Install it on a phone

Agents: claude, codex, opencode · On: phone, desktop

Put VCode on your home screen so it opens in its own window, with its own icon, and keeps working when the server is out of reach.

Why you would use it

You drive agents from your phone. In a browser tab the app shares the address bar and the tab pile, it cannot show notifications on iOS, and it has no home-screen icon. Installed, it opens like an app and it opens offline.

How to use it

1. Open VCode over https. A plain http origin cannot install.

2. Tap the install button (#install), the blue arrow just left of the cog. It is there on every browser until the app is installed.

   

3. On Android and desktop Chrome that opens the browser's install dialog. Accept it.

4. Anywhere else — iPhone, iPad, Safari on a Mac, Firefox — there is no dialog to open, so the tap raises a toast with the steps for that browser instead.

What you see

• The button is the ⤓ mark alone, in blue, drawn at 24px — bigger than the marks beside it — with no chip, edge or label. It sits in the same slot family as the +, the folder and the cog. The +, folder and cog are in the mobile icon rail; the install button stays in the top bar. The name is in its title and aria-label, Install this app.
• On a browser that offers an install, the tap opens the browser's own dialog. The app suppresses Chrome's separate install banner, so the button is the only prompt.
• On iPhone and iPad, in any browser, the tap shows Tap Share, then Add to Home Screen.
• In Safari on a Mac it shows Open the File menu, then Add to Dock.
• In Firefox on Android it shows Open the browser menu, then Add to Home screen.
• In Firefox on a desktop it shows Firefox cannot install apps — open this page in Chrome or Edge.
• In Chrome or Edge with no offer — after a dismissal, or with the app already installed and this page open in a tab — it shows Open the browser menu, then Install — or open the app if it is already installed. On Android the wording is Open the browser menu, then Install app — or open it from the home screen if it is already installed.
• Accepting the dialog shows the toast installed — open it from your home screen, and the button disappears.
• Declining shows install dismissed. The button stays, and falls back to the menu steps until the browser offers the install again.
• The installed app is called VCode — on the launcher, on the iOS home screen, in the tab title, and in the app's #app-id label beside the tabs.
• Its launcher icon and browser tab show the purple VCode mark on a black disc inside a purple ring. The Android and iOS icons fill the corners with the ring colour, so the ring shows whatever shape the launcher crops to.
• It opens with no browser chrome (display: standalone) on a dark background (#0a0d14).
• In the installed app the button is gone: it hides on display-mode: standalone and on iOS's navigator.standalone.

Limits and known gaps

• https only. A service worker needs a secure context, so over plain http there is no button, no install, no offline shell and no notifications.
• Desktop Firefox cannot install. It has no install command; the button says so and names Chrome and Edge.
• The dialog cannot be forced. Only Chromium fires beforeinstallprompt, and only when it decides the app is installable; everywhere else the button can only tell you where your browser keeps the command.
• Without https, Chrome's "Add to Home screen" makes a plain shortcut: it opens in a tab, with the browser bar showing and no offline support.

Related

• open-the-app-offline — what the installed app does with no connection
• turn-on-notifications — on iOS this install is the prerequisite
• update-to-a-new-build — how a new build reaches an installed phone
• reach-it-from-a-phone — the https origin an install needs
• toasts — where installed — open it from your home screen lands