The developer of OpenMTP has announced a new update that adds support for Samsung devices. The update also introduces a Dark Theme along with several other new features.
Developer ganeshrnet posted the full changelog of OpenMTP 3.0 over on Reddit:
- New and Super performant Kalam MTP kernel
- Much awaited Samsung phone support
- 5-6x faster file copy speed
- Dark Theme mode
- New App logo
- Drag and Drop files from the macOS Finder window
- New file icons
- Overall progress on the file transfer screen
- New 'Show directories first’ option
- New 'Single pane mode’ option
- New 'Move the Local Disk pane to the right side’ option
- New 'Auto device detection' option
- Other UI optimisation and performance improvements
If you’re unfamiliar with OpenMTP, it’s an unofficial Android File Transfer application for macOS. It fills an important gap in the ecosystem. Whereas transferring files between Android and Windows has always been fairly straightforward, it’s a different story on macOS.
Google offers an Android File Transfer tool, which lets you browse and transfer files off your Android device. However, it's severely limited in terms of functionality. For example, you can’t transfer files that are larger than 4GB. The tool also lacks basic features such as a search bar, the ability to rename files and folders, and it can be unreliable when transferring files.
There are plenty of other third-party services out there as well such as CommanderOne, Handshaker, Pushbullet, and more. But most of them are paid or offer very limited functionality in their free version. That's what makes OpenMTP so appealing, because it's completely free.
If you own a Samsung device, the latest OpenMTP update should make it easier than ever to transfer files to your Mac device. OpenMTP does its magic via USB, rather than WiFi or ADB, which is what other similar applications use. OpenMTP is free, open-source, and works on any Mac device running macOS 10.11 or higher.