How to test an app created with Angular CLI ng serve from another device?

Question

I have an app generated with Angular CLI from scratch. CLI version angular-cli: 1.0.0-beta.11-webpack.2

I am trying to test it from my smartphone but I get

Answer 1

Adding the host-flag with value "0.0.0.0" should allow you to access the webserver from any device on your local network.

This should work: ng serve --host 0.0.0.0

For an explanation: https://github.com/angular/angular-cli/pull/1475#issuecomment-235986121

Answer 2

you have to find in node_modules angular cli folder all the occurences of localhost and replace (one in particular, depending of your angular-cli version) with 0.0.0.0.

then in package.json put ng serve --host 0.0.0.0

In my case the file is commands/serve.js

Answer 3

In package.json

 "start": "ng serve --host 0.0.0.0   --port 4200 --disable-host-check ",

However --disable-host-check would be a security risk and you will need "@angular/cli": "^1.1.0-rc.2" as this flag appeared in 1.1 version

Answer 4

Maybe this can be helpfull (a bit automated version of @Captain Whippet's answer):

dev-server.js:

const os = require('os');
const { spawn } = require('child_process');

function getLocalIp(ipMatchArr) {
  const networkInterfaces = os.networkInterfaces();
  let matchingIps = Object.keys(networkInterfaces).reduce((arr, name) => {
    const matchingInterface = networkInterfaces[name].find(iface =>
      iface.family === 'IPv4' && ipMatchArr.find(match => iface.address.indexOf(match) > -1));
      if (matchingInterface) arr.push(matchingInterface.address);
      return arr;
  }, []);

  if (matchingIps.length) {
    return matchingIps[0];
  }
  else {
    throw(`Error. Unable to find ip to use as public host: ipMatches=['${ipMatchArr.join("', '")}']`);
  }
}

function launchDevServer(address) {
  const port = process.env.port || 4200;
  const publicHostname = address + ":" + port;
  console.log(`[[[ Access your NG LIVE DEV server on \x1b[33m ${publicHostname} \x1b[0m ]]]`);
  spawn(
      "ng serve"
    , [
          "--host 0.0.0.0"
        , `--public ${publicHostname}`
      ]
    , { stdio: 'inherit', shell: true }
  );
}

/* execute */
launchDevServer(getLocalIp(['192.168.1.', '192.168.0.']));

package.json:

"scripts": {
    "start": "node dev-server.js"
  }

then run "npm start"

You can then open your app on any device on your local network via address printed in yellow.

@angular/cli: 1.3.2, node: 6.9.5

tested on Mac and Windows

Answer 5

Following the advice on this page: https://medium.com/webpack/webpack-dev-server-middleware-security-issues-1489d950874a, this worked for me:

ng serve --host 0.0.0.0 --host my-computer