Best Thunderbolt docks 2023: Extend your laptop’s capabilities – The TechLead

The short answer: Look at the laptop’s published specifications to be sure. A Thunderbolt port may look indistinguishable from a USB-C port, since they both use the same physical USB-C connection. Put another way, all Thunderbolt ports are USB-C, but not all USB-C ports are Thunderbolt-equipped.

Thunderbolt ports are supposed to have a small lightning-bolt icon to identify them. But some laptop makers use a similar lightning-bolt icon to indicate that a USB-C port can be used for charging your phone, and not for Thunderbolt. Laptop makers sometimes don’t want to clutter the clean lines of their products by adding additional logos, it seems. Fortunately, most laptops now choose to highlight their Thunderbolt capabilities, so the ports should be well-marked.

You may also see USB-C hubs marketed as “Thunderbolt compatible.” That’s true. You can plug a Thunderbolt dock into a non-Thunderbolt, generic USB-C port. But it will be limited by the available bandwidth that the port provides, so it’s somewhat deceptive in that regard. 

A 10Gbps USB-C dongle won’t replace a 40Gbps Thunderbolt dock, as there’s circuitry within the dock that allows it to work with your laptop’s high-speed Thunderbolt port. However, there’s nothing saying that you can’t connect the dongle to an available USB-C port on the Thunderbolt dock itself to add even more ports. If your laptop has two Thunderbolt ports, you can also attach a Thunderbolt dock to one port, and the dongle to the other.

That solution will add more clutter to your desk, but it might allow you to buy a cheaper, budget dock, too. It’s up to you!

Put simply, 40Gbps.

Most USB-C ports are built on the second-generation USB 3.1 data-transfer standard, which transfers data at 10Gbps. Thunderbolt 3 and 4 ports, the most common standard, transfer data at up to 40Gbps. Thunderbolt 4 differs very slightly in that it supports a theoretical maximum of 32Gbps for external storage devices, but you probably won’t notice the difference.

Intel is expected to unveil an 80Gbps version of Thunderbolt this year, called Thunderbolt 5, meaning that you’ll see even Thunderbolt docks with even more capabilities when devices release in 2024.

There are some exceptions, which you can largely ignore. A new USB 3.2 Gen 2×2 spec can pair two 10Gbps channels together, creating an aggregate 20Gbps hub. (This is really only for external gaming-class SSDs.) And while the vast majority of Thunderbolt 3-equipped laptops are designed with four PCIe lanes for a total of 40Gbps, some laptops only ship with two PCIe lanes for a total of 20Gbps. (A Dell support page, for example, details its four-lane and two-lane laptops.) Essentially, a 20Gbps connection should be enough for a single 4K monitor running at 60Hz, with a bit of extra bandwidth for other data transfers among connected peripherals.)

Intel’s 10th-gen and 11th-gen Core chips launched in the early days of Thunderbolt, and company representatives say that you can depend on them for 32Gbps of data, not a full 40Gbps. Intel’s 12th-gen and 13th-gen Core chips offer the most consistent Thunderbolt experience, with 40Mbps Thunderbolt 4 speeds, including 32Gbps for data transfers to and from storage devices.

The short answer: Not that much! Thunderbolt 3 and 4 are functionally equivalent, transferring data at 40Gbps.

Thunderbolt 5 is the 80Gbps version, but it will be backwards compatible with both Thunderbolt 3 and 4. You won’t see it until 2024, however. (If you own a laptop with a Thunderbolt 4 port, you’ll be able to use with a Thunderbolt 5 dock, Intel says. The only wrinkle is that a Thunderbolt 4 laptops will only pass data at its rated speed of 40Gbps.)

For the sake of completeness, we’re going to detail some of the differences below. But if you’re new to this, let us reiterate: Thunderbolt 3 and 4 are basically the same, and Thunderbolt 5 won’t be an issue until 2024. Don’t sweat the details.

Think of Thunderbolt 4 as the more restrictive version of Thunderbolt 3, with less room for any gotchas.

Essentially, Thunderbolt 3 and Thunderbolt 4 allow up to 40Gbps maximum bandwidth, enough for two 4K/60 displays. “Up to” is the key phrase: Thunderbolt 3 is only required to support a 10Gbps connection, allowing for a single external 4K display (a 16Gbps PCIe connection, paired with USB 3.2). Most manufacturers go beyond this, however, and our recommended docks support the full 40Gbps specification (and two 4K displays) unless noted. Thunderbolt 3 also supports a slower (16Gbps) PCIe connection for connecting to external storage.

Thunderbolt 3 is also the only specification (not Thunderbolt 4) that we’ve seen connecting to external GPUs, in case you’d like to try that approach.

Thunderbolt 4 doesn’t allow for any leeway—you’re getting a full-fledged 40Gbps connection (32Gbps PCIe + USB 3.2), no questions asked. For external storage, Thunderbolt 4 supports 32Gbps of data transfer—this really only matters for video, external GPU connections, or possibly games. Thunderbolt 4 supports “wake on sleep” from an external keyboard or mouse, which allows you to tap your external keyboard or wiggle your mouse to wake up your PC, which is handy. Thunderbolt 4 allows for longer cables and more Thunderbolt ports on laptops, too.

Device maker Anker has a nice summary of all of the technical features associated with Thunderbolt 3, Thunderbolt 4, and USB4, if you really want to get into the fine distinctions (below). What’s USB4? We address that in the next question.

Probably. USB4 ports typically appear on laptops with AMD Ryzen processors inside. USB4 and Thunderbolt 4 are compatible and functionally equivalent. (Though Thunderbolt is an open standard, Intel declines to certify non-Intel hardware. That means that Ryzen laptops end up with USB4 ports, and Intel Core laptops include Thunderbolt.)

USB4 is essentially a subset of Thunderbolt 4, mainly designed as an an I/O specification.

As a subset of Thunderbolt 4, a USB4 device will run just fine plugged into a Thunderbolt 4 port. But dock makers tell us that a Thunderbolt 4 device may not work as expected when plugged into what is specifically a USB4 port. Instead, most hubs and docks are marketed as Thunderbolt 4, while most devices (like an external SSD) are designed around USB4. (We test Thunderbolt docks on Thunderbolt laptops.) There are USB4 docks, however, which you’ll find in our list of best picks, which we’ve also tested.

USB4 Version 2 is an upcoming standard that will propel USB4 to 80Gbps, just like Thunderbolt 5. The first products will debut (at a guess) in early 2024, but the USB-IO hasn’t given us an exact timeline or the capabilities of USB4V2 docks.

Note that Thunderbolt 3 and 4 require at least 15W to power devices plugged into the Thunderbolt port, such as a bus-powered hard drive. USB4 requires just half that.

Thunderbolt 5 will debut in 2024, both in laptops as well as docks and devices. The spec pushes I/O bandwidth from 40Gbps in Thunderbolt 4 to 80Gbps in Thunderbolt 5, and even to 120Gbps in some cases. Another good way to think of Thunderbolt 5 is in the context of what it can do. Thunderbolt 4 allows enough bandwidth for two 4K displays, running at 60Hz. Thunderbolt 5 will offer enough bandwidth to connect to three 4K displays, at 144Hz apiece. That helps make Thunderbolt 5 a gaming-class technology, rather than just for office work.

Thunderbolt 5 will also allow for 64Gbps of dedicated bandwidth for storage and external GPUs, double the 32Gbps on Thunderbolt 4.

Finally, there’s power. Thunderbolt 5 will provide up to 240W (140W required) of charging power for your laptop. Most laptops require 65W to 90W today, but gaming laptops require more. All this means is that a Thunderbolt 5 dock will potentially eliminate the need to carry a gaming laptop’s charger around. (It won’t be in all cases, but some.)

Virtually every Thunderbolt dock will ship with its own cable. We’d recommend that you use Thunderbolt 3 cables with Thunderbolt 3 products, and Thunderbolt 4 cables with Thunderbolt 4 products. Ditto for Thunderbolt 5, when it ships in 2024.

A DisplayLink USB-C docking station is a new category of docking station. They’re often marketed just as a USB-C docking station, unfortunately, though the DisplayLink logo features prominently on the box. The key here is that the DisplayLink technology (now owned by Synaptics) uses data compression between your PC and the dock to approximate a Thunderbolt experience (a pair of 4K displays at 60Hz, plus additional peripherals) across the narrower, slower USB-C bus. You’ll need to install a software driver for your PC to communicate with the DisplayLink chip built into the dock.

The advantage here is twofold. First, DisplayLink allows you to “cheat” and get a Thunderbolt dock experience on an older laptop. Alternatively, even if you do own a laptop with a Thunderbolt port, you may be able to find a DisplayLink USB-C dock for a cheaper price than Thunderbolt. This is a viable solution, especially if you don’t mind not playing PC games.

Our separate story on DisplayLink docks has more.

We’re starting to see some USB-C docking stations take advantage of another technology: HBR3 (High Bit Rate 3) with DSC (Display Stream Compression). Think of it as the industry-standard, manufacturer-agnostic version of DisplayLink. It works over the USB-C port, and again provides a dual 4K60 display experience.

The problem? It’s wonky. We’ve found that support for the technology was very iffy in 11th-gen hardware, and really seems to work consistently in 12th-gen or 13th-gen Core laptops (and above, when they ship). While we can’t really recommend it right now, we’re keeping an eye on it.

Yes, you can. Certain manufacturers (Razer is one, though there are others) have built enclosures that can house a standard desktop graphics card, connected to your laptop via a Thunderbolt. Although a mobile gaming laptop with an external GPU does a good job enabling mobile gaming, a desktop GPU does even better. Thunderbolt simply connects the two. How can you hook up an external GPU to your laptop via Thunderbolt? Our story has more.

According to a representative for Razer, the differences between Thunderbolt 3 and Thunderbolt 4 were too small. “When we release any product, we only do so when there can be a material advantage over the previous generation,” we were told.

Since Thunderbolt 4 was backwards compatible and functionally equivalent to Thunderbolt 3, Razer simply declined to invest in the production and testing of a Thunderbolt 4 eGPU. We presume other manufacturers followed suit.