your phone and PC can communicate with each other. They’ll both need to be connected to the same network (for example, your home Wi-Fi).

If attempting to use Phone screen in your workplace, a successful connection may not always be possible. In that event we’d recommend talking to your IT department or network administrator. 

Common troubleshooting for Wi-Fi:

1. Check if your phone is connected to mobile data instead of Wi-Fi, by going into your phone’s Settings > Connections > Wi-Fi and ensure your Wi-Fi toggle is turned “On” and underneath your current network is “connected”.
2. Check if your phone is connected it to the same Wi-Fi as your PC
   • Start by checking your phone’s connection in Settings > Connections > Wi-Fi and note the name of the network under the current network heading.
   • Check that this is the same network as your PC – on your PC go to Settings > Network & Internet > Wi-Fi and check at the top of the page, your PC Wi-Fi is turned “On” and the connected network is the same as on your phone.

• You may have two different Wi-Fi networks, e.g. one that uses the 2.4GHz band and the other 5GHz. If you click on your PC/phone Wi-Fi icon you should be able to see these networks in the list. Try connecting to the same network on both devices.
   
• Are you behind a firewall or using a VPN? If so, it could be blocking communication between your devices, you could try disabling these to see if this fixes the problem.

You can use your PC’s mouse, trackpad, keyboard, or touch-enabled screen to open, type, scroll, and interact with apps.

Tips for interacting using mouse and keyboard:

• Single click will behave as any single touch tap interaction
• Right click anywhere on your phone screen to navigate to the previous page
• Click and hold to open a context menu
• Click and hold and drag for text selection
• Mouse scroll to move screen vertically

Some games and apps might not respond to interactions from the PC.

When you type using your PC’s keyboard the layout and language is controlled by a setting on your Android phone for physical keyboards. It won’t be affected by the language of the keyboard you’re using on your PC.

You can click on the keyboard language button when you are using the phone screen feature. This will launch the keyboard language settings where you can choose the language of your preference.

When you are using a physical keyboard with the Your Phone app, you can also manually change your language or layout settings at any time by: 

1. On your Android, open the Settings app. 
2. Tap Language and input. 
3. Under keyboards, tap Physical keyboard. 
4. Select the keyboard that you’re using on your Phone (E.g. SwiftKey or Samsung Keyboard). 
5. Pick a language or layout.

Tip: On your Samsung phone, you can use the keyboard shortcut Shift + Space to switch languages.

Note: You’ll need to change this setting whenever you want to type using another layout or language.

If you see an error message indicating your PC couldn't connect to your phone, it could be for a variety of reasons. Here are few things to try:

On your phone:

• Is your phone turned on?
• Is Battery saver mode turned off on your phone?
• Is airplane mode turned off on your phone?
• Are your phone and your PC connected to the same network or Wi-Fi?
• Are you signed into the Your Phone Companion app with the same Microsoft account as you're using on your PC?

On your PC:

• Does your PC have internet connectivity?
• Is Battery saver mode turned off on your PC?
• Are your system accounts working correctly? You can check. In Windows, go to Settings > System> Shared experiences. If you see a Fix now link in the Accounts section, select the link and follow the instructions.

Phone screen supports accessibility features such as screen reading and focus tracking.

Before using TalkBack for the first time you’ll need to download the Android Accessibility Suite from the Google Play store on your Samsung phone. Then enable TalkBack functionality by doing the following:

On your Phone:

1. Go to your phone Settings > Select Accessibility > Select Installed Services.
2. Tap on TalkBack.
3. Select TalkBack and turn it "On" to enable. Select "OK" to accept the service permissions. 

1. Make sure you have the Your Phone app open and click to Phone screen. Your Phone won't be able to configure accessibility with your PC correctly if you're not running the app first. The accessibility service requires you to initiate a phone screen session before you can enable the service.
2. Once you begin the phone screen session, the application will be able to recognize that TalkBack is enabled and prompt with a dialog to guide you to enable our service. This allows the Your Phone Companion accessibility service to connect to your phone.

You can also enable the service manually using the following steps:

1. Open the Settings app
2. Select Accessibility
3. Select Installed services

4. Select Your Phone Companion and turn the switch “On” to enable. Click “OK” to accept service permissions.
5. Once the Your Phone Companion accessibility service is enabled, Narrator spoken feedback will play through the PC speakers or headphones plugged into the PC. You can navigate through your Android phone screen on your PC by using your keyboard and mouse.

1. Follow all the previous steps for enabling the Your Phone Companion accessibility service. 
2. Turn on Magnifier on your PC, either from the settings menu or using the shortcut Win + (Plus Sign).

Tip: Make sure in Magnifier’s settings, you have Magnifier set to follow your keyboard and mouse, by checking the boxes for mouse cursor and keyboard focus.

More information on how to use Magnifier to make things on the screen easier to see.

When the Your Phone Companion accessibility service is enabled, you will navigate on your PC in phone screen with the keyboard using default Android accessibility keys.

Here is a list of the basic navigation shortcuts:

To move to next item hold Alt + Right arrow

• To move to previous item hold Alt + Left arrow
• To move to item above hold Alt + Up arrow
• To move to item below hold Alt + Down arrow
• To select an item in focus or click focused element hold Alt + Enter

Get the full list of Android TalkBack navigation keys.

On your PC:

1. Select Start (or press the Windows logo key on your keyboard), then select Settings > Ease of Access
2. From the Vision menu select Magnifier.
3. Turn on Magnifier by switching the Off button to On.

Magnifier enables you to zoom in on parts of your display. By default, it opens in full screen and will follow your mouse pointer, keyboard entry, text cursor, and narrator cursor.

You can change your magnifier view by pressing Ctrl + Alt + M – this will cycle through full screen mode, a floating transparent magnifying glass, or docked.

Press the Windows logo key + Plus (+) or Minus (-) to zoom in and out.

Currently the feature is only available on the following Android phones in select markets:

• Samsung Galaxy Note10
• Samsung Galaxy Note10+
• Samsung Galaxy Fold
• Samsung Galaxy S10
• Samsung Galaxy S10+
• Samsung Galaxy S10e
• Samsung Galaxy A30s
• Samsung Galaxy A50s
• Samsung Galaxy A90 

You'll need both your Windows 10 PC and one of the following select Samsung devices: S10, S10+, S10e, Note 10, Note 10+, or Galaxy Fold (dependant on market). The Your Phone app is already installed on your PC if you have the Windows 10 October 2018 Update or later.

On your PC:

1. In the search box on the taskbar, type your phone and select Your Phone from the results.
2. You’ll be asked to sign into your Microsoft Account.
    

Now we’ll guide you through the steps to complete the set up process on your Android phone.

On your Android phone:

1. Swipe downwards from the top of your screen to reveal your Android Notification panel.
2. Tap Link to Windows.
3. Sign in with the same Microsoft Account you’re using on your PC.
4. When prompted, tap to allow permissions.

The name of your Windows 10 PC will appear below Link to Windows when a successful link has been made.

Following a recent update, you will no longer see the old app icon. Instead you will now see Link to Windows pre-installed on your device. Swipe downwards from the top of your screen to reveal your Android Notification Panel, then tap Link to Windows.

Alternatively, you can find it by visiting Settings > Advanced Features, or type Link to Windows in the search box in Settings.

Updates will be installed automatically if this option is enabled on your Android phone. To ensure a smooth experience we recommend updating to the latest version available. To check manually:

On your Android phone:

1. Go to Settings > Advanced features > Link to Windows
2. In the upper right-hand corner, select "..." (More) > About Link to Windows
3. If an update is available, you should see a dialog. Tap Update.
4. Wait for the update to complete successfully, then close and reopen the Your Phone app.

To update the app from the Galaxy store, follow these steps:

1. Open the Galaxy Store app on your Android phone. 
2. In the Galaxy Store, tap the search icon and type “Your Phone Companion – Link to Windows."
3. Tap on Your Phone Companion – Link to Windows to open the app listing.
4. Tap the Update button.

You also need to ensure Link to Windows is updated to the latest version too. To do this:

1. Go to Settings > Advanced features > Link to Windows
2. Tap the “…” (More) option
3. Tap on About Link to Windows.
4. Tap the Update button.  You will be redirected to the Galaxy Store listing for the app. This time you will also see Link to Windows in the app update options. Tap Update.
5. Wait for the update to complete successfully and restart your Android phone. Wait a few minutes, then close and reopen the Your Phone app on your PC.

Note: It can take a few minutes for the updates to be recognized by the app. If the Your Phone app is still in an “update state”, wait a few minutes then restart your Android phone. On your PC, close and reopen the Your Phone app.

• It can take a few minutes for the updates to be recognized by the app.  After you update, if the app is still blocked, restart your phone. Then, wait a few minutes and close and reopen the Your Phone app.
• Check that both your phone and PC are on Wi-Fi. You will need to be connected to Wi-Fi in order to download updates.

On your PC:

1. Open the Microsoft Store.
2. Search for Your Phone.
3. If an update is available to you, you will see an Update button. Select Update and wait for the update to complete successfully, then select Launch.