Open your local dev server on the phone

Why: you’re building the web part of the app on your laptop and want to see it inside the real app’s WebView on a real Android, without deploying anything.

What happens

1. Connect your computer first and leave the holtdroid client running.
2. Start your dev server as usual, for example Vite on port 5173.
3. The port shows up on the Computers page. Click it to publish it on your devices; in the default Dev servers mode the client publishes servers like node, bun or vite by itself.
4. On the session page, the SSH card lists the published ports.
5. On the phone, open http://localhost:5173: the page comes from your laptop.

Good to know

• A port is the “door number” a program listens on: your dev server listens on 5173, so it is localhost:5173. Publishing makes the same door open on the device.
• A published port goes to every device you run, including the ones you start later, and only to yours.
• Plain http://localhost works even if the app forbids unencrypted traffic: Android makes an exception for localhost. Other hosts still follow the app’s rules.
• Hot reload works: save a file and the page on the phone updates.
• In Everything mode every listening program on your computer is published, desktop apps included. The client asks before switching to it.

If it doesn’t work

• The port isn’t on the Computers page: make sure the client is running and the server listens on localhost, not only on another address.
• Red port in the SSH card: nothing answers on that port on your computer. Start the server, or check the number.
• The page loads but API calls fail: the app still calls the API by its normal address. Point it at localhost too, or publish the API’s port as well.
• A port is skipped on emulators: a few ports are taken by the session itself (5555, 5038, 27042, 18580, 18581, 7890, 9090). Use another one.

More details: Connecting your computer.