Anyone that is somewhat tech-savvy(or able to google) knows the pressure of family or friends needing help for any computer related issue. Researching and providing the help needed is done out of love, but what happens when they grow reliant and are too far away for in-person computer support? Enter TeamViewer.
TeamViewer has been on the scene for a long time as the go-to remote desktop software for remote support situations. TeamViewer is free for personal use and available across multiple platforms, making it an easy choice for those providing the family tech support. It's also easy for family and friends to search, download, and set up. All of which are important for those users who are unfamiliar with computers or tech in general. However despite hitting all those marks, it's after you connect where the issues start.
Before I go into that, TeamViewer has always had a system in place to flag free users they believed were using their product for commercial use, and that's completely fair. But in the past few years, TeamViewers quest to convert casual free users to paying licensed users has gotten more aggressive. The system flagging has gotten more sensitive and even when only using TeamViewer to connect to a personal computer and occasionally family or friends for support, it's extremely quick to suspect you of commercial use and will limit your connection time to 5 minutes. Hopefully you can solve the tech issue within that time limit! Once you're disconnected, TeamViewer will block your ability to connect with that device for 10 minutes.
So what else is there?
Chrome Remote Desktop
Chrome Remote Desktop is an easy choice to go with. It's a Google product so any end user should be ok with it and easy to access from any computer that has Chrome or downloaded quickly on a mobile device. Google made sure it's easy to use by having the user that needs support generate a one-time code that is then given to the user connecting. It's lightweight which is nice but doesn't always have all the features you'd like. An example would be like file transferring since Google offers that service with their other product, Google Drive.
NoMachine & AnyDesk
There are quite a few choices that do provide close to what TeamViewer originally offered for free users. Among those are NoMachine & AnyDesk. While they may be a little harder to direct your grandma over the phone over, they'll easily handle any remote work needed.
The Others
Didn't name your favorite alternative? Unlike a few years ago, there's now a wide assortment of options available that are easy to use and these are just ones I've personally used and had a good experience with. Let me know what you use!
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