Dev tools · alternatives · 2026
24 alternatives to Payload – Cross-platform desktop app for LAN file transfers
Hi HN. I built Payload to make file transfers easy for less-technical users who need large/fast transfers, so I have focused on auto-discovery, drag-and-drop, visually distinct device icons. It's using Tauri (an "Electron alternative" built on Rust) which keeps my binaries small and bundles to .msi, .dmg, .deb and .appimage. No CLI, iOS or Android support (yet). The network stack is a separate binary written in Go. It uses mDNS for local network discovery and TLS over TCP or Quic, with a public Ed25519 keypair for each device. The protocol is ad-hoc and symmetrical control stream using…
Payload is a desktop application for transferring files quickly across local networks. It is designed for non-technical users and emphasizes ease of use through automatic device discovery, drag-and-drop functionality… Below are 24 products that do a similar job, ranked by how close each is in meaning and then by launch-day votes. Prices are shown for the 1 we have checked on their own sites, 1 of them free or with a free tier. Payload – Cross-platform desktop app for LAN file transfers launched in 2022; newer entries below may have overtaken it.
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A year ago, my co-founder launched Desktop Docs here on HN. It's a Mac app we built with Electron that uses CLIP embeddings to search photos and videos locally with natural language. We got positive feedback from HN and our first paying customers, but the app was almost 1GB and clunky to use. TLDR; rebuilding in Rust was the right move. So we rewrote the app with Rust and Tauri and here are the results: - App size is 83% smaller: 1GB → 172MB - DMG Installer is 70% smaller: 232MB → 69.5MB - Indexing files is faster: A 38-minute video now indexes in ~3 minutes instead of 10-14 minutes -…
2025 · desktopdocs.com · its alternatives →
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Hi HN community, I’m Zach, founder and CEO of Warp, and am excited to show you Warp, a fast Rust-based terminal that’s easy to use and built for teams. As of today, Warp is in public beta and any Mac user can download it. It works with bash, zsh, and fish. The terminal’s teletype-like interface has made it hard for the CLI to thrive. After 20 years of programming, I still find it hard to copy a command’s output; I always forget how to use `tar`; and I always have to relearn how to move my cursor. To fix fundamental accessibility issues, I believe we need to start innovating on the terminal,…
2022 · warp.dev · its alternatives →
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Drop any files to any devices on your LAN.
2021 · landrop.app · its alternatives →
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Hey folks! This winter I've been building Citadel to scratch my itch of managing ebooks without using Calibre. Calibre is incredibly powerful, but it's slow and awkward to use. I dreamed of writing a native app (and originally tried this in Swift), but ran into issues building the UI. Plus, whatever I built would only work on macOS. I started writing Citadel using Tauri (Svelte on the frontend + Rust on the backend) to have a cross-platform desktop app. Plus, Citadel supports running in a headless / webbrowser mode. You can self-host a Citadel server that manages your library, and…
2024 · github.com · its alternatives →
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Capsule packages your entire app — UI, data, and assets — into a single portable file. No cloud. No accounts. Just share it.
Sep 2026 · withcapsule.app · its alternatives →
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Friendly and fast tool for sending HTTP requests. Contribute to ducaale/xh development by creating an account on GitHub.
2021 · github.com · its alternatives →
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2016 · bitf.ly · its alternatives →
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2015 · youtransfer.io · its alternatives →
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Blockchain-based file transfer. Designed for everyday use.
2019 · its alternatives →
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i made sink. it's a simple little tool that continuously syncs folders between 2 devices. no cloud, no email, flash drives, no bs. it just uses your local wifi. run it on your machines, tell them to trust each other, and you're set. and if you manage to edit the same file at once, it handles the conflict and saves both copies. for anyone who just wants to get files from point a to b without the headache. hope it makes your life a bit less annoying. github: https://github.com/sirbread/sink binary:…
2025 · github.com · its alternatives →
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ByteNite▲206Hi HN, I’m one of the creators of ByteNite (https://bytenite.com). We built it for developers running compute-heavy containerized workloads (AI, ETL, batch jobs) who are frustrated with the limitations of traditional serverless platforms: timeouts, cold starts, orchestration complexity, and limited runtime control. ByteNite is a serverless platform that lets you submit distributed jobs packaged as Docker containers. You define simple or complex fan-out/fan-in logic, set your hardware requirements, and we handle the rest—distributing execution across warm cloud runners (CPUs,…
2025 · docs.bytenite.com · its alternatives →
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Hey HN, At work, I was annoyed about having to download logs by writing them out to files and transferring them over to my local over HTTP (admittedly, this is because of a rather novel architectural situation). So, I built a tool in Go that lets you pipe contents into an SSH server for sending and reading them out on another connection. You can also use this tool to transfer files. Just cat the file on the sender end and redirect the output of the receiver end to a file. Please note that the transfer rate is heavily dependent on your connection and proximity to the public ssh.beam.camp…
2025 · github.com · its alternatives →
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After building several Tauri desktop apps, I kept hitting the same wall: there's no reliable way to access cameras across Windows, macOS, and Linux. Every project meant reinventing camera integration, dealing with platform-specific APIs, and debugging permission issues. So I built CrabCamera – a Tauri plugin that handles all the camera complexity for you. What it does: - One API, three platforms: Same Rust code works on Windows (DirectShow), macOS (AVFoundation), and Linux (V4L2) - Permission handling: Automatically requests camera permissions on each platform - Format conversion: Takes care…
2025 · crates.io · its alternatives →
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Desktop runtime for apps built on web technologies, using the system's own web browser engine - pojala/electrino
2017 · github.com · its alternatives →
- 17FP
https://shelf-bookmarks.stupidlabs.lol I have been using raindrop.io for years now, and it has worked perfectly for me. Seriously, no issues. But, bookmarks are something that are a bit too personal... they allow profiling you. And I don't want anyone doing that to me, Hence, this app. It's 100% offline and free. It's built in Rust using Tauri, is roughly 6MB only, is beautiful to look at, and packs more features than commercial ones. Make sure to checkout the "All features" page as well from the homepage. Also, it has an inbuilt api server (configurable) so you can automate as…
Aug 2026 · its alternatives →
- 18SE
2012 · sendrail.com · its alternatives →
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- 20EA
Hi HN! If you've ever tried to build a desktop app, you probably understand our frustrations with how challenging it is to build one and make it available on Mac, Windows, and Linux. Even with Electron, you still have to set up your own build pipelines, updating mechanisms, code-signing, deployments, and deal with cross-platform compatibility issues. We built EXT to make building cross-platform desktop software easier! Dog-fooding our own APIs, we ported 36 initial games and utilities to the EXT store (all free), and we've open-sourced all of them: https://github.com/extpkg If…
2024 · ext.store · its alternatives →
- 21BF
2019 · blackhole.run · its alternatives →
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dish is a lightweight, 0 dependency monitoring tool in the form of a small binary executable. Upon execution, it checks the provided sockets (which can be provided in a JSON file or served by a remote JSON API endpoint). The results of the check are then reported to the configured channels. It started as a learning project and ended up proving quite handy. Me and my friend have been using it to monitor our services for the last 3 years. We have refactored the codebase to be a bit more presentable recently and thought we'd share on here! The currently supported channels include: - Telegram -…
2025 · github.com · its alternatives →
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HTTP client/libcurl TUI front end in Rust, with request + key storage - PThorpe92/CuTE
2023 · github.com · its alternatives →
Also compare
- I rewrote my Mac Electron app in Rust alternatives
- Tauri alternatives
- Warp, a Rust-based terminal alternatives
- LANDrop – A cross-platform AirDrop-like file transfer tool alternatives
- Citadel – a Calibre-compatible eBook management app alternatives
- Capsule – Single-file web apps that save their data into SQLite alternatives
Ranked by how close each launch is in meaning, then by votes. Prices were read from each product’s own site when checked and can change. Refine with your own description →