Working Offline in Overleaf

Overleaf v2 provides great new ways of working offline as well as online.

Dropbox

Overleaf v2 introduces an automatic two-way sync between Overleaf and Dropbox. Any changes to your project in Overleaf will automatically sync to your Dropbox folder on your computer, and any changes you make locally in Dropbox will appear in your project online.

From listening to user feedback, we understand how important it is to be able to seamlessly transition between working offline in your favourite editor to working online on Overleaf with your collaborators. Overleaf v1 only supported a one-way sync to Dropbox, where you could manually save your project to Dropbox with one click. This wasn't enough to take your work offline and then back online easily, and had a number of other limitations. With the much improved Dropbox sync in Overleaf v2 you should be able to work on your projects whenever you want, wherever you are, however you like.

Git and GitHub

Overleaf v1 currently offers direct git access to projects, so you can git clone, git push, and git pull your project on Overleaf just like you would any git repository.

Overleaf v2 currently offers direct sync to GitHub. While it is possible to sync an Overleaf v1 project with GitHub, it requires setting up git remotes and manually keeping them in sync. We found that most people used Overleaf v1’s git support in conjunction with another git hosting service, most frequently GitHub, so we believe this will be an improvement for many users.

A git integration for Overleaf v2 is also now in beta. The integration lets you git clone, push and pull changes between the online Overleaf v2 editor, and your local offline git repository. You can find out more details of how to try out this git integration beta in this blog post.

In order to use the GitHub sync in v2, users will need to have a GitHub account. Students and academics can benefit from free accounts on GitHub, which will allow you to use private git repositories:

• Students can take advantage of the GitHub Education Pack,
• Academics can apply for discounted or free accounts.

Finally, the git integration in Overleaf v1 was a free feature during its long beta period, and we will continue to offer it for free to all users with Overleaf v1 accounts. For users who sign up after Overleaf v2 is out of beta, GitHub sync and direct git access will be available on our paid plans, like on ShareLaTeX. As with many other v2 features, this means that the owner of the project will need a paid subscription in order to connect their project with GitHub or enable direct git access, but their collaborators can use the integration with free accounts.