mRemoteNXT
The native macOS alternative to mRemoteNG. SSH, RDP, Telnet, SFTP and HTTP/HTTPS in tabs.
~21 MB · macOS 14+ · Apple Silicon · GPL-2.0
Screenshots
Main view: connection tree, panels, embedded SSH tab and bottom status bar with click-to-copy host / user / password.
Empty workspace.
Settings · Appearance.
All hosts come from the bundled demo config — IANA documentation IPs, no real machines.
Why mRemoteNXT?
If you use mRemoteNG on Windows and you want the same
connection tree, encrypted passwords, panels and tabs on your Mac,
mRemoteNXT imports your confCons.xml directly — no
conversion, no re-typing.
The format is preserved byte-exact: passwords stay
encrypted with the same scheme (PBKDF2-HMAC-SHA1 + AES-256-GCM,
documented default passphrase or a custom one), and files
saved by mRemoteNXT on macOS are read back by mRemoteNG on Windows
without complaint. You can keep one file in Dropbox or iCloud and
work from both platforms.
Features
- Tree with foldersAttribute inheritance, drag&drop reorder, original mRemoteNG icons, guide lines.
- PanelsGroup connections into top-level tabs, like on Windows.
- Search / filterBy name, host, protocol, description.
- SSH + TelnetEmbedded in tabs via SwiftTerm. PuTTY-style copy-on-select + right-click paste.
- SFTPRight-click an SSH connection → Transfer files.
- RDPEmbedded via FreeRDP. GFX pipeline, live resize, Retina DPI, Ctrl+Alt+Del.
- HTTP / HTTPSWKWebView with auto-fill for router / iLO / switch web UIs.
- External toolsCustom commands with macros (%Host%, %Username%, ...).
- Auto-backupEvery save creates a timestamped copy. Your original file is never lost.
- ThemesDefault, Solarized, Dracula, Nord, macOS Light, more. Live font-size adjust.
- Bilingual UIEnglish (default) or Romanian, switchable from Settings.
- Self-contained .dmgNo Homebrew install needed. FreeRDP, OpenSSL etc. are bundled.
Install
- Download the latest
.dmg from the releases page.
- Open the
.dmg, drag mRemoteNXT.app to the Applications shortcut.
- Open mRemoteNXT.app from
/Applications and use ⌘O to load your confCons.xml or ⌘N to start from scratch.
No Homebrew required. The .dmg bundles
FreeRDP and OpenSSL inside the app (~21 MB total). Build-from-source
details and the packaging script are on GitHub.
Changelog
Mirrors the GitHub releases exactly. Newest first.
Tab bar scroll arrows, session restore, classic tree guide lines.
- Tab bar scroll arrows — when more tabs are open than fit, left/right chevrons appear and stay while the bar overflows; clicking pages through them. Trackpad scrolling still works.
- Remember open connections — a new Settings toggle (on by default) reopens and reconnects the connections that were open when you last quit, restoring tabs, panels and selection. Only node references are stored, never passwords.
- Classic tree guide lines — Windows-style guide lines,
[+]/[-] toggle boxes and a green "play" badge on active connections. Contributed by @vurmil.
v0.5.0-alpha
· 2026-06-16
— First community contributions
Polish UI, duplicate action, sidebar fix.
- Polish localization — the full UI is now available in Polish, joining English and Romanian. Contributed by @vurmil.
- Duplicate connection / folder — a new right-click action copies a node (and its children) with a fresh ID and a non-colliding name, inserted right below the original. Contributed by @vurmil.
- Sidebar context-menu fix — right-clicking the empty area below the tree now creates top-level connections and folders correctly, instead of nesting them under the first node. Contributed by @vurmil.
v0.4.0-alpha
· 2026-06-16
— Signed and notarized by Apple
No Gatekeeper warning.
- Developer ID signature — the app and every bundled library are signed with a Developer ID certificate (Vtun Hardware SRL).
- Apple notarization — the
.dmg is submitted to Apple's notary service and the ticket is stapled, so macOS Gatekeeper accepts it offline with no warning. No more xattr -dr com.apple.quarantine workaround.
- Hardened Runtime enabled, with the minimal entitlements required by the bundled FreeRDP / ffmpeg codec paths (JIT, executable memory, library validation relaxed for the re-signed Homebrew dylibs).
v0.3.0-alpha
· 2026-05-26
— Cursor blink + OSC tab titles + drag auto-scroll
Features ported from term-mac:
- Auto-scroll while drag-selecting — drag past the top/bottom edge of the terminal, the buffer scrolls and the selection extends. Workaround for an upstream SwiftTerm bug where
mouseDragged sets the autoScrollDelta but never schedules the timer.
- Configurable cursor blink (Off / Slow / Medium / Fast) in Settings > Appearance. Uses DECSCUSR for the on/off toggle and a custom
CABasicAnimation for the duration.
- Dynamic tab title from terminal OSC 0/1/2 — when the remote shell emits a title sequence (typical zsh precmd:
user@host:cwd), the tab updates live. Gated by a new toggle in Settings.
v0.2.0-alpha
· 2026-05-24
— About / Help / New & Close + self-contained .dmg
Polishing pass — no breaking changes, all confCons.xml files from v0.1 keep working.
Features
- About panel — replaces the generic macOS About with a proper one (author, email, repo link, license).
- Help menu — in-app Help window with 7 sections (What is, Getting started, Connecting, Editing, Shortcuts, Tips, Limitations), plus quick links to GitHub source, issue tracker, and the author's email.
- File > New configuration... (⌘N) — create an empty
confCons.xml from scratch.
- File > Close configuration (⌘⇧W) — closes the current document and returns the app to its empty state.
Fixes
- HelpView no longer crashes on first open — the hosting controller now receives the
LanguageManager environment object explicitly.
Documentation & community
SECURITY.md, CONTRIBUTING.md, CODE_OF_CONDUCT.md (Contributor Covenant 2.1), issue + PR templates.- README now includes real screenshots from the bundled demo configuration.
Examples
examples/demo-config.xml — 4 folders / 15 connections covering SSH, RDP, Telnet, HTTPS, using IANA documentation ranges (safe to embed in screenshots).
Packaging
build/package.sh — builds Release, copies 28 Homebrew dylibs into Frameworks/, rewrites install names with install_name_tool, re-signs ad-hoc and produces a self-contained .dmg. End users no longer need brew install freerdp at runtime.
v0.1.0-alpha
· 2026-05-24
— First public release
First public alpha — a native macOS multi-protocol remote connection client that imports confCons.xml from mRemoteNG.
What works
- Direct
confCons.xml import (schema 2.6; documented default passphrase or a custom one). Crypto validated byte-exact (PBKDF2-HMAC-SHA1 + AES-256-GCM).
- Connection tree with folders, attribute inheritance, drag & drop reorder, original mRemoteNG icons, guide lines.
- Panels — group connections into top-level tabs like on Windows.
- Search / filter by name, host, protocol, description.
- SSH + Telnet embedded via SwiftTerm. PuTTY-style copy-on-select + right-click paste.
- SFTP — right-click an SSH connection → Transfer files.
- RDP embedded via FreeRDP. GFX / disp / cliprdr channels, live resize, correct Retina DPI, Ctrl+Alt+Del.
- HTTP / HTTPS embedded in
WKWebView with auto-fill from the tree.
- External Tools with macros (
%Host%, %Username%, ...) executed in a terminal tab.
- Connection editor modal (General / Connection / Credentials / Appearance / Advanced) + bottom status bar with click-to-copy.
- Auto-backup on save to
backups/confCons-<timestamp>.xml on every write.
- Terminal themes, live-adjustable font size, zoom ⌘+ / ⌘−.
- Bilingual UI — English (default) / Romanian, switchable from Settings.
What's not yet there
FullFileEncryption="true" (whole-XML encryption).- Schema
ConfVersion > 2.6 — untested.
- RDP image-clipboard, drive / sound redirect, remote-cursor visibility.
- VNC (planned), external applications (
IntApp nodes).
Frequently asked questions
Is mRemoteNXT free?
Yes. mRemoteNXT is free and open source under the
GPL-2.0-or-later license. There is no paid tier, no subscription, no telemetry. The source and the .dmg download are both on GitHub.
Does it work on Apple Silicon Macs?
Yes. The .dmg is built for Apple Silicon (arm64) and requires macOS 14 Sonoma or later. An Intel build is not provided today, but you can build from source on Intel if needed.
Can mRemoteNXT import my existing mRemoteNG configuration?
Yes — this is the whole point. mRemoteNXT opens your existing confCons.xml byte-for-byte. The connection tree, folders, panels, attribute inheritance and icons are preserved exactly as on Windows. Files saved on the Mac are read back by mRemoteNG on Windows without complaint, so you can keep one file in Dropbox / iCloud and work from both platforms.
What about my saved passwords — are they decrypted correctly?
Yes. The crypto scheme is re-implemented byte-exact: PBKDF2-HMAC-SHA1 (1000 iterations) + AES-256-GCM with the salt as AAD. Passwords stored with mRemoteNG's documented default passphrase or with a custom master password are both supported. Decryption was validated against real production confCons.xml files with hundreds of credentials.
Does mRemoteNXT trigger a macOS Gatekeeper warning?
No. As of v0.4.0-alpha the app is signed with a Developer ID certificate and notarized by Apple, so macOS Gatekeeper accepts it with no warning — just download, drag to Applications and open. The old xattr -dr com.apple.quarantine workaround is no longer needed.
Which protocols does mRemoteNXT support?
SSH (and SFTP), Telnet, RDP and HTTP/HTTPS, all embedded in tabs. SSH/Telnet use SwiftTerm with PuTTY-style copy-on-select and right-click paste. RDP uses FreeRDP with the GFX pipeline, live resize, correct Retina DPI scaling and Ctrl+Alt+Del from the menu. HTTP/HTTPS uses WKWebView with auto-fill for router, iLO and switch web interfaces. VNC is planned for a future release.
Does mRemoteNXT need Homebrew or any other dependency installed?
No. The .dmg is self-contained at about 21 MB and bundles all required libraries (FreeRDP, OpenSSL, ffmpeg and friends) inside the app. Drag to Applications and run — no brew install, no further setup. Building from source does require Xcode plus Homebrew freerdp and xcodegen, but that is only for contributors.
License & credits
mRemoteNXT is released under GPL-2.0-or-later.
It bundles FreeRDP (Apache-2.0)
and SwiftTerm (MIT).
The icon set is taken from the official
mRemoteNG project (also GPL-2.0).
Community contributions by
@vurmil
(Polish localization, duplicate action, sidebar fix). Pull requests
are welcome.
This project is not affiliated with the mRemoteNG team. The name is
referenced only for file-format compatibility.