Pushbullet is a service that lets you share content between your computers and mobile devices. Want to see your smartphone notifications on your desktop? Pushbullet can do that. Want to copy a link or a line of text on your PC and paste it on your phone? Pushbullet can do that too.
It’s been about two years since Pushbullet launched, and the company’s apps have been free for all that time. The company’s gained a pretty loyal fan base… but a lot of people have been wondering how Pushbullet plans to make money.
Now we know: Pushbullet Pro is a new premium service that offers features that aren’t available to free users. Subscriptions run $4.99 per month or $39.99 per year.
The change means that some features which had previously been available for free will only be available to Pushbullet Pro users starting December 1st. And while some features continue to be available for both free and paid users, Pro subscribers have advantages in some cases.
For instance, Pushbullet free users can send files up to 25MB in size and get 2GB of online storage space. But Pro users get 100GB of storage space and can send files that are up to 1GB in size.
Pushbullet Pro also supports unlimited messaging, while free users can only send 100 messages per month using SMS, WhatsApp, or other messaging services.
Free users can still see smartphone notifications, take advantage of end-to-end encryption, and send links. But if you want universal copy and paste or support for responding to Android notifications from you desktop you’ll need to pay for a subscription.
Looking for a cheaper alternative? If you’re an Android users, AirDroid also offers free and paid apps and services for linking a phone and computer, including support for displaying notifications, transferring files, and more. But AirDroid Premium plans are about half the price (or less) of Pusbullet Pro.
Ugh. Come one Google and just get Hangouts on par with iMessage so I quit needing to use apps like Push Bullet to duplicate the feature set I’m after.