Run Claude Code from your iPhone

Claude Code runs on a computer, not your phone

When you “run Claude Code from your iPhone”, Claude Code does not run on the phone. It runs on a computer, in a terminal. That computer can be your own Mac or Linux machine, or Anthropic’s cloud. The phone is a window into the session.

Waycar is that window for your own machine. It attaches to the tmux or herdr session where Claude Code runs. Your phone connects straight to your machine over mosh, with SSH as the fallback. There is no Waycar account, and no Waycar server sits in the path of your session.

Waycar has an optional push relay. Your machine encrypts each notification first, so the relay cannot read what it says. For Live Activities it does see how many agents are in each status.

Set it up in four steps

1. Run Claude Code in tmux or herdr. If you start Claude Code from Waycar, it does this for you. In New Agent, pick Claude Code and turn on Chat Mode if you want a chat view.

2. Install the Waycar host tools. Run this once on the machine:

   curl -fsSL https://waycar.dev/install.sh | sh

   On a fresh machine it first asks whether to install or only pair this computer. Press Return to install. It then offers to show a pairing QR code to scan in Waycar. On tmux it also adds Waycar’s status hooks, which is how Waycar knows when an agent is Blocked or Done. Waycar shows status from them for Claude Code, Codex, omp, pi and opencode.

3. Scan the code in Waycar. Waycar makes your key on the phone and pins your machine’s host key, so the first connection is already checked.

4. Open the Console. Claude Code shows up in the list, sorted by who needs you.

What you can do from the phone

• See when it needs you. Blocked agents come first in the Console, after any you pinned. You get a push when Claude Code is Blocked or Done, and a Live Activity can keep a machine on your Lock Screen.
• Answer permission requests. In Chat Mode, a “Needs your OK” card shows the request. Tap Allow or Cancel. For anything else, tap Show Terminal.
• Use the real terminal. You see exactly what Claude Code draws, with a toolbar for Esc, Tab, arrows and Ctrl.
• Send photos and files. Attach up to 10 per message. Files can be up to 64 MiB each. Photos are resized to fit 16 MiB. The file lands in a private folder on your machine, and its path is added to your message when you send it.
• Dictate a prompt. On iOS 26 or later, dictation runs on your phone.
• Bring back a closed session. Closed Sessions keep an agent for 30 days. Tap it to reopen it in the same folder.

What Waycar cannot do

• Claude Code runs on your machine, not in the app, and Waycar keeps no cloud copy. Your machine must be on and awake.
• It needs tmux or herdr on that machine. It cannot open a plain SSH server with neither.
• Waycar supports Mac and Linux machines. Claude Code also runs on Windows, which Waycar does not support.
• It is an iPhone and iPad app with no native desktop or web client. An Android app is coming soon.
• Chat Mode covers Claude Code, Codex, omp, pi and opencode. opencode needs one extra setup step: see the Chat Mode help page.
• The terminal session ends about 20 seconds after you leave the app and re-attaches on its own when you come back. Claude Code keeps running on your machine the whole time.

If you only use Claude Code

Anthropic’s Remote Control is the built-in way to steer a Claude Code session from the Claude app. It needs a paid Claude plan and no SSH. Anthropic also runs Claude Code sessions in its cloud, which you can start from the Claude app, and those do not need your machine to be on.

Waycar is the better fit when you also run Codex, omp, pi or opencode, want the agent’s real terminal, or want your session to go straight to your machine. See Waycar vs Claude Code Remote Control for the side-by-side and the sources. For the same need on tmux, see tmux on your iPhone.