Android devices are able to stream Xbox games on their decries via Microsoft’s cloud streaming service xCloud. xCloud is not available on iOS right now, but there are options if you want to stream Xbox games on your iPhone or iPad.
With Microsoft xCloud Game Pass Ultimate subscribers can stream over 100 games to their mobile device. The games are usually steamed to the device from the cloud. However, for Apple devices streaming from the cloud is not available because Apple will not allow games to be made available outside of the iOS App Store.
Nevertheless, iOS users can use their iPhone or iPad as a playback device for Xbox games. The official Xbox app allows streaming from your own console to a mobile device. The Xbox One dashboard can appear on the mobile device as a video stream.
Thanks to this feature the screen of iPhone or iPad can be used as the display and control commands can be entered via a Bluetooth gamepad.
There are some disadvantages to this form of streaming – it means only the games that are already installed on the console are available. Also, since the Xbox One is busy streaming it cannot be used by other family members for their own game sessions. If the streaming happens via xCloud the console can be used for other tasks.
The benefit is that when streaming Xbox games within the home network the television is at least free for others to watch.
The Xbox app will eventually mimic Sony’s PS4 Remote Play app, with which PS4 games have been wirelessly streamed to other devices for years. The new Xbox app for iOS should be out soon, a beta test is currently running.
More on streaming Xbox games on iPhone here.
This article originally appeared on Macwelt. Translation by Karen Haslam.