Keep using another Mac through an internet outage

An internet outage can leave your local network working. Two Macs connected to that network can still exchange data.

Yes. You can access another Mac without internet when both Macs can still reach each other locally. On your own network, Beam connects your Macs directly, and Monthly, Yearly and Lifetime plans keep working for up to 30 days offline.

Here, remote access means using the Mac in front of you to reach applications or files on the other Mac over a network. That same local network can use Ethernet, Wi-Fi or both. As Cloudflare explains, a local network can operate without an internet connection. The condition for this workflow is that the connection between your Macs remains available during the outage.

Rehearse the outage with an editor

Complete setup, approval and a successful connection before disconnecting anything. Use an editor and a local file on the other Mac for this rehearsal. Saving a change gives you a result you can inspect on the Mac where the app runs.

1. Before disconnecting the internet, install Beam on two Macs running macOS Sonoma or later and sign in on both. Keep the internet connection available while you prepare them, so setup is complete before the outage test begins.
2. Approve the new Mac from a Mac you have already approved, or through the link we email you. Finish this step before proceeding with the rehearsal, while you still have access to the approval method you choose.
3. Put both Macs on the same local network for the rehearsal. On the other Mac, open an editor and a local file you can safely change. Keep that file available so you can inspect its contents after saving your edit.
4. In Beam on the Mac in front of you, use the picker to choose that editor window. Beam brings the individual app window onto your desktop. This is a beamed window: the app still runs on the other Mac.
5. Disconnect the router’s internet uplink, the connection from the router to your internet provider. Leave the router powered on and the local network running. Keep both Macs connected to that network throughout the rest of the rehearsal.
6. Edit and save the local file through the beamed window. Then verify the saved change on the other Mac. Checking the file there confirms that your edit reached the app and was saved where the app runs.

Keep local development moving

With the editor still available, try a local Git task in an existing repository on the other Mac. Inspect its history, compare the saved change with the previous version, or commit it. Git performs these operations locally, so they can continue offline. Uploading those commits requires a connection to the destination; an internet-hosted repository must wait for connectivity.

Choose work whose inputs are already available on the other Mac. A local file and an existing repository let you check editing and version control without making a package download or an internet-hosted service part of the rehearsal. Test the particular development tasks you expect to use during an outage.

For sharing or accessing a computer with Chrome Remote Desktop, Google explicitly requires an internet connection. It is therefore not a documented offline fallback. That requirement does not establish exactly when an existing session would disconnect, so plan around the stated requirement rather than assuming a session will remain usable.

Leave the router’s internet uplink disconnected for the final check. Restart the other Mac. Perform this reboot test before moving the other Mac to its intended location.

Check that you can reconnect, choose an app in the picker and beam a window again. Verify that you can use it after the restart. Prove you can get back in before you move it.