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The Best Thunderbolt Docks

By Jason Cipriani and Nick Guy
Updated
Three Thunderbolt Docks, accompanying USB C cables, and an SD card.
Photo: Michael Hession

Laptops once had a plethora of ports to support all your most-used peripherals. But laptop makers have mostly done away with a wide variety of ports in favor of slimmer, multifunction Thunderbolt and USB-C connectors. If you need to plug in accessories with any sort of regularity, a Thunderbolt dock offers connectivity with various inputs and outputs over a single cable and also charges your computer. CalDigit’s TS3 Plus is the best among them, offering a healthy mixture of ports and excellent performance in a package that takes up little space on a desk.

Everything we recommend

Our pick

This dock has a myriad of useful ports, including USB-A, USB-C, and an SD card slot. It can charge a 15-inch MacBook Pro at full speed or a Surface Laptop Studio at close to that.

Buying Options

Budget pick

This Monoprice dock costs significantly less and has a more impressive array than other docks in its price range.

Buying Options

Upgrade pick

Equipped with 18 total ports, this Thunderbolt 4 dock allows you to connect whatever you want to your laptop, with plenty of connections left over.

Buying Options

$400 $370 from Amazon

You save $30 (8%)

Our pick

This dock has a myriad of useful ports, including USB-A, USB-C, and an SD card slot. It can charge a 15-inch MacBook Pro at full speed or a Surface Laptop Studio at close to that.

Buying Options

Ports and features

two Thunderbolt 3 (one pass-through)Gigabit Ethernet
one USB-C 3.2 Gen 1audio-in
one USB-C 3.2 Gen 2audio-out
five USB-A 3.2 Gen 1S/PDIF digital optical audio
one DisplayPort87-watt charging
one SD card reader

The CalDigit TS3 Plus has the best combination of ports, size, and shape that we’ve found, and it's more affordable than ever. It has 15 ports, including a second Thunderbolt port that allows you to hook up two 4K monitors at 60 Hz with ease. This is the only dock with an S/PDIF connector for those who want high-quality audio. Whereas most docks have a strictly horizontal orientation, taking up precious desk space, the TS3 Plus can also stand vertically, minimizing its footprint.

Budget pick

This Monoprice dock costs significantly less and has a more impressive array than other docks in its price range.

Buying Options

Ports and features

one Thunderbolt 3one audio-in/out
one USB-A 3.2 Gen 1two DisplayPort
two USB-A 3.2 Gen 2one SD card reader
one USB-C 3.2 Gen 2one microSD card reader
Gigabit Ethernet60-watt charging

Consider Monoprice’s Thunderbolt 3 Dual DisplayPort Docking Station if you don’t need a Thunderbolt pass-through port for connecting high-speed accessories such as an external Thunderbolt hard drive, and if you’re okay with fewer USB-A connectors and slightly slower charging than on our top pick. Although that may sound like a lot of sacrifices, the array of ports on this dock remains impressive, especially in comparison with similarly priced models; nothing else in the sub-$200 range matches it. And with its two DisplayPort connectors, you can run two 4K monitors at once.

Upgrade pick

Equipped with 18 total ports, this Thunderbolt 4 dock allows you to connect whatever you want to your laptop, with plenty of connections left over.

Buying Options

$400 $370 from Amazon

You save $30 (8%)

Ports and features

three Thunderbolt 4one audio-in
five USB-A 3.2 Gen 2one audio-out
three USB-C 3.2 Gen 2one audio-in/out
one DisplayPortone SD card reader
2.5 Gigabit Ethernetone microSD card reader
98-watt charging

Want to upgrade from an older dock or need something with more power and ports? The CalDigit TS4 has a total of 18 ports, including three Thunderbolt 4 ports, three USB-C ports, and five USB-A ports. Additionally, it supports 98-watt charging, more than enough power to charge even the biggest of standard laptops. Like the TS3 Plus, the TS4 can lie flat on your desk or stand vertically, so it has a smaller footprint than most docks.

Jason Cipriani has covered consumer technology for the past 15 years for a wide range of publications, reviewing and testing countless devices and gadgets during that time. He specializes in mobile, computing, and smart-home topics.

Nick Guy, the previous author of this guide, has covered mobile and computer accessories for more than a decade. During his tenure at Wirecutter, he reviewed more than 1,000 iOS and Mac products, including numerous docking stations.

A Thunderbolt dock is designed to expand the capabilities of your laptop by increasing the number of ports you have available at your desk. You can take advantage of a Thunderbolt dock to connect several peripherals to your computer—displays, drives, printers, and such—with one cable as long as your laptop has a single Thunderbolt port.

A reliable Thunderbolt dock transforms your laptop into a makeshift desktop computer when you’re at your desk, giving you access to multiple peripherals that you don’t have to plug and then unplug; just leave them plugged in when you’re away from your desk, and when you come back to your desk, you can simply plug your Thunderbolt cable into the laptop to connect everything instantly.

Thunderbolt docks are ideal for creative professionals and other people who need the fastest possible transfer speeds and the widest port selection. Most people, however, are just as well served by a much less expensive USB-C hub, which uses the same connector to do almost all the same things, at slower transfer speeds, and often with fewer ports.

There’s no getting around it: USB-C, USB4, and Thunderbolt standards and names are downright confusing. Adding to the confusion is the fact that the three ports look identical. But it’s important to know what each standard means for you in everyday use.

Although USB-C, Thunderbolt 3, USB4, and Thunderbolt 4 use the same type of connector, they aren’t the same thing. Each name effectively refers to a different connection standard, each with its own benefits. For the sake of this guide, we consider Thunderbolt 3 and Thunderbolt 4 to be interchangeable.

Thunderbolt is a more capable version of USB-C. It provides faster transfer rates (up to 40 Gbps, versus a maximum of 5 Gbps or 10 Gbps for USB-C depending on the device) and supports data transfers in both directions, so it’s useful for connecting a slew of devices, including a hard drive, through one cable; in addition, that cable can charge your laptop and output video at the same time as it handles data.

Thunderbolt is more complicated and thus more expensive for computer makers to include. You can find it mainly on recent Macs and higher-end Windows PCs such as our top ultrabook picks. For the sake of clarity, Thunderbolt 4 has the same max data-transfer rates as Thunderbolt 3, but it implements double the minimum requirements for video and data.

USB4 (sometimes stylized as USB 4) is now being advertised on Apple’s M-series Mac laptops, among others, and is functionally identical to Thunderbolt 3. Unlike Thunderbolt 3, a specification owned and controlled by Intel, USB4 (PDF) is a royalty-free standard established through the USB Implementers Forum, the industry group that oversees all things USB.

If your computer has USB-C but not Thunderbolt 3, the docks in this guide aren’t for you—check out our guide to USB-C hubs.

Two CalDigit Thunderbolt docks and one Monoprice dock situated next to each other.
Photo: Michael Hession

A great Thunderbolt dock extends the functionality of a computer by offering additional connections, each capable of the fastest data-transfer speeds, regardless if it’s a port-strapped laptop or a desktop computer. In evaluating our picks, we looked for the following features:

  • Port selection: In general, more ports are better, but we especially prefer useful ports such as USB-A and digital video output. Less expensive docks generally don’t have extra Thunderbolt ports, so you can’t connect additional Thunderbolt devices through such docks.
  • Port performance: Devices connected via the Thunderbolt dock should perform almost as well as devices connected directly to the computer.
  • Design and size: Everything else being equal, a smaller dock is better for your desk than a larger one.

Once niche, more Thunderbolt docks are gradually becoming available. For our 2024 testing, we used a 2023 15-inch M2 Apple MacBook Air and a Microsoft Surface Laptop Studio to test the docks’ performance and speeds. Specifically, we ran the following tests:

  • USB-A, USB-C, Thunderbolt 3 or 4: The “standard” USB-A port is still the most common input for peripherals—including external drives, wired keyboards, and more—and most Thunderbolt docks have several of them. USB-C ports are less common, as are extra Thunderbolt ports. To measure the read and write speeds, we ran AJA System Test speed tests using a 1 TB OWC Envoy Pro for the USB-A and USB-C ports and a 1 TB OWC Envy Pro FX for the Thunderbolt ports, and we recorded the results.
  • Video: Almost all Thunderbolt docks promise dual 4K monitor support at a full 60 Hz, assuming that your computer and monitors support it. Using the appropriate cable depending on each dock’s port selection, we connected our 15-inch MacBook Air and the Surface Laptop Studio to a pair of 4K monitors. We set each monitor to its maximum resolution and verified that both were performing at the proper refresh rate. (Apple’s M-series-based MacBooks support only one external display, even if you’re using a dock.)
  • Power output: We used the Power tab in macOS’s System Report to view the wattage of the dock, and then we compared the figure against what each company advertised.
  • Audio: We tested each dock’s audio inputs and outputs by plugging microphone-equipped headphones into each of the audio jacks, making sure the input or output source was properly set in macOS or Windows.
  • Ethernet: We verified each hub’s connection speed in Network Settings on the Mac and in System Settings on the Surface Laptop Studio.
  • SD card: We ran AJA System Test on an OWC Atlas Pro SD to measure the read and write speeds.
The CalDigit TS3 Plus Thunderbolt dock plugged in.
Photo: Michael Hession

Our pick

This dock has a myriad of useful ports, including USB-A, USB-C, and an SD card slot. It can charge a 15-inch MacBook Pro at full speed or a Surface Laptop Studio at close to that.

Buying Options

CalDigit’s TS3 Plus has 15 ports, including a respectable mixture of USB-A and Thunderbolt 3 ports. It supports up to two 4K monitors or one 5K monitor at a full 60 Hz refresh rate. It’s also one of the most compact models available, so it takes up less room on a desk—especially if you stand it up vertically on its end, an option you don’t get with most docks. And the 87 watts of power that it can send to a connected laptop means it’s capable of charging even a 15-inch MacBook Air at full speed or a Microsoft Surface Laptop Studio at close to that.

Ports and features

two Thunderbolt 3 (one pass-through) Gigabit Ethernet
one USB-C 3.2 Gen 1 audio-in
one USB-C 3.2 Gen 2 audio-out
five USB-A 3.2 Gen 1 S/PDIF digital optical audio
one DisplayPort 87-watt charging
one SD card reader

Its Thunderbolt speeds always impress. In our data-transfer tests using a Thunderbolt 3 drive (the 1 TB OWC Envy Pro FX), the TS3 Plus’s Thunderbolt 3 read and write speeds were many times faster than its standard USB results. We consistently saw read speeds of 2,410 MB/s and write speeds of 884 MB/s, comparable to results from the rest of the docks we tested and blazing-fast compared with most other connection types. That said, you shouldn’t buy this dock—or any dock, for that matter—expecting to see the same performance as you’d get with a direct connection between your computer and the fastest Thunderbolt 3 drives.

Read (MB/s)Write (MB/s)
USB-A four at 347, one at 425 four at 312, one at 389
USB-C one at 703, one at 347 one at 703, one at 310
Thunderbolt 2,419 884
SD card 230 183


Read and write speeds on the CalDigit TS3 Plus.

It has fast enough USB-A speeds. In our USB-A testing with a 1 TB OWC Envoy Pro, we measured average read and write speeds from four of the ports that were about 33% slower than what we saw from other docks with USB 3.2 Gen 2 connectors. You may find that slower speed to be an issue if you’re transferring a lot of data using USB-A accessories, but it won’t make a difference for peripherals such as keyboards or webcams. The TS3 Plus’s USB-C 3.2 Gen 1 read and write speeds were identical to those of the slower four USB-A ports.

It can quickly transfer photos from your SD card. The TS3 Plus’s SD-card transfer speeds are on a par with those of every other SD-equipped dock we’ve tested, with a read speed of 230 MB/s and a write speed of 183 MB/s.

The front of the CalDigit TS3 Plus has (from left) an SD card slot, audio-out, audio-in, one USB-C 3.2 Gen 1 port, and one USB-A 3.2 Gen 1 port. Photo: Michael Hession

It offers you multiple options for connecting an external monitor. Most Thunderbolt docks, including this one, use DisplayPort for video output. When this dock was connected to two 4K monitors, we measured a proper 60 Hz refresh rate on both displays; one was connected directly to the DisplayPort, while the other was attached through a USB-C–to–DisplayPort cable plugged into the Thunderbolt port. We didn’t test 5K monitor support, but we’re confident in CalDigit’s claims.

It has enough power for most laptops. The TS3 Plus can charge connected laptops at up to 87 watts, which we confirmed when we connected it to our test 15-inch MacBook Air. The most power-hungry MacBook Pro models, along with the Surface Laptop Studio, max out at 96 watts, so during resource-intensive tasks, such as editing video, you may find that your laptop uses power faster than it can charge. The CalDigit TS4, our upgrade pick, offers 98 watts of charging power if that’s of importance to you.

It doesn’t take up a lot of room on a desk. Almost every other Thunderbolt dock we tested is long and flat, designed to lie horizontally. The TS3 Plus, in contrast, can sit horizontally or stand vertically. When it’s standing on its shortest edge, it takes up only about 6.25 square inches of desk space, not counting the power brick, which measures roughly 6 by 3 by 1 inches.

It comes with two years of warranty coverage. CalDigit offers a two-year warranty on the TS3 Plus; that’s as good as the coverage length on any of our other picks.

Flaws but not dealbreakers

A Wirecutter editor who uses the TS3 Plus with two LG 27UK850-W monitors and a 2017 MacBook Pro has reported issues in which one or both displays don’t wake up when the computer wakes from sleep mode: “The solution is usually to unplug one or both of the displays and replug. Occasionally it requires a restart.” He has noted similar quirks with the headphone port.

Another Wirecutter editor has experienced wake-from-sleep problems with a similar LG display, the 27GN950-B, using direct connections from a PC. We didn’t encounter these problems in our testing, but we have seen issues with several Thunderbolt docks when connecting two displays directly to the dock.

The Monoprice Thunderbolt 3 Dual DisplayPort Docking Station plugged in.
Photo: Michael Hession

Budget pick

This Monoprice dock costs significantly less and has a more impressive array than other docks in its price range.

Buying Options

If you want to spend a little less and don’t need to hook up any extra Thunderbolt accessories, the Monoprice Thunderbolt 3 Dual DisplayPort Docking Station is a good option. Although its port selection is more limited than that of the CalDigit TS3 Plus, it still offers plenty of options to suit most needs, including the ability to connect to multiple monitors at full resolution.

Ports and features

one Thunderbolt 3one audio-in/out
one USB-A 3.2 Gen 1two DisplayPort
two USB-A 3.2 Gen 2one SD card reader
one USB-C 3.2 Gen 2one microSD card reader
Gigabit Ethernet60-watt charging

It can keep up with the fastest of ports. The ports on this Monoprice dock all performed as advertised, matching or surpassing the top speeds of every dock we tested. We had no issues running two monitors on its DisplayPort connectors.

Read (MB/s)Write (MB/s)
USB-Atwo at 417, one at 865two at 409, one at 823
USB-C886844

 

Read and write speeds on the Monoprice Thunderbolt 3 Dual DisplayPort Docking Station.

 

But you can’t connect it to Thunderbolt accessories. For someone who uses any Thunderbolt accessories, the lack of Thunderbolt pass-through on this dock is an automatic dealbreaker.

The front of the Monoprice dock has (from left) an SD and microSD card reader, a combined audio-in/audio-out port, a USB-C 3.2 Gen 2 port, and two USB-A 3.2 Gen 2 ports. Photo: Michael Hession

Its charging speed is lacking. Depending on your computer, you may also sacrifice laptop charging speed. The Monoprice dock can power a computer at up to 60 watts, which is top speed for pretty much any 13-inch computer. But if you have a more power-hungry machine, such as a 15- or 16-inch MacBook Pro or the Surface Laptop Studio, this docking station will still charge your computer but at a slower rate.

You have to make room for both the dock and the power supply. Like all Thunderbolt docks, this Monoprice model comes with a huge power brick, as well as a Thunderbolt 3 cable. Its footprint is relatively small next to that of the other docks we tested, which tend to be a bit wider, but unlike the CalDigit TS3 Plus and TS4, it isn’t made to stand on its end.

It has a one-year warranty. Monoprice covers its dock with a one-year warranty. We’ve generally had positive experiences with Monoprice on the whole, as well as with the company’s customer service process, but it’s not uncommon for products to go out of stock for stretches of time.

The CalDigit TS4 plugged in.
Photo: Michael Hession

Upgrade pick

Equipped with 18 total ports, this Thunderbolt 4 dock allows you to connect whatever you want to your laptop, with plenty of connections left over.

Buying Options

$400 $370 from Amazon

You save $30 (8%)

The CalDigit TS4 is a clear step up from the TS3 Plus thanks to three extra ports, 98 watts of power output, a 2.5 GbE port, and support for the Thunderbolt 4 standard. However, all of those extra features and capabilities carry a steep price tag. If you’re eyeing our top pick but need more power output and extra ports, the TS4 is a worthy investment.

Ports and features

three Thunderbolt 4 one audio-in
five USB-A 3.2 Gen 2 one audio-out
three USB-C 3.2 Gen 2 one audio-in/out
one DisplayPort one SD card reader
2.5 Gigabit Ethernet one microSD card reader
98-watt charging

It has all of your port needs covered. The TS4 has a total of 18 ports, including three Thunderbolt 4 ports, two of which you can use to connect extra Thunderbolt peripherals to your computer. It also offers three USB-C ports, two of which provide 7.5 watts of power to accessories, while the third one can put out 20 watts of power. It has a total of five USB-A ports, which is quite rare among Thunderbolt docks, along with a total of three audio ports. Not to mention, it has a 2.5 Gigabit Ethernet port to ensure that you have the fastest wired internet connection.

Read (MB/s)Write (MB/s)
USB-A 746 616
Thunderbolt 2,547 960
SD card 265 226


Read and write speeds on the CalDigit TS4.

It has plenty of speed. The TS4 outshone most of the docks we tested in performance, sitting near the top across the board for its various ports. When we tested its Thunderbolt transfer speeds, it exhibited a read speed of 2,547 MB/s (or just over 2.5 GB/s) and a write speed of 960 MB/s, ever so slightly besting the performance of the TS3 Plus. It also scored high marks in its standard USB-A performance, posting a read speed of 746 MB/s and a write speed of 616 MB/s. Another area where the TS4 showed its performance chops was in its SD card transfer speed, reading at 265 MB/s and writing at 226 MB/s, providing a 15% boost in performance over the TS3 Plus in the former and a 24% increase in the latter.

The front of the CalDigit TS4 dock has (from left) an SD and microSD card reader, a combined audio-in/audio-out port, USB-A 3.2 Gen 2, and two USB-C 3.2 Gen 2 ports. Photo: Michael Hession

External displays aren’t an issue. If you want to add an extra monitor or two to your laptop, the TS4 is ready to handle two 4K displays at 60 Hz, which we confirmed in our testing using a Surface Laptop Studio. You can connect an external display to the TS4 using either of the extra Thunderbolt 4 ports or connect it directly to the standalone DisplayPort.

It can power almost any standard laptop. For the TS4, CalDigit advertises 98 watts of power output, a number that we confirmed in our testing. Unless you’re using a gaming laptop or a dedicated video-editing setup, 98 watts is more than enough to power and charge your laptop, under heavy load, while it’s connected to the TS4 via the lone Thunderbolt 4 cable.

You get a two-year warranty. CalDigit gives the TS4 a two-year warranty; that’s as good as the coverage length on any of our other picks.

If you need only Thunderbolt ports: Plugable’s Thunderbolt 4 Hub TBT4-HUB3C represents the smallest way to add three extra Thunderbolt 4 ports to your setup—and it’s cheap. The port selection is too limited for most people who might require a dock, but if it fits your needs, the performance is good.

If you need a budget pick with more ports: CalDigit’s Thunderbolt 4 Element Hub offers the same three Thunderbolt pass-through ports as the Plugable Thunderbolt 4 Hub does, plus four USB-A connectors.

If you want a wide variety of ports: OWC’s 11-Port Thunderbolt Dock is a worthy choice if you need a dock that has more than just a couple of port types. It has a total of 11 ports, including three Thunderbolt pass-through ports, plus an SD card slot that works nicely with four USB-A ports. It performed slower than our upgrade pick, which kept us from naming it as a pick, but it’s also much cheaper.

If all you need is the basics: Equipped with four Thunderbolt 4 ports and a lone USB-A port, Belkin’s Connect Thunderbolt 4 5-in-1 Core Hub can extend the connectivity of your laptop or desktop while providing multiple high-speed lanes for transferring data or connecting Thunderbolt accessories to your computer.

The Anker 778 Thunderbolt Docking Station performed well in our tests, but it was slower than the competition in its USB speed tests.

If you don’t like the design of our upgrade pick, Belkin’s Connect Pro Thunderbolt 4 Dock is just as good.

Belkin’s Thunderbolt 3 Dock Pro is a fine choice if you don’t care what version of Thunderbolt you’re using, but at this writing it’s $250. You can find cheaper options with more ports, such as the Plugable TBT4-UDZ (discussed below).

HP’s Thunderbolt Dock 120W G2 supports two displays but can only mirror the same image on both rather than extending the image across the two. We also dislike that its cable is permanently attached—if something happens to the cable, you have to replace the entire dock.

Kensington’s SD5780T Thunderbolt Dual 4K scored high in our performance tests but had slightly fewer ports and was more expensive than our top pick.

Plugable’s 16-in-1 Thunderbolt 4 Dock TBT4-UDZ mirrors the CalDigit TS3 Plus and TS4 in that it can lie flat or stand vertically, saving desk space while also providing 16 ports for all your connectivity needs. Its single Thunderbolt connection for your computer is something to be aware of, though.

The Sonnettech Echo 11 Thunderbolt 4 HDMI Dock performed well, is priced well, and has more than enough ports for most situations, but not as many as our top pick.

Anker’s 577 PowerExpand Elite requires a USB-C–to–dual-HDMI splitter to connect to multiple displays, something that our picks can do without an extra purchase.

CalDigit’s USB-C Pro Dock, with one fewer USB-C port and no USB-A 3.2 Gen 2 ports, is more expensive than our budget pick from Monoprice. We were otherwise impressed with this dock, which offers an SD card slot and faster, 85 W charging.

The port selection on Plugable’s TBT3-UDC3 almost mirrors that of our budget pick from Monoprice. This model swaps one of the DisplayPort connectors for HDMI and offers faster, 96 W charging, but it lacks extra USB ports and an SD card reader.

Plugable’s TBT3-UDV was a previous top pick, but it commands a relatively high price and doesn’t have an SD card slot or USB-C ports. The only extra feature you get for your money is a DisplayPort-to-HDMI adapter, but typically that would cost less than $10 if you were to buy it separately.

This article was edited by Signe Brewster and Caitlin McGarry.

Meet your guides

Jason Cipriani

Jason Cipriani has been a freelance technology journalist for nearly 16 years, covering all types of technology for a wide range of publications online and in print. You can find his byline on sites such as CNET, Fortune, Time, Wired, CNN Underscored, Pocket-lint, ZDNET, and Tom’s Guide. His primary focus has been mobile products, but he has also reviewed countless laptops and computers over the years, including stints reviewing personal laptops for Tech Radar and gaming laptops for IGN. He has dabbled in podcasting on his own and at various publications, co-hosting the Jason Squared podcast for a couple of years (and over 100 episodes) while he was at ZDNET. He’ll go viral, eventually.

Nick Guy

Nick Guy is a former senior staff writer covering Apple and accessories at Wirecutter. He has been reviewing iPhones, iPads, and related tech since 2011—and stopped counting after he tested his 1,000th case. It’s impossible for him not to mentally catalog any case he sees. He once had the bright idea to build and burn down a room to test fireproof safes.

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