What are the differences between the desktop and mobile app versions of LinkedIn? A recent question during an Espresso+ community Live Q&A call prompted me to look at this.
Introduction.
You’d think that a large, well-established platform like LinkedIn (which has been around since 2003) would have the same features regardless of whether you’re on desktop or mobile, but that’s not the case.
LinkedIn has historically used separate engineering teams for building the desktop and mobile versions of the platform, so it’s no surprise that there are differences.
And to be fair, even if a sole, tireless person were miraculously responsible for the entire LinkedIn user experience, you wouldn’t necessarily expect feature parity everywhere, because some things are better suited to a larger screen size and hence make little sense to attempt on mobile.
(That’s about as far as I can go in being a LinkedIn apologist.)
I asked the other LinkedIn specialists in the Espresso+ community to share their observations on the differences between the desktop and mobile versions of LinkedIn. I believe our community might have the greatest concentration of independent LinkedIn trainers and specialists anywhere online, so if that interests you then you might want to be part of the action: join Espresso+.
I’ve linked to each person’s LinkedIn profile in case you want to check them out.
Feature differences between LinkedIn desktop and LinkedIn mobile.
John Espirian: The LinkedIn mobile app doesn’t let you edit articles and newsletters. The workaround if you’re stuck on your phone is to use your mobile browser (Safari/Chrome) to navigate direct to linkedin.com and then edit via there. Won’t be much fun but it ought to work.
John Espirian: The LinkedIn mobile app lets you record a 10-second audio pronunciation on your profile. You can’t record this via desktop, but you can play back existing recordings on desktop or mobile.
John Espirian: The LinkedIn mobile app lets you record 1-minute voice notes in direct messages. There’s no official route to do this via desktop, but you can play back recordings.
John Espirian: The LinkedIn mobile app lets you natively record and send 2-minute videos in direct messages. You can’t record a video to send via DMs on desktop, but you can upload existing MP4 videos via desktop DMs so long as the file size in under 20MB.
John Espirian: Your recommendation “magic link” won’t go to the right screen on mobile. Instead, you’re just taken to the person’s main profile. On desktop, the link would take you straight to the popup screen for writing a recommendation. It’s best, therefore, to share a link that looks like this, which will work on desktop and mobile:
linkedin.com/in/johnespirian/details/recommendations/
(Change the username to your own, and remember that only 1st-level connections can recommend you on LinkedIn.)
John Espirian: You can customise your LinkedIn profile username (e.g. /in/johnespirian/) only via desktop.
John Espirian: You cannot translate longform article/newsletter content into other languages on mobile, because the Immersive Reader that contains the translation feature is shown only on desktop when reading articles and newsletters.
Sarah Burgess: You can edit the featured link in the top card of a profile via the LinkedIn mobile app but not via the desktop. (John’s note: this feature is being deprecated, so attempting to edit the link might mean you lose it altogether.)
Mary Wu: In the US, profile verification through CLEAR can be done only via mobile. (John’s note: I believe that all personal profile verification routes lead back to a mobile device. This was true from day 1 of verification in the UK in 2023, via Persona. However, there are other ways of verifying that don’t require a mobile device, e.g. via a company page.)
Beth Granger: There’s no link on the left navigation pulldown on mobile to Events listing like there is on desktop.
Gillian Whitney: Mobile video: I don’t see a way to upload a thumbnail graphic (which I CAN do on desktop). And, I don’t see a way to upload a SRT file for closed captions (which I CAN do on desktop). So it seems there are only two captioning options on mobile. LinkedIn’s autogenerated captions OR uploading your video file with Open Captions (already burned into your video).
Gillian Whitney: Can’t do a “Save to PDF” of someone’s LinkedIn profile on mobile as we can on desktop.
Gillian Whitney: LinkedIn Live: Can’t edit/trim a past live event via mobile. And, can’t access the new “Manage Live” dashboard for livestream hosts (that we see on desktop).
Gillian Whitney: When you schedule a LinkedIn Live Event, when you view it on desktop, the event doesn’t show up as a “post” on your profile, but it does show up as a post when you click “Show all posts” and scroll through them. When you view the it on mobile the event DOES show up as a post.
Gillian Whitney: With videos, it’s a one-step process to view someone’s post from the Video tab (click the post’s first line below video). On mobile, it’s a two-step process (click the post’s first line below video AND then on the video you have to tap the post text again at the bottom of the video).
Gillian Whitney: With images, it’s a similar one-step (desktop) vs two-step (mobile) process.
Gillian Whitney: From a member’s profile “Contact info” is on the top card (beside location) on desktop. On mobile you have to tap the “more button” (… 3 dots) and then select “Contact info”.
Gillian Whitney: With articles and newsletters, the “Immersive Reader” option is available only on desktop.
Gillian Whitney: In LinkedIn DMs, there’s a tab/pill for “Drafts” on mobile, which isn’t there on desktop.
Graham D Rae: Social Selling Index (SSI) isn’t available on mobile. (John’s note: There is speculation that SSI will be removed altogether for free accounts, but I’ll believe it when I see it.)
Kevin D Turner: Profile QR codes are available only via the mobile app. (Tap into the Search field to get yours.)
Mic Adam: You can’t create or view other profile languages on the LinkedIn mobile app. Only your main language is shown when viewing your profile.
If you spot any other differences between the desktop and mobile versions of LinkedIn, please drop me a line on LinkedIn and I’ll add it to the list.
