Getting started with TermLink: install, sign in, and reach your machine

TermLink gives you a live terminal on a machine you own, from anywhere else — a browser, your phone, or another terminal. There is no SSH key to distribute, no port to open on your router, and no VPN to dial into.

This post walks the whole path: sign in, register a machine, connect to it, and run something.

The four TermLink setup steps: termlink login to sign in with Google, termlink host to register the machine, opening it from anywhere, and getting a real shell — Two commands on the machine you want to reach. Everything after that is a browser.

What you need

The termlink binary on any machine you want to reach (macOS, Linux, or Windows).
A Google account. That is the whole credential story — TermLink has no passwords, no PINs, and no keys for you to manage.

Step 1 — Sign in

On the machine you want to reach, run:

termlink login

Your browser opens, you sign in with Google, and the credentials are stored locally on that machine and refreshed automatically. You do this once per machine — not once per session.

Nothing about this step opens a port or exposes the machine. It just tells TermLink which account this machine belongs to.

Step 2 — Register the machine as a host

Still on that machine:

termlink host

The machine registers under your Google account and dials out to the TermLink relay. That direction matters: because the connection is outbound, the machine works fine behind a home router, a NAT, or a corporate firewall, and it never accepts an inbound connection. There is nothing listening for an attacker to find.

Leave this running. It is the process that owns your session.

Step 3 — Connect from somewhere else

From any other machine:

termlink client

You get a numbered list of the machines registered to your account. Pick a number, and you are in that machine's shell.

Only your own machines appear — the host list is scoped to the Google account in your token, so you never see anyone else's machines and they never see yours.

Step 4 — It is a real shell, not a screenshot

Here is a Mac being reached from a Windows box. The window at the back is the Mac itself; the one in front is TermLink on Windows, connected to it. Watch ls run:

Running ls on a remote Mac through TermLink from a Windows terminal — Left: the actual Mac, shown over Chrome Remote Desktop purely as a witness — so you can see the same shell on both sides. You do not need Chrome Remote Desktop to use TermLink; the window in front is all you need.

The output is identical on both sides because it is the same shell. TermLink is not streaming a picture of a desktop — it is relaying the terminal itself, byte for byte.

That distinction is why it stays usable on a bad connection and on a phone screen, and why cat, a log tail, or a full-screen terminal UI all behave the way they would locally:

Running cat on a remote machine through TermLink — cat on the remote machine, rendered in the TermLink client.

Or skip the CLI entirely

You do not need termlink client on the machine you connect from. Open the web client, sign in with the same Google account, and your hosts are waiting in a list. That works from a laptop you have never installed anything on — or from your phone.

What this replaces

If today you would reach for SSH, you have to expose a port and manage keys. If you would reach for Chrome Remote Desktop or TeamViewer, you have to stream an entire desktop and keep the far machine unlocked with a session running.

TermLink mirrors the one window you actually care about — the terminal — and authenticates it with the Google account you already have.

Frequently asked questions

Where do I install it?

Only on the machines you want to reach. The device you connect from needs nothing — the web client is a browser tab. Downloads for macOS, Linux, and Windows are on the download page.

Do I need it on both machines?

No. termlink client exists if you prefer a terminal on the connecting side, but it is optional. Most people install on the workstation and connect from a browser.

Does it work behind a home router or a company firewall?

Yes, with no configuration. The host dials out, so there is nothing inbound for a router or firewall to block and no port to forward. That is also why it keeps working on a laptop that moves between networks — see how a remote terminal works without SSH or a VPN.

Do I have to keep `termlink host` running?

Yes. That process owns the session. If you kill it or the machine sleeps, the machine goes offline until you start it again — TermLink is not a background daemon like tmux.

Is my machine exposed to the internet?

No. Nothing listens on it. What the relay can and cannot see, and where your credentials sit on disk, is set out on the security page.

How do I sign a machine out?

termlink devices --revoke. Useful for a laptop you no longer have.

Does it cost anything?

There is a free plan — two sessions running at the same time, with no time limit. Pricing has the rest.

Now that you can reach a machine, the interesting part is what you leave running on it. See how to run Claude Code remotely on another machine — start an agent on your workstation, close the laptop, and check on it from your phone. For the wider picture, Claude Code remote access.