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What ports to use to connect to multiple displays from M1 MacBook Pro 16"?
- Thread starter hajime
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But then why M1 Pro can only support two displays? In this case, which ports can be used and which can't?
In pre-M1 Macbook Pros sometimes some ports had different capabilities than the others even they had the same name.
Because M1 Pro is literally half of an M1 Max, or close to it. At least in terms of number of GPU cores and possibly other ways too.
You should be able to connect up to 2 displays using any combination of the available ports.
The Thunderbolt/USB-C ports on the M1 Pro and M1 Max MacBook Pros are all identical in terms of capability. These ports can handle up to 6K, while the HDMI can only go up to 4K. You should also be able to run two monitors at 4K or less from one Thunderbolt port using a dock or hub.
For M1 Max, you can connect 4 to USB-C using a Thunderbolt dock or hub or adapter. Get two of those to free up the third Thunderbolt port.
I was able to run a Maximum of 4 x 49" monitors (5120 x 1440). Two that were each plugged into their own USB C port, and then the other two are plugged into a Caldigit Element dock via USB C. All I know is that this is seems like the maximum number of monitors the computer can run. When I tried to plug a lower resolution monitor into the HDMI port, I got nothing. I also bought a second Caldigit dock and tried to add the 5th monitor there, but no luck.