Free Online Image OptimizerWhat is my device?
Checking…
If this does not fill in, your browser is blocking the script that identifies it.
What about the phones around you?
Hold up a square code and every phone that scans it appears by make and model, one after another, with nothing to press on either screen.
Why this is harder than it looks
Most pages that answer “what is my device” read the short description your browser sends with every request and read it back to you. That gets you as far as “Android, Chrome” — which you knew — and stops, because the description genuinely does not contain the rest.
Two things make it worse than it used to be. Every iPhone sends an
identical description, so the model is simply not in there. And since 2023
Chrome has reported the same frozen Android 10 on every Android
phone on earth, on purpose, to make people harder to track.
So the name above is not read off that description. It is matched against a catalogue of real hardware, and then narrowed down in your browser — which is how an iPhone, an iPad or a current Android gets named properly rather than generically.
It works on things that are not phones
Smart TVs, streaming sticks, set-top boxes, games consoles and car dashboards all fetch pages, and most pages that would tell you about them assume a desktop browser with JavaScript. A television that cannot run a modern script still gets a complete answer here, because the answer is already in the page before it is sent.
Questions
How can a website know what phone I have?
Your browser sends a short description of itself with every request. On its own it says very little. The actual model is recovered by matching that description, and what the browser can be asked afterwards, against a catalogue of real hardware.
Why does my browser say Android 10 when I have a newer phone?
Chrome freezes the version it reports at 10, and the model at
K, on every Android device. It is deliberate, it is not a fault
in your phone, and you cannot switch it off from the handset. The real model
is still available to a page that asks for it properly, which is what this
one does.
Does this work on a smart TV or a set-top box?
Yes. A TV browser, a streaming stick, a games console or anything with JavaScript switched off still gets an answer, because the page is put together on the server before it is sent.
How do I find the make and model of another phone?
Open What’s my friend’s device. A square code appears straight away; point the other phone's camera at it, and its make and model appear on your screen. There is nothing to press on either phone, and the code stays up and goes on working, so you can do several phones one after another. Nothing is installed on either phone, and it works between an iPhone and an Android in either direction.
Is any of this stored?
Your own device is not. The answer is worked out while the page is being built and nothing about it is written down.
Checking another phone is the one exception, because the two screens have to have somewhere to meet. While a code is open, the make, model, operating system and browser that phone reports are held on the server for up to ten minutes, then dropped. Nothing else travels with it, a code works once, and nothing is written to disk. There is no account and nothing to sign up for.