iPhone and Android file transfer has been made easy with various free wireless transfer apps, such as SHAREit, Zapya, Xender, etc. SHAREit has intrusive ads. Xender has no ads but not as powerful as the other two. Zapya is the best choice for most iPhone and Android users. It is free, powerful and easy to use. It contains ads, but not very annoying. It support file transfer through Wi-Fi, Hotspot and Wi-Fi direct. You can find more features and download Zapya here.
If you need to transfer files, documents, photos, videos, music, contacts from iPhone to Android or vice versa and you have Wi-Fi, the transfer process is extremely easy. What you’ll need to do is connect both iPhone and Android mobile to the same Wi-Fi network, and then connect iPhone and Android through WiFi, finally select files on iPhone and send them to the Android phone wirelessly.
Zapya is a cross-platform file transfer which is compatible with phones, computers, tablets, Android, iOS, Windows, Mac. We will focus on iPhone and Android smartphones in this article, but this process would work almost the same with tablets and computers too.
Step 1. Download Zapya on both iPhone and Android
You can find the download from previous linked page or do a search on Apple App Store to find it. It can be found on Google Play Store too. Both devices need to install the transfer app.
Step 2. Connect both iPhone and Android to Wi-Fi
We’re focusing on Wi-Fi transfer in this tutorial, although Zapya supports also Hotspot and Wi-Fi direct file transfer. See this iPhone Android hotspot file transfer guide if interested. Make sure to connect both mobile phones to the same Wi-Fi network. Sometimes you may have two Wi-Fi networks, typically a 2.4G Wi-fi VS 5G Wi-Fi. We found many routers nowadays serve up the 2.4GHz and 5GHz bands. iPhone and Android need to be connected to the same Wi-Fi network. You can’t connect one to the 2.4G Wifi, the other to the 5G Wi-fi, otherwise, Zapya won’t be able to connect both devices.
Also some public Wi-Fi networks, like those in Airport, cafe, restaurant, hotel, may prevent devices in the same local network to exchange data for higher security.
Step 3. Connect iPhone and Android in Zapya
Run Zapya file transfer app on both iPhone and Android phone. The Photo tab opens at the home screen so you can quickly select any photos from your Camera Roll to share. You can also switch to Video, Music, Contact, or File tab to select and share more other files.
Tap on the Transfer button at the bottom of Zapya on iPhone, the app will search for nearby devices and your Android mobile will be found automatically. Tap on your Android phone name to connect. If you have already selected files under the Photo, Video or other categories on the Home screen, the selected files will be sent to the Android phone once they are connected.
Step 4. Select files to transfer from iPhone to Android – alternative
If you have not selected any files to share from the Home screen categories on iPhone, you will have another chance to browse through the Photo, Video, Music, Contact and File categories to find and select the files and documents you want to share when you have already connected up the two phones. Tap on the Send button at the bottom to copy them over from iPhone to Android in blazing fast speed through your local Wi-Fi. Way faster than Bluetooth or WLAN syncing.
This process would work the same with file sharing from Android phone or tablet to iPhone or iPad.
Update Sep 2022: this article was originally published in May 2020 and has since been updated. added new screenshots to reflect the changes in Zapya StringVersion 6.1.8, the latest version at this moment.