7 Best Remote Desktop Software Tools IT Teams Should Consider

Few functions in a modern organization stretch across more operating systems, device types, and user environments than IT teams do. Morning: a help desk tech troubleshooting a Windows laptop, then remoting into a Linux server in the afternoon while assisting Mac users across the building. Diversity that the remote desktop tool an IT team standardizes on will need to manage, capturing it all without forcing technicians to use multiple platforms or risk security and reliability coverage.

This guide explores seven tools, each deserving consideration, with an eye to how well they handle the diversity of environments IT teams encounter in real life.

Splashtop

Splashtop’s cross-platform reach is one of its strongest assets for IT teams managing varied environments. The platform supports Windows, Mac, Linux, iOS, and Android, meaning a single tool can cover nearly every device an IT team is likely to encounter without requiring separate software for different operating systems. For organizations evaluating remote desktop software for IT teams, the breadth of platform support reduces the operational overhead of maintaining multiple remote access tools for different parts of the environment.

Splashtop goes beyond platform coverage by providing IT teams with the administrative granularity they require: role-based access controls, session recording, multi-factor authentication and management of devices and permissions. Given that high-bandwidth streaming performs well whether the remote computer is an ever-powerful server supporting resource-heavy applications, this matters if your IT teams are supporting engineering/design or data team work in addition to standard office users.

ConnectWise ScreenConnect

Particularly popular in IT support contexts involving technicians who need to manage multiple simultaneous support sessions across Windows, macOS, Linux and Android devices. Its licensing model for concurrent sessions is ideal in environments where multiple technicians may be supporting various end users simultaneously and where per-seat costs cannot grow indefinitely.

ScreenConnect offers useful white-label options and several PSA integration options for IT teams managing their own help desk operations, but how much value your organization would get from those features depends on whether you’re already using compatible ticketing and asset management tools. Even without those deeper integration benefits, however, teams lacking that existing infrastructure will still find the core remote support functionality nice and solid.

NinjaOne Remote

NinjaOne Remote is well integrated with the RMM platform, and we’ve found it a good fit for IT teams who are already using NinjaOne for endpoint tracking and management. You can initiate sessions straight from the console used to monitor and ticket on devices, meaning rather than using one tool for monitoring and another for remote access, technicians have a single workflow to follow.

Diagnostic tooling that expands system information during live sessions to accelerate issue identification enhances the platform, along with support for Windows and macOS. While the remote access part alone is a less convincing reason to use NinjaOne over broader endpoint management platforms for IT groups not already reliant on it, these capabilities still work as standalone tools.

A foundational piece of knowledge for any IT team supporting varied environments is understanding operating system fundamentals, particularly how resource management, process scheduling, and file systems differ across Windows, macOS, and Linux. That grounding helps technicians diagnose issues more effectively, regardless of which remote desktop tool they are using to access a given system.

Atera

Atera takes a different approach from the dedicated remote access tools on this list, combining RMM and remote support in one subscription so IT teams get monitoring, patch management, and remote sessions from a single console instead of licensing separate point solutions. Because pricing scales with technician count rather than device count, the platform can work out favorably for teams managing large device fleets with a lean technical staff.

The tradeoff for IT teams looking strictly for a dedicated, best-of-breed remote desktop tool is that Atera’s remote session capabilities are somewhat less deep than platforms built around remote access as their singular focus, since the broader RMM feature set is the primary draw.

RemotePC

RemotePC provides IT teams with a relatively inexpensive solution that delivers decent base capabilities such as remote printing, file transfer, always-on access and cross-platform support for Windows, macOS, Linux and mobile devices. Pricing is based on device counts rather than per technician rates, which can benefit IT teams managing many endpoints with a small number of technicians.

Having less mature administrative and reporting capabilities a priority for larger, IT-team running complex, multi-tiered support operations compared to the more straightforward needs of smaller teams matters here. Even if your team is small enough, RemotePC’s blend of features and attractive pricing make it a contender for consideration.

Many of the operational pressures driving remote desktop tool selection mirror broader shifts happening across IT support more generally. Industry analysis of the modern IT service desk describes a transition away from traditional, manually escalated support models toward more automated, data-driven operations. IT teams selecting remote access tools should consider how well a given platform integrates with this broader direction, including whether it supports the kind of automation and centralized visibility that modern service desk operations increasingly require.

AnyViewer

Available in Free and paid tiers, AnyViewer offers core remote-control functionality, making it an easy fit for smaller IT teams or those just getting off the ground with a remote support practice. With core remote-control and file-transfer functionality, it supports Windows and iOS at a bare-bones, entry-level for organizations that are still not ready to jump into a full feature set.

Of course, these limitations quickly become apparent for IT teams that support any enterprise-level platform diversity because AnyViewer does not extend to macOS or Linux. It may suffice for basic needs for teams with a Windows-only environment, but any team managing a cross-platform environment will require an end-to-end tool to cover their entire device fleet.

TsPlus

TsPlus fills a particular niche for certain IT teams of enabling remote access to legacy Windows apps without having to rebuild them. TsPlus A lower-cost alternative to pricier enterprise publishing platforms such as Citrix for IT teams supporting organizations with older, Windows-centric software that needs to be open up for remote access.

TsPlus is not a general-purpose remote desktop software alternative for IT groups that need to access their network more broadly than this specific application-publishing use case. Keep it in the toolkit, specifically for the use cases of legacy applications that it solves, with a more general purpose platform for everything else.

Frequently Asked Questions

How should an IT team decide between a general-purpose remote desktop tool and an RMM-integrated remote access feature?

The decision largely depends on whether the team already uses or plans to adopt a broader RMM or endpoint management platform. If so, the integrated remote access feature within that platform often reduces tool sprawl and keeps technician workflows consolidated. If the team does not use or want a full RMM platform, a dedicated, general-purpose remote desktop tool with strong cross-platform support and security features is usually the more practical choice.

Why does Linux support matter for IT teams even if most end users are on Windows or Mac?

Many IT teams manage server infrastructure, development environments, or specialized systems running Linux even when the majority of end-user devices are Windows or Mac. A remote desktop tool that lacks Linux support forces the IT team to maintain a separate solution for those systems, increasing complexity and the number of tools technicians need to learn and switch between during their daily work.

What security features should IT teams prioritize when evaluating remote desktop software?

Multi-factor authentication, end-to-end encryption, role-based access controls, and session logging or recording should be considered baseline requirements rather than premium features. IT teams should also evaluate how a platform handles credential management and whether it integrates with existing identity providers, since the remote desktop tool itself becomes part of the organization’s broader attack surface and needs to meet the same security standards as the rest of the IT environment.