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Other Laptop Docking Stations to Consider
We test a lot of laptop docking stations and, quite frankly, most of them are … fine. They’re fine! We get into the nitty-gritty for specific use cases to find the best, but that leaves a bunch of devices that are great options even if they don’t make our top picks. Here’s a selection of some of our favorites, past favorites, or just alternatives to our picks above.
Photograph: Luke Larsen
Baseus Spacemate Air 12-in-1 Mac Docking Station for $200: This is a really great budget option to the Plugable 5-Display USB-C dock above. While that one offers a faster and more full-featured way to get extra external displays, the Spacemate Air 12-in-1 gives you two 4K displays. That’s especially helpful if you own an older MacBook Air or just appreciate the ease of use of connecting all your peripherals, displays, and accessories over a single USB-C cable. But I don’t love the integrated cable; there are no card slots, and some of the USB ports aren’t very fast.
Belkin Connect Pro Thunderbolt 4 Dock for $300: This one is a bit expensive for a Thunderbolt 4 dock, but it gets you 12 ports, including support for up to two 4K displays at 60 Hz and 90 watts of power delivery to your laptop. Like the Spacemate Air, it also includes some slower USB-A ports, though.
Satechi Thunderbolt 4 Slim Pro Hub for $200: Sometimes, simpler is better. This docking station from Satechi is small, made of sturdy aluminum, and comes with just three Thunderbolt 4 ports on the rear, each of which is capable of up to 40 Gbps. Nothing else. This layout is surprisingly clean, with only a few cables coming out of the back, and one running to your laptop. If all you need is to connect to a couple of monitors or high-speed data storage and you like to keep your desk free of clutter, this is a great option. —Eric Ravenscraft
Satechi Triple 4K Docking Station for $300: Satechi’s Triple 4K Docking Station supports three monitors, and while the first display output is HDMI-only, the two others can be connected via either HDMI or DisplayPort. Each display supports up to 4K resolution at 60 Hz, which is more than enough for most office or media work, though don’t expect it to support the high frame rates you might want for gaming. —Eric Ravenscraft
Kensington Triple Video Mobile Dock for $90: A mobile docking station might sound like a contradiction, but in the case of the tiny Kensington Triple Video Mobile Dock, it makes a lot of sense. Using the included two HDMI ports and the DisplayPort, this little device can power three 1080p displays or two 4K displays—all at 60 Hz. It also has a USB-C port with 85 watts of pass-through charging, which is enough to charge most laptops. The downside is that it only supports a single 4K monitor on MacBooks, as the dual 4K support is only for Windows devices.
Satechi Dual Docking Station and Stand for $170: It’s tough for laptop docking stations to stand out—most of them are simple boxes that add extra ports to your laptop—but Satechi’s Dual Docking Station and Stand breaks the mold. It sits neatly under your laptop and elevates it slightly, putting it at an angle that has better ergonomics. A collection of three USB ports and three monitor output ports on the rear are conveniently placed so your desktop setup can stay connected while cables are tucked out of the way. A hardware switch on the back lets you turn the dock on or off. There’s also a small strip of rubber on top and a built-in NVMe solid-state drive. While no SSD is included, you can plug in your own (something like this will work) to give your dock storage to offload files from your laptop.—Eric Ravenscraft
Sonnet Echo 13 Thunderbolt 5 Dock for $460: Sonnettech’s Echo 13 was one of the first Thunderbolt 5 docks out on the market. As it turns out, it’s also one of the most unique offerings out there, including just about every port imaginable as well as an integrated M.2 storage slot with a Kingston SSD inside. While handy, I don’t like that the drive isn’t user accessible. The cheap plastic chassis is disappointing for the price, too.
Ivanky FusionDock Max 1 Thunderbolt 4 Docking Station for $330: It’s hard to overstate how excessively luxurious this dock is. It’s specifically for MacBook Pro users and can tackle up to four 6K screens, something only recent MacBook Pros support. The Ivanky FusionDock Max 1 accomplishes this via four USB-C Thunderbolt 4 ports, each capable of 40 Gbps data transfer speeds. If you’re building the beefiest media workstation you can for the most powerful MacBook Pros on the market, this is it. Just put it on the company card, because it’s expensive. —Eric Ravenscraft
Ugreen Revodok Max 213 Thunderbolt 4 for $300: Few people need an 8K display—or multiple 4K displays—but those who do know how difficult it can be to find gear that supports one. Fortunately, the Revodok Max 213 from Ugreen fits that bill. The DisplayPort 1.4 port can handle up to an 8K display at 30 Hz. It also comes with a Thunderbolt 4 upstream port that runs to your laptop, and, more importantly, a pair of downstream Thunderbolt 4 ports, which is another rarity among the docks I’ve tested. If you need to transfer a ton of media from various sources into one machine, connected to seriously high-res displays, this is the dock that can handle it all. —Eric Ravenscraft
Do You Need a Docking Station or a USB Hub?
This is the big question you’ll want to answer before moving forward. Chances are you know if you need a full-on docking station rather than just a USB hub, but I’ll explain the differences in case you’re on the fence. A simple USB hub will handle most people’s needs, as it will expand the potentially very limited ports of your laptop. If you own a MacBook Air, for example, a USB hub functions as a multiport adapter to get you HDMI, USB-A, and more. They’re intended to be portable, and many of these hubs even include HDMI to connect an external display.
A laptop docking station will do quite a lot more. These devices are meant to be stationary on a desk, enabling you to access your entire workstation setup with just a single USB-C cable. The docking station is meant to stay put and have all your monitors and accessories plugged into it. Because of that, they require significantly more power and are often bundled with a large power brick. They are often quite expensive. So, while both accessories connect your laptop to more ports, they serve two different functions.
There are now lots of docks and hubs that blur the lines, offering multi-monitor support in a very small package. These can be useful, but a full docking station will still give you the fastest transfer speeds, the most ports, and better external display support all through a single cable.
What Ports Should Your Docking Station Have?
Figuring out the right connections you need for your setup can be daunting, and the confusing, arcane USB terminology only makes it worse. You can check out our explainer on parsing USB terms here. For the short version, here are the basics you should keep in mind:
Check your ports’ speeds, and don’t rely on version numbers. For a lot of confusing reasons, ports labeled as USB 3.0, 3.1, and 3.2 can all have the same speed or wildly different speeds. For this reason, docking station manufacturers have recently started opting to add speeds (usually written like “5 Gbps”) directly onto individual ports. Use the faster ports for transferring data, and slower ports for things like your keyboard and mouse.
Thunderbolt is best for lightning-fast data transfers or high-res displays. Thunderbolt is like a supercharged version of USB, and it even uses USB-C ports. However, Thunderbolt ports are also capable of transferring massive amounts of data. This makes it ideal for tasks like moving uncompressed video files around, as well as 4K (or even 8K) displays or lower-resolution monitors with extra high refresh rates.
Keep in mind your power needs. Most laptop docking stations will have some form of power connector and USB Power Delivery (or USB-PD) that can send power through to your laptop. You’ll also sometimes see this referred to as “pass-through charging.” Most devices you connect will require their own power as well, especially if you want to connect monitors or charge your phone and tablet. If you plan to connect a lot of power-hungry devices, make sure your docking station can handle your needs.
Upstream and downstream ports. You’ll often see USB ports labeled either as upstream or downstream. The data either flows up to the source (your PC or docking station) or down from the source. An upstream USB port means it’s meant for transferring data from a peripheral (like an external drive) to your PC, whereas a downstream USB port only works in the opposite direction.
All the docks in our recommendations are compatible with both Mac and Windows, unless otherwise noted. But there are lots of hubs and docks out there that have certain limitations on Mac, such as only supporting mirroring mode in dual monitors. That’s not a problem on Windows.
On lower-end Macs, there is a limitation on the number of screens. There is a way around this if you use a dock that supports DisplayLink. This software can create a “virtual GPU” that tricks the system into allowing for additional displays so you can drive more displays than are typically allowed on a MacBook Air, for example. In my experience, however, the performance can be shoddy, and you may run into issues with latency.
Is Thunderbolt 5 Worth It?
The first Thunderbolt 5-capable PCs, docks, and accessories came out in 2024. Thunderbolt 5 can now handle three 4K displays at 144 Hz (or two 4K displays at 240 Hz) and can deliver up to 240 watts of power. That’s dramatic, up from the 100 watts of Thunderbolt 4. Thunderbolt 5 allows you to fully juice up more powerful devices, such as gaming laptops or the 16-inch M4 Max MacBook Pro.
Thunderbolt 5 docks are all backward compatible, so there’s no worry about outdoing the peripherals you currently own. As is true in many scenarios, buying the latest specs is often worth it to avoid having to upgrade later. However, the adoption of Thunderbolt 5 has been slower than I’d hoped. And if you don’t have a Thunderbolt 5 laptop to connect to, you won’t get the full benefit that Thunderbolt 5 offers.
While there’s a breadth of Thunderbolt 5 docks out in the world (many of which you’ll see on this list), the biggest disappointment has been in the lack of Thunderbolt 5 accessories. It’s still very difficult, for example, to find a Thunderbolt 5 SSD to achieve those faster speeds. Thunderbolt 5 docks are sometimes only marginally more expensive than previous-generation options, so they’re often worth buying for the improved display support or higher power delivery. For example, CalDigit’s TS5 is only $20 more than the TS4.
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