Blip: Peer-to-peer massive file sharing
109 comments
·July 22, 2025tomazsh
pizzathyme
Looks amazing! Maybe a dumb question: why isn't Dropbox doing this? Why did you all need to leave to make this a reality?
tomazsh
Thank you, and great question. In my experience, big companies have way more strategic priorities than two guys who just want to build something useful. We didn't leave to build exactly this, but a few things came together organically from past projects, including our work at Dropbox.
NautilusWave
What's the timeline on rolling out E2EE? Is it for paid users only?
mempko
Linux support please!
Saris
Interesting that it says "Internet sending may be slower during peak times to keep things fair" even though it's supposed to be P2P?
Maybe they just mean if you end up with a relayed connection due to NAT issues? Because lower down it says "Send as fast as your connection"
tantalor
> When a direct connection isn’t possible, files travel through our servers.
Saris
I figured, it's just explained in an odd way.
bilbo0s
That's what actually made it a hard pass for me.
SquirrelOnFire
Why's that, given that files are encrypted?
tomazsh
That's right. We actively manage load across our relay network to ensure good performance, but we'll prioritize business transfers during peak times. We don't artificially limit the client, but P2P connection speeds can sometimes be affected by router configurations and ISP routing. For example, some ISPs route P2P traffic through slower paths, which can introduce variability.
ryandotsmith
Does anyone have an idea of how this is built? I wonder if they are using QUIC with relay servers or something like Tailscale's DERP.
iamcalledrob
It's something closer to Tailscale DERP.
We evaluated QUIC (and many other approaches). Turns out it's a lot harder than you might think to move traffic at high speed across the world, over residential-grade internet, and not drain your battery.
realsdx
If it's truly p2p, some relay would be there in case the client cannot be reached through NAT. Not sure how they would bear the cost of the bandwidth for unlimited transfers in that case
wongarsu
Traffic is pretty cheap outside the big clouds. For example Hetzner charges $1/TB on a 10Gbit connection
throwawayffffas
Their 1Gbit connections are unmetered.
2color
I wouldn't be surprised if it's built with Iroh
satvikpendem
I wonder what tech stack they're using, given it supports all the major platforms. I like sendme [0] which uses iroh, a peer-to-peer library as well.
poisonborz
Free open source alternative: https://pairdrop.net
dhruvmittal
Magic Wormhole [1] also exists.
ori_b
And for a web native version, there's also WebWormhole: https://webwormhole.com/
rickydroll
Syncthing [1] also exists
jjcob
Syncthing is for syncing folders like Dropbox
It's not a good solution to send individual large files.
jszymborski
Is there something like a Magic Wormhole server, so I can e.g host a file on my NAS (behind a NAT) for download long term?
ch71r22
also Keet: https://keet.io/
evantbyrne
There's also LocalSend, which I've found works the best for me personally and is a bit more polished than browser clients
drexlspivey
I vibe coded this in one hour to send files to my work laptop. Static page + webRTC + short lived cloudflare durable object to make the handshake.
jjcob
There's also croc: https://github.com/schollz/croc
snvzz
croc has the advantage of being well-established by now. Most package systems have it.
seemaze
..also FilePizza as a web service: https://github.com/kern/filepizza
or tailscale's Taildrop as a native application: https://tailscale.com/kb/1106/taildrop
ishanjain28
Are you people seriously suggesting webrtc crap in response to a native app built for much much high speed transfers? Unbelievable
koreanguy
[dead]
rahimnathwani
This looks awesome. For sending files between my phone (Android) and my son's iPad, I use:
Android: Wormhole William (https://github.com/psanford/wormhole-william-mobile)
iOS: Destiny (https://github.com/LeastAuthority/destiny)
Some drawbacks to my current approach:
1. Destiny needs to be configured to use the standard Magic Wormhole servers (just once, after installation): https://github.com/LeastAuthority/destiny/issues/259#issueco...
2. Initiating a transfer requires out of band communication and some copy+paste.
miksak
I wonder how widely usable is file sharing nowadays when most of the non tech people just use cloud services for their data, be it google docs or some cloud photo storage
nrmitchi
Most non-tech people do not just use cloud services for their data.
Really not sure where you got that from, but even if it was true, most non-tech people will still shy away from putting a 250G file in a cloud service once they get prompted to upgrade their plan because they don't have enough space.
thehappypm
Cloud is kinda the default now. Most Americans just take pictures with their iPhones and it ends up in icloud.
throwawayffffas
That's different from getting a Dropbox account or manually uploading stuff to Google drive in order to share it with someone.
crazygringo
I dunno, seems like most do? Their stuff is in Google Photos, Google Docs, iCloud Drive, etc. And yes they pay for the space once their photos or phone backups get big enough.
And I don't know any non-tech people who have any 250GB files. The only people I know with those shoot 4K video professionally. Or scientists running truly massive simulations.
supportengineer
Non-tech people couldn't tell you what a "file" is.
ryandrake
I think non-tech people used to be able to, but tech companies have been on a 10+ year long crusade against the concept of a "file" and where that file is "stored" and trying to blur once-sharp lines so that people forget. Tech really wants you to think of your data as an amorphous blob vaguely "in their app" and not worry about crisp delineations like files, whose hard drive those files are on, and whose machine that hard drive is in.
packetlost
I'd be more inclined to use this if it were open source. Oh well.
leosanchez
Android app looks beautiful. Waiting for the Linux version.
greener_grass
Is this AirDrop but cross-platform?
FabHK
Addressed in the FAQ:
> How is Blip different to nearby sharing like AirDrop? Apple’s “AirDrop” and Google’s “Nearby Share” can be really handy. However, they aren’t compatible with each other and require devices to be physically next to each other. They are also unreliable when transferring large files, and will often lose your progress.
> Blip doesn’t need devices to be nearby, so it’s much more reliable. Blip works wherever your internet connected devices are in the world, and works regardless of what kind of device you own. You can transfer from Android to Mac, Windows to iPhone, iPad to Android—you name it!
kjksf
No.
AirDrop is for people who are physically nearby.
This allows to send files between any computers anywhere.
The other person must be a known contact but it doesn't have to be on the same local network like in AirDrop.
dewey
There’s a new AirDrop feature that also transfers over the internet: https://allthings.how/how-airdrop-over-internet-works-on-iph...
thejazzman
> To start AirDrop over the Internet, initiate the AirDrop as you normally would
...
this is hardly the same thing?
abcd_f
This is a minor OCD nitpick, but
> at super fast speeds
Fast speeds aren't a thing, just like cheap prices and wet waters aren't.
therealdrag0
I don’t follow. Speed and price can be many values, high or low. It’s perfectly valid to add an adjective describing it as fast or cheap.
abcd_f
Cheap means "low in price", so "cheap price" makes no sense.
Fast means "of a high speed", so it's the same here.
Tokumei-no-hito
nit-nit, what's wrong with cheap prices? price doesnt infer magnitude.
abcd_f
Cheap means "low in price". Price can't be "low in price", it can be just "low".
gnabgib
Cheap has many more meanings than that. It can mean comparatively inexpensive (a cheap Lamborghini), of inferior quality (cheap paperclip), miserly (he's too cheap to buy better), gained with little effort (cheap win).
readthenotes1
That's a quality nit pick for sure.
J/k
It's a high quality nit pick imo:)
manoji
Surprised syncthing isn't mentioned yet. It has been the most stable sync tool for me over the years https://syncthing.net/ . Solid product . Great oboarding experience for Blip! Its just working!
Hey! Blip co-founder here. We didn't expect to show up on HN, but really grateful to OP for sharing Blip. Here's a little bit more about it.
We've built Blip because it's still hard to send original quality photos, videos, and large files to your devices and to other people on the internet. We’re designers and engineers, so our goal has always been to keep the product super simple on the surface, but really fast and powerful underneath.
Blip works in a peer-to-peer way at the UI level: you pick the device or person, and Blip takes care of the delivery. Transfers go directly over WAN whenever possible, and fall back to relays when needed. The idea is to send in one click, skipping the usual dance of moving files through cloud drives and managing shared links.
Under the hood, Blip is optimized for large media and data transfers. It supports full-speed acceleration, resumable progress, and we're rolling out E2EE across all clients to ensure sensitive business data remains secure. Many creative pros and teams already use Blip in their daily media workflows.
We don’t monetize data because it doesn't align with the values of our creative and technical users. Instead, we run on a simple donation and subscription model that lets you support the product and use it without limits, quotas, and frustrations. Our goal is to make file transfer feel invisible.
Happy to answer any questions.