Citrix Receiver updated as a universal Windows 10 app

By Dan Thorp-Lancaster
last updated

Citrix has added its name to the slowly growing list of major players to support the Universal Windows Platform (UWP) with an update to its Citrix Receiver (opens in new tab) app. The app was recently updated to support the UWP platform on Windows 10 across PC, Mobile and HoloLens.

Citrix Receiver isn't so much geared towards the consumer crowd, but it is an important piece of the puzzle for businesses that need access to virtual desktop and enterprise apps on the go. Here's a look at some of its features:

  • Secure access to virtual desktops and enterprise apps
  • Work anywhere on your Windows device
  • Account configuration using your email address, a server URL, or a provisioning file
  • Use of multiple published apps at a time

Citrix Receiver is, of course, still available for Windows Phone 8 and 8.1 as well, but those working from Windows 10 PC or Mobile will receive the updated UWP version when downloading the app from the store. Based on its listing, this update look to have started rolling out a few days ago, so you may already have it if you use the app regularly. Otherwise, you can grab the UWP Citrix Receiver from the Store now.

Thanks to Deven for the tip!

Download Citrix Receiver from the Windows Store (opens in new tab)

Dan Thorp-Lancaster
Dan Thorp-Lancaster

Dan Thorp-Lancaster is the former Editor-in-Chief of Windows Central. He began working with Windows Central, Android Central, and iMore as a news writer in 2014 and is obsessed with tech of all sorts. You can follow Dan on Twitter @DthorpL and Instagram @heyitsdtl. 

62 Comments
  • That's just awesome. dose it support continuum??? 
  • This is the question of the day because it was promised when continuum was announced.
  • Ofcourse, it should
  • Yes, it supports Continuum. One app at a time with an App Switcher button in the bottom right to switch between programs. I tested it with my 950XL.  
  • Thanks buddy :)
  • You're welcome 😊
  • I tried it on Continuum and it worked great.
  • Awe yeah, baby..... Surface Phone on the horizon.
    .........
    Need to get this iDroid trash out of here, and take this site back.
  • From who exactly?  Idroid trash?  what are you 3?  childish beyond belief.  
  • Look at your own posts. It's at the same level, just the wording is different. Move on. This is the internet.
  • no...it's not...at all  hoekie.  I call a few people here fanboys because they are blind and think one OS is vastly superior than the rest...IT'S not...but those same fanboys call anyone who uses another OS trash?  I think you need to learn the definition of "the same".   BTW I just purchased a 950XL again....Now that 3d builder works on it....I was going to buy the 1020,  but I would have to hack 10 to work correctly so I just bought the 950 XL AGAIN!  so,  please...I am NO WHERE NEAR THE SAME as some off these people.
  • Yeah, you're worse🙄
    You're problem is that you don't know a pathetic fanboi when you see one... You just call any WP fan a famboi, which is blind in itself... Anything that you could possibly say bad about about WP, and the way MS handles WP, I will most likely agree with... I'm THE biggest WP fan, but I'm also It's biggest critic... Nevertheless, you CONTINUOUSLY refuse to see that...... To be honest, yes, I don't believe trolls like you ever used WP, and Yes, I think this place would be better without your stupid negativity........ Change your ways, dude.
  • ha ha...too funny....You want to see a pathetic fanboy...it's spelled BOY!  again,  making you look like your 3 years old...BOI...ha ha...and I am using windows 10 right now,  I typed my previous response to your childish crap on my RT based tablet...and I did,  and am going to be using windows 10 mobile again, I have a new 950xl ordered.  However,  you are the biggest fanboy but not the biggest critic there bud...SORRY!  You are too blind to see anything whats going on.
  • 950xl hey... Now what is all that about Steve!!!
  • Well,  in order to do what I want with 3d builder I needed it.  I could have swiped my son's kinect camera,  but wireless would be better for me.  Like I said,  its' not my daily driver.  UNLESS i can get bluestacks on it...I my use it alot then....but for right now,  it's a tool I need for creating parts and things in my business using my 3d printer and plasma CNC machine.  
  • Well hopefully it performs well with the task, mine handles most tasks flawlessly nowadays, though I'd like to freshen the look of it with another mozo cover
  • Yeah,  As I stated on here many times before,  if W10M had the apps my iphone has,  and microsoft didn't **** around it's users of the denim based w8 phones,  I will still be using it happily.   however,  websites do NOT have the functionality of apps and my 1020s were left in the dust after MS took back their all denim promise so,  BYE.   But since they brought 3d builder to moible,  I see a need for the 950xl now.  I am excited to try it out with my CNC machine...that should be really cool.  take a picture of something I need to make...even if it's a drawing,  and load it into builder and it should convert to "print" on my CNC plasma machine or 3d printer,  depending on what I need.  Will make making Motorcycle frames SUPER EASY!....and exhaust pipes too!  
  • All we need now is 'the app' that gets another few hundred million people to see the benefits of the platform and we will all be happy then, but hey one at a time is a step in the right direction :D
  • That would be an epic app.   No the app where developers just automatically develop for windows 10 as well!  thats the gold mine there!
  • Yeah, you're worse🙄
    You're problem is that you don't know a pathetic fanboi when you see one... You just call any WP fan a famboi, which is blind in itself... Anything that you could possibly say bad about about WP, and the way MS handles WP, I will most likely agree with... I'm THE biggest WP fan, but I'm also It's biggest critic... Nevertheless, you CONTINUOUSLY refuse to see that...... To be honest, yes, I don't believe trolls like you ever used WP, and Yes, I think this place would be better without your stupid negativity........ Change your ways, dude.
  • nice copy and paste ****!
  • it doesn't work for me. It gets stuck after entering my credentials, I have contacted them hope they will back to me soon. H  
  • Yep. Continuum tested and confirmed - worked pretty well, too. 
  • Awesome!
  • This is needed for Windows 10S for businesses.
  • This definitely will make Windows 10s more viable for the enterprise.
  • I would as far as extended that to continuum enabled w10m phones...
  • UWP Citrix app with the upgrade Continuum with multiple windows will truly make it useful as a desktop replacement. Right now, you can only use one app at a time but once we can use multiple pinned apps, then we will be in business. Things like the lack of native windowed apps is what is hindering Continuum adoption in business. Using a Virtual Desktop in Citrix helps but not all companies deploy their apps via a Virtual Desktop with some companies opting to host only the apps themselves, pinned to a local desktop where each app launches like it is on your local machine. Good times are ahead for Windows on phones, whether it is Continuum updates or the full switch to Windows on ARM.
  • I have to admit: that is really cool. Geez, it's a new world!
  • Cool. You mention Mobile and hololense, but this type of stuff is very necessary for schools and enterprises that might make use of Windows 10S... I wonder if that is more of the motivation.
  • I believe his point is that IT'S A UWP APP from an Enterprise vendor. Schools are enterprises.
  • Lol... True.
  • Every day user !!😊
  • Yes, After all these years! Old one didn't work properly. Hope it will enhance the productivity through Mobile in Enterprise :)
  • Just tried it out for a little bit, seems to work pretty good. Weird that on a 200% screen it decides to render the VM contents at 1:1 making everything small. Desktop version doesn't do this as far as I can tell. Would be better for performance if they just assumed half size and scaled up.
  • Or added that as a setting.. Regular RDP suffers from this as well.
  • Very nice! Wonder if Desktop-enhancing applications like Auto Sizer, WindowSpace and all of StarDock's applications will ever have a place in the Windows Store...if Android apps can provide system wide enhancements on a Smartphone, there's no reason (besides greed) that UWP apps shouldn't be capable of such. At the moment, there are apps like Tablet Pro and TouchMeGesture studio that are available via the Windows Store, but they still require a Win32 component, making them unusable on Windows 10S devices.
  • As long as all the components are on the store based installer, it would work on windows 10s
  • Thought it was a UWP app, just that the old one never worked right. No?
  • FINALLY!!!! I have been tweeting them for a while about this. They always said it was in the works but after what seemed like years, I started to think they changed their mind! This is great! One step closer to flushing out Ultrat...wait...One step closer to deploying Windows 10 Mobile devices in our organization! I just gave a futures demo of the 950XL, Continuum and Windows 10 Mobile 2 days ago at work and on the list of "No Go's" was "Lack of a Windows 10 UWP Citrix Receiver". Time to strike that point through in OneNote! I demoed our Citrix Apps through Edge Mobile via the 950XL and Continuum but alas, the lack of the UWP app was a real showstopper of it's own. Now (somebody say Now), the app is here and now we can move on to the rest of the list of must have deliverables! We've already banished iPads in favor of 2-1 and Convertible Windows devices, next up, iPhones in favor of 2-1/3-1 Windows phones! Progress I say....progress.  Come on multi-window Continuum or better yet, an HP Elite X3 Gen 2, Snapdragon 835 with Windows 10 on ARM!  
  • Glad it's here too. MS started pushing people towards Citrix when they canned Azure Remote App (which was a huge shame as it was so quick to get up a running and to manage. It was also cheap enough for even small businesses)
  • Yes!!! The old app was horrid. So stoked about this.
  • Fast forward 5 years, no updates and the app withers on the vine?
  • This is great news for businesses who want to deploy Windows 10S and Windows 10 mobile as the app also supports continuum. The timing is also perfect for the upcoming Surface Laptop release. If you close your eyes, you can definitely see the vision Microsoft has in mind for Windows 10. It may not happen today, or next year... But I am confident that they will eventually get there.
  • Cool
  • In our company we use two-step authentication, and this app can't support it. It's a shame because the older version was a disaster and I was specting for a newer one :'(
  • Was just about to try but then this...so, if you need to use a SecurID key fob...don't bother installing?
  • How about installing the app but not setting up an account within the app. Log into your company Citrix login from Edge, download the .ica and open it, it should launch the apps via the receiver without setting up the account within the receiver? May you let me know if that works for you? It did for me. I can't actually set up our accounts IN the receiver but running from our site works.
  • How about Citrix take security properly, and setup 2 factor support in their app.
    It's stupid stuff like this that makes people look at the app store and think... nah. not gonna happen.
  • Doesn't do the same as the desktop app. Keep getting an "App failed to launch" error when opening the .ica file. In the UWP app, where are all the fancy settings like, "Connection Center", "Configuration Checker", "Settings Options" like in the system tray tool of the desktop app?
  • Nice!
  • The best time to release this would have been a couple of years ago. The second best time is now.
  • Does not support assigned access, still useless.
  • HUGE news!!!  Continuum support and hopefully more stable than the Edge on Win 10 Mobile experience.  
  • Doesn't seem to work the same. Where are all the fancy settings like, "Connection Center", "Configuration Checker", "Settings Options" like in the system tray tool of the desktop app?
  • Works like a charm
  • The only advantage I see over the previous app is the continuum support but overall, this is actually worse on my laptop than the previous version. I can't make this version completely full screen (like the prior win8 one) and it has an additional bar for the full length of the screen which doesn't go away. Thus, this version has a lot more wasted space compared to the prior one.
  • SHIFT +WIN+ENTER goes to full screen mode on apps. Hit the key combo again and it exits out of full screen = Problem Solved... No need to thank me :-)
  • Brilliant, I did not know this! Now if I could get rid of that black toolbar at the bottom...
  • Doesn't work for me :(
    I can connect to my company's citrix server with IE. This doesn't accept my login info or passcode to connect the server.
  • Great, definitely great stuff. We do quit some Citrix related work at our customers' though RDS has taken a big chunck of the SBC related business.
  • Just logged into my Citrix portal and was going to play in lab and saw this " New features only in Enterprise Edition: Windows Continuum (with XenDesktop 7.14 / experimental)"  Looks like the Xendesktop 7.14+ will support Continuum this will make the Window S very attractive.