How to Access Shared Windows Folders on Android, iPad, and iPhone

If you have different devices like smartphone, laptop, desktop, tablet with different operating systems (OS), then sharing of files from one device to another often becomes difficult. For instance, if you have an Android smartphone, an iPad as your tablet and a Windows laptop or PC, and you want to access your Windows laptop files and folders wirelessly on your Android, iPad or iPhone, then it can be a tricky affair.

However, with this tech tutorial you will learn how to do this quite conveniently. For this you will require sharing folders from your Windows system using the Windows built-in sharing options. Folders shared in that way are easily accessible on an Android device, iPad, or iPhone.

Read below to learn how you can share folders using the Winnows built-in sharing options:

How to Share the Folder?

The sharing process is done in a little bit traditional manner as mentioned below:

• Open the Control Panel
• Click "Choose homegroup"
• Chose a sharing option under "Network and Internet"
• Click "Change Advanced Sharing Settings"
• Enable the "File and Printer Sharing" feature
• Note: Here, you can configure other advanced sharing settings such as you can enable access to your files without a password. However, do this only if you are sure that all the devices on your local network can be either trusted or known to you.
• After getting the printer sharing enabled, open File Explorer or Windows Explorer
• Right-click the folder you want to share
• Select ‘Properties’
• Click the ‘Share’ button
• This will make the folder available on the network

Now, your shared folder will be available on the local network. However, you can access the shared folders only from those devices that are on the same local network. Hence, you can’t access the shared Windows folders over the Internet or from a smartphone that is connected to mobile data. To access those folders, the phone has to be connected to the same Wi-Fi over which you had shared your Windows folder.

Access a Shared Folder on Android

Once you have learnt how to share Windows folder, now learn how you can access those from Android. This feature is very helpful. For instance, if you have some videos on your Windows laptop, but you want to watch them on your Android, then you won’t have to physically import them on your Android device. Rather, just share the video from your Windows and wirelessly access it on your Android device.

On Android there is no built-in way to access Windows shared folders as it doesn’t have a built-in file manager app. However, there are many third party file managers available for Android. Many of those support the accessing of Windows shared folders. For instance ES File Explorer app, a free app allows users to access files on a wide variety of systems.

Perform the following steps to work with ES File Explorer:

• Install ES File Explorer
• Launch it
• Tap the menu button
• Tap Network
• Tap LAN
• Tap the Scan button
• Now ES File Explorer will scan your network and search for Windows computers sharing files
• A list with computers by their local IP addresses will get featured
• Tap the IP address of your Windows PC that you used for sharing files
• If you have set password enabled sharing, then enter your username and password

Now, you can easily access the Windows shared files, and you can copy the files to your device’s local storage or can directly open these using various supportive app. If you are accessing a shared video, then you can directly stream it from your network share. In this process, your PC will operate as a media server and you won’t require any other special software.

Access a Shared Folder on iOS

To access Windows shared files on your iPhone or iPad, you will need a third-party file management app. Just like there are various such apps available for Android, so does for iOS. You can get such apps on Apple App Store. FileExplorer Free is one such app, which works well and available for free. Perform the following steps to work with FileExplorer Free.

• Launch the FileExplorer Free
• Tap the ‘+’ button
• Tap ‘Windows’ and add a Windows network share
• Now the FileExplorer Free will scan your network and search for Windows computers sharing files
• It will display the list of the computers engaged in file sharing
• Tap the computer you used and view its shared file
• Provide username and password if you have done the settings in that way, or you can log in as a guest.

When it comes to file management, iOS is less flexible as compared to Android. Hence, here is less you can do with these files. However, the basic functions like opening a video file directly from your shared folder and playing it on your device can be done very much conveniently.

The aforementioned apps ES File Explorer and FileExplorer Free for Android and iOS respectively are just one example out of so many similar apps available on Play Store and App Store. You can search for other such apps by using "SMB" or "CIFS" as the keywords for your search. Here CIFS is the Windows network file sharing protocol, which is an implementation of the SMB protocol.

About the Author: Hi! I am Brook M. Perry, a prolific blog writer and keen author of articles related to online tablet support and solution for issues related to computers and mobile devices. Being associated with the reputed best pc tuneup service provider Qresolve, I have resolved thousands of tech issues for our customers from worldwide.

Brooke M. Perry is an ardent technician associated with Qresolve computer security, with wide experience of fixing issues with PCs, laptops, tablets and smartphones.