Blink Shell is the long-standing serious-developer terminal on iOS. It has been around for years, has a loyal following, ships a Mosh implementation, and packs a Linux-style local shell layer on top of iOS via the ios_system project. It is paid, and it is dense. ShellDrop is a narrower app: free, SSH-only, and tuned for the specific case of managing AI coding agents in tmux on a headless Mac Mini or VPS.
Both apps are legitimate. They aim at different users. Here is an honest side-by-side.
| ShellDrop 5 | Blink Shell | |
|---|---|---|
| Paste a screenshot into the terminal | Yes. Any image, multi-image; agent reads them on the server | No native feature; inline image display needs third-party CLI tools |
| Attach a file from Files or Photos | Yes. Files, photos or video; uploads over SSH, path lands at the prompt | No dedicated attach button; move it via scp/SFTP first, then paste the path yourself |
| Agent-to-phone clipboard | Yes. The agent can drop text onto your phone's clipboard | No |
| Voice dictation | Built in. On-device Apple speech free, or your own Groq key. | Not a listed feature |
| Pricing model | Free. No account, no in-app purchases | Blink+ $19.99/year (annual only) after a 14-day trial; free routes exist (open-source build, TestFlight Community Edition) |
| Platforms | Native on iPhone and iPad, Vision Pro with version 5, macOS coming soon | iPhone, iPad, Apple Vision Pro (no native macOS app) |
| Account required | No | No for core SSH and Mosh |
| Telemetry | None | Purchase history linked to your identity (Analytics, App Functionality) |
| Password auth | Yes | Yes |
| Public-key auth (SSH keys) | Yes (Ed25519, ECDSA, Secure Enclave P-256) | Yes. Ed25519, ECDSA, RSA, certificates, ssh-agent, agent forwarding |
| Secure Enclave keys | Yes (P-256) | Yes |
| SFTP / scp | No (SSH-only) | Yes (native sftp/scp, Files.app integration) |
| Mosh | No (separate app MoshDrop in development) | Yes, first-class |
| Local shell (on-device) | No (SSH-only) | Yes (ios_system, local Unix tools) |
| Tmux single-finger scroll | Yes | Standard scroll |
| iPad layout (incl. 13" iPad Pro M4) | Universal app, full-canvas landscape, centred toolbar | Universal app, iPad supported |
| Connection sync | iCloud CloudKit (no vendor account) | iCloud + Blink config files |
| Custom command shortcut | One Tap button | Blink commands via config |
| Background session keep-alive | Opt-in, location-services-based | Mosh handles roaming; SSH limited |
| Open source | No (closed-source) | Yes, on GitHub |
Copy an image anywhere on the phone and paste it into the session. Your agent reads it on the server. Multi-image paste works too. The same toolbar has a paperclip button for files: pick one from Files, or a photo or video from the library, upload over SSH, and the path lands at the prompt. Blink does not do either natively: pasting a screenshot into the session is not a built-in feature, showing an image inline needs third-party command-line tools on the server, and attaching a file means moving it over scp/SFTP first and pasting the path in by hand. For anyone feeding screenshots to a coding agent all day, that is the gap between one paste and a five-step detour.
The clipboard works the other way too. Ask the agent to write something, tell it to copy the result, and it lands on the phone's clipboard ready to paste into another app. It is opt-in and takes about ten seconds to set up. Terminal text selection is now a dedicated mode: toggle it on, long-press a word, drag the handles, copy. And Nerd Fonts (FiraCode and JetBrains Mono) ship bundled, so the glyphs nvim and LazyVim rely on render the way they should.
ShellDrop is a free download. No purchase, no subscription tier, no account. Blink runs on Blink+, a $19.99/year subscription (annual only) after a 14-day trial, though free routes exist if you self-build the open-source code or run the TestFlight Community Edition. For a maintained app off the App Store, ShellDrop is free and Blink is a yearly fee. Both models are reasonable; they suit different buyers.
Single-finger swipe through tmux scrollback without entering copy mode. The keyboard toolbar carries Esc, Ctrl-C, arrow keys, Shift-Tab, and a dedicated tmux detach button at all times. If most of your SSH time is inside a tmux pane attached to Claude Code, Codex, or another coding agent, that matters.
ShellDrop added P-256 SSH keys generated inside the iPhone Secure Enclave, where the private key cannot be exported, even by the app. Ed25519 generation and paste-import of unencrypted OpenSSH keys (Ed25519, ECDSA P-256/P-384/P-521) are also supported. Blink also backs its keys with the Secure Enclave, so hardware protection is a wash here. Blink goes wider on key handling overall, with RSA, certificates, ssh-agent, and agent forwarding; ShellDrop stays on the modern Ed25519 and P-256 set.
Universal app with full landscape, Magic Keyboard trackpad scroll, hardware-keyboard friendly. On the 13" iPad Pro M4 the terminal uses the whole canvas, the toolbar centres, and the font scales cleanly. Blink also supports iPad well. ShellDrop's layout is built around the large-canvas case specifically.
ShellDrop adds Voice Drop, a built-in mic on the keyboard toolbar. It transcribes on-device with Apple speech at no cost, or through your own Groq API key for whisper-large-v3-turbo, and drops the words at the cursor without sending Return. Dictating a long prompt to an agent is the kind of input a phone keyboard is worst at, and it is where ShellDrop puts the least friction.
Version 5 also added custom key bindings for the keyboard toolbar: create your own Tmux-aware keys in Settings, Ctrl plus a key with an optional follow-up, and arrange them like any stock key.
Blink ships Mosh on iOS. If you live on flaky cellular, switch networks often, or hate seeing your shell freeze when your phone changes Wi-Fi, Mosh is the right protocol and Blink is the app for it. ShellDrop does not have Mosh; MoshDrop is a separate app in development.
Blink ships a Linux-style local shell on iOS via the ios_system project. You can run common Unix tools locally on the device, vim, grep, awk, python (limited), git, without an SSH session at all. ShellDrop is SSH-only. If you want a usable on-device Unix shell, that's Blink (or a-Shell).
Blink has been in active development for years. It has deeper config, a richer key-binding system, robust Mosh handling, and a userbase that has stress-tested it across many releases. ShellDrop is newer and narrower.
Blink Shell is open-source on GitHub. ShellDrop is closed-source. If open-source matters to you for the SSH client running your private keys, Blink wins on that axis.
Running both is fine. Blink for Mosh roaming, ShellDrop for the One Tap loop on Claude Code.
Not natively. Blink has no built-in image paste into the session, and showing an image inline needs third-party command-line tools on the server. ShellDrop lets you copy any image on the phone, paste it into the session for your agent to read.
The maintained App Store app runs on Blink+, a $19.99/year subscription (annual only) after a 14-day trial. Free routes exist if you build the open-source code yourself or run the TestFlight Community Edition. ShellDrop is free with no account and no in-app purchases.
Not in ShellDrop itself. A separate app, MoshDrop, is in development for Mosh. For Mosh today, Blink is the established iOS option.
Yes, via ios_system. You can use common Unix tools on the device without SSH. ShellDrop does not, it connects out over SSH to a real machine.
Yes. Ed25519 generation, paste-import of unencrypted OpenSSH keys (Ed25519, ECDSA P-256/P-384/P-521), and Secure Enclave-backed P-256 keys where the private key never leaves the iPhone hardware.
Either covers the SSH layer. ShellDrop is built around this workflow: single-finger tmux scroll, always-visible Esc / Ctrl-C / arrow keys, background keep-alive, One Tap for firing commands at the agent.
ShellDrop is on the App Store. Universal iPhone and iPad, iOS 17+. Free, no subscription.
