It's fairly common these days to have devices from multiple operating systems. If you use the iCloud on your iOS or MacOS device and also have a PC powered by Windows 10, Cloud for iDevice allows you to continue your work across devices.
The app features a good-looking and familiar design that lets you access your iCloud content on your PC.
The app is available for $1.99 on Windows 10 and HoloLens.
See in Microsoft Store (opens in new tab)
Attractive layout
Cloud for iDevice will look familiar to anyone who has used Apple's services. It has a home area with square icons in two neat rows. It's a simple to use interface that can't be customized. This makes it easy to get started, even if it can't be tweaked that much.
Using the app is very simple, you just login once to your iCloud account and then every service that you use can be opened up in the app, including Mail, Contacts, Photos, Pages, Numbers, and more.
Editing your calendar, browsing through photos, and jumping around other content in the cloud feels natural and very similar to if you were on an Apple device.
Issues
While the app is attractive, it does have some issues that hold it back. It runs into some issues that make it obvious that you aren't using a first-party app. The biggest issue is that if you try to use a service that you haven't setup in the past, instead of getting a message directing you to a signup page, you just get a weird mess of a page that is unusable.
In the example above, I tried opening up Numbers, a service which I admittedly don't use, and ran into this issue. It's understandable that the app could get confused trying to use Numbers when I don't have any files that run in it, but I'd expect a proper explination rather than some text and a graph cutoff in the corner and half a continue button that doesn't help.
There were also some general loading issues with the app. Opening photos failed once in my testing but worked on multiple other occasion.
These issues are very noticeable but you won't run into them often, or at all, if you stick to using services that you've already setup on your iCloud. That isn't a perfect fix but as an example, using Calendar and Reminders had zero issues for me.
Overall thoughts
Cloud for iDevice provides an attractive interface for accessing your iCloud content on Windows 10. Using it feels more like an extension of your iOS device than using Windows 10's File Explorer. It works fairly well, but has flaws that hold it back, including some performance issues and a price that is higher than Apple's own iCloud software (opens in new tab) for Windows.
Utlitmately, Cloud for iDevice is a good-looking app that is worth looking into if you have an Apple device as well as a Windows 10 PC.
Pros
- Attractive layout
- Login once to access all iCloud content
Cons
- Performance issues
- Costs money compared to free competition
See in Microsoft Store (opens in new tab)
