You don’t have to own a file transfer app to share files on your Android phone. The file sharing feature can be found with many file managers and explorers. For example, Xiaomi has added the FTP support to its file manager for easier file transfer between Xiaomi & Redmi phones and computer. Files app by Google has the Nearby Share feature which allows Android users to send and receive files or apps with Android devices nearby. In this article, we will recommend another file manager which is free, multi-functional and feature rich, the Owlfiles file manager for Android. Similar to Google Files app, Owlfiles also comes with the nearby share feature to help Android users exchange files, such as photos, videos, music, etc. Additionally the Owlfiles app also supports file transfer with computers via HTTP and FTP. Compared to the File Manager by Xiaomi, Owlfiles does not only support FTP transfer with computers, but also HTTP transfer, and even file sharing with nearby Android devices.
Connect phones and computers wirelessly
Before we go to use the Owlfiles to transfer files between two Android phones or between an Android phone and a PC below, we have to connect them via Wi-Fi or hotspot. If both Android phones support Wi-Fi Direct, you can also connect them via Wi-Fi Direct to transfer files between them.
Method 1. Connect phones, computer to the same Wi-Fi
If a Wi-Fi network is available, you can simply connect them to the same Wi-Fi. This is the easiest way to connect two devices, computers.
Method 2. Connect phones, computer via hotspot
When Wi-Fi is not available, you can create hotspot on the phone, then connect the other phone or computer to this mobile hotspot; alternatively you can choose to setup hotspot on the PC, then connect the phone to the hotspot on your computer.
Depending on the Android version, manufacturer and device model, you might see something like Portable hotspot, Personal hotspot, Wi-Fi tethering, Tethering, Mobile Hotspot, or Hotspot & tethering instead. Here we will use a Tecno mobile phone to show you how to create personal hotspot on Android phone. The process can vary by phone.
Open Settings on Tecno mobile, choose Network & internet.
Find Hotspot & tethering option from the lower section, tap on it to view and select the types of tethering: Wi-Fi hotspot or Wi-Fi tethering, USB tethering and Bluetooth tethering.
Here we will choose Wi-Fi tethering in this demo. In general, this is the easiest, most convenient, and most commonly used option of the three connection types. It is easy to connect, wireless and fast. Essentially the phone creates a Wi-Fi network to which you can connect other mobile phones, tablets or laptops in the usual way.
As we can see from above screenshot, It is called Wi-Fi hotspot on the Tecno phone. Tap on to open it on a new screen.
Here you need to touch the On/Off toggle to turn on the Wi-Fi hotspot. Customize other settings, like hotspot name, security, hotspot password, automatic turn off, AP band(2.4/5.0G).
Now you can go to connect other phones or computers to your hotspot on Tecno mobile through Wi-Fi. Note that if you don’t want others to use your cellular data to access the internet, you can disable the cellular data while you setup hotspot tethering on the phone.
Method 3. Connect phones via Wi-Fi Direct
Wi-Fi Direct is a wireless technology that allows two devices, mobile phones or applications to quickly find and interact with nearby devices without needing to connect to a network or hotspot.
You can refer to this guide to connect & use Wi-Fi Direct on Android phones.
Share files between Android phones via nearby share
Run Owlfiles app on the receiver’s Android phone. Switch from My Files to the More tab from the bottom. Choose Nearby Receive in the Toolbox section.
Run Owlfiles app on the sender’s Android phone. Switch to the More tab from the bottom. Choose Nearby Send in the Toolbox section.
Then select the files you like to share from the sender’s phone.
You can select photos, videos, music, PDF documents, apps and any other files saved on your Android phone’s storage, then choose Send. Owlfiles app will then search nearby devices. Simply tap on the receiver’s device to send all selected files over.
Received files will be saved into the Download folder on the receiver’s phone. You can change the save location in the app settings.
Android and computer file sharing via HTTP
Owlfiles turns your mobile phone into a web server, your computer acts as the client to access the web server to download files from phone to desktop or upload files from the computer to the phone. You don’t need to download any program on the computer side. You can simply use a desktop browser to access the web server on the Android phone.
Run Owlfiles app on Android phone. Switch to More tab from the bottom. Choose Built-in Servers in the Toolbox section.
Once you are on the Built-in Servers screen, you can find the options to configure, start both Web server and FTP server.
The default web server or HTTP server port number is 8080. Click Start Servers to setup the Web server on your Android phone and get the web server URL at the bottom.
Now go to your PC, run Edge browser, Google Chrome or Mozilla Firefox, to visit the web server. Make sure to type in the full HTTP address in the address bar of your desktop browser, including the prefix ‘http://’ and the affix, the port number 8080.
Now you can upload files from computer to mobile or download files from phone to PC via this Owlfiles web interface.
Transfer files from Android through FTP
Owlfiles can also help you setup an FTP server on the phone so you can connect to it from computer or other mobile phones to download or upload files.
Run Owlfiles app on Android phone. Switch to the More tab. Choose Built-in Servers in the Toolbox section.
Once you are on the Built-in Servers screen, you can find the options to configure, start both Web server and FTP server.
Note that the default FTP server port in the Built-in FTP server is 2121. So when you access the FTP server using an FTP client, make sure to use the correct FTP port.
On Windows computer you can simply use Windows File Explorer as the client to connect to Android FTP server. Launch File Explorer on Windows PC, type in the full FTP server address, with ftp:// as the prefix and the port number as the affix, in the address bar, then press Enter on the keyboard to access. You’ll be prompted to input the FTP username and its password if you created an FTP account in Owlfiles built-in servers. If anonymous access is enabled in Owlfiles app, no authentication required.
On Mac, you can use Finder to connect to FTP server. Click on the Finder in the Dock. Navigate to the Go menu, then choose Connect to Server. Type the address of the FTP server with port number into the text box. Press Connect.
Click another Connect button to continue. You will be requested to type in your username and password for the FTP server. If anonymous access is enabled, choose Guest to connect to the FTP server without an username/password. Otherwise, select Registered User, then type in the FTP username and password in the Name and Password fields separately. Finally click Connect to connect to the FTP server on Android phone.
Some Android phones, like Xiaomi, Redmi phones, as mentioned above, come with FTP support which allows users to connect FTP servers without extra FTP clients or apps.