Lenovo's Free SHAREIt App Transfers Files Between All Your Devices via Wi-Fi Direct

Sending files over the Internet often takes too long and transferring them via direct connection is a nightmare of incompatibility. Sure, you can tap two Samsung phones together to share that HD video, but what about when your friend has an iPhone or a PC laptop? Enter Lenovo's SHAREIt, a new free app from the leading PC vendor that lets you send files between any Android, iOS, Windows or Mac OS devices in the room over Wi-Fi direct. SHAREit even sends files to entire groups, and works just as well whether you own a Lenovo device or not.

MORE: Best Tech of CES 2014

SHAREit is one of Lenovo's new suite of DoIT apps, which include SYNCIt, for backing up phone contacts and other data, SECUREIt for keeping your phone virus-free and two camera functions: SNAPIt and SEEIt. All of the non-camera functions are available as free downloads for any Android device. However, SHAREIt stands out by offering a more compelling and comprehensive Wi-Fi direct sharing service than we've seen elsewhere.

Lenovo's Ashley  Perry gave us a demo of SHAREIt, showing just how easy it is to use this application for high-speed, local file transfers. First, she opened SHAREIt on a Lenovo VibeX phone, hit the send button and selected a photo from her gallery. Then a list of local devices running SHAREIt (with receive mode on) appeared and she hit send to transfer the file to a coworker who was also on a Vibe X.

She then entered Group Sharing mode and selected an existing group, which consisted of two  other devices. The group screen looked and acted like a powerful chatroom as Perry sent text messages to the other users then pulled up a whiteboard mode and sent a drawing directly to the other users. She also said she could send files to group.

Perry then demonstrated pairing with a PC, using a Moto X to communicate with her ThinkPad laptop, which was running a Windows version of SHAREit. From her handset, she was not only able to send photos to the laptop, but also to go forward or backward through slides in PowerPoint, a real benefit for business users.

Users can download SHAREIt for Android from the Google Play, the iOS version from the Apple App store and the PC version from kc.lenovo.com.

Avram Piltch is Tom's Hardware's editor-in-chief. When he's not playing with the latest gadgets at work or putting on VR helmets at trade shows, you'll find him rooting his phone, taking apart his PC or coding plugins. With his technical knowledge and passion for testing, Avram developed many real-world benchmarks, including our laptop battery test.