One app · One cable · Full resolution

Your iMac as a 5K 60 Hz external display.

DisplayBridge sends one Mac's screen to another over a single Thunderbolt cable. The whole 5120 × 2880 at 60 Hz on a Retina 5K iMac, 120 Hz on a recent MacBook Pro.

7-day free full trial · no account · no credit card · macOS 13 or newer · Thunderbolt 3 or higher

Setup

One app. Both ends.

No host app and viewer app, no accounts, no IP addresses to type. The same 6 MB download goes on both Macs, and either one of them can be the screen.

  1. 1

    Download it on both Macs

    One app, 6 MB. The same file goes on the Mac you work on and the Mac you want to use as a screen.

  2. 2

    Open it on both

    No account, no sign-in, nothing to set up. Just open it on each of the two Macs.

  3. 3

    Connect the cable

    One Thunderbolt cable, directly between the two Macs. macOS brings the connection up on its own.

  4. 4

    Click Connect

    Each Mac already lists the other. One click, and the second screen is live.

  • 60/120Hz60 on a 5K iMac, 120 on a
    ProMotion MacBook Pro
  • 5120×2880the full 5K, at
    native 2× sharpness
  • ~30msaverage delay, from one
    screen to the other
  • 6MBthe whole app,
    on disk

The Mac receiving the picture is free, forever — only the Mac sending its screen needs a license.

The film

Five minutes,
start to finish.

What it is, what it needs, and how the second Mac lights up. Watch it before you download — it is the whole product.

The app

This is all of it.

One window, on both Macs. It shows what is connected, how well it is running right now, and the two sliders you would otherwise walk around the desk for. There is no second window, no preferences maze, no dashboard.

The DisplayBridge window during a live session: a MacBook Pro connected to an iMac Pro over Thunderbolt at 40 Gbit/s, streaming 5120 × 2880 at 60 frames per second with 21 ms of delay, with brightness and volume sliders for the second Mac and a control for where sound plays.
A live session, straight off the screen. The line in the middle is the connection reporting itself — resolution, frame rate and delay, updating as you work.

Sound comes along

Audio follows the picture to the second Mac's speakers, in sync with the frame it belongs to.

Its brightness, from here

Brightness and volume of the second Mac sit on the streaming card of the first. You never walk around the desk.

Two screens at once

Dual 5K at 60 Hz from a single MacBook Pro, on two separate cables, both at full resolution.

It stays out of the way

No login item, no background agent, no menu bar clutter you did not ask for. Quit it and it is gone.

Native, and small

Built with the frameworks macOS already ships. Universal binary, back to macOS 13 on Intel and Apple silicon.

Nothing to configure

No resolution lists, no transport pickers, no diagnostics tab. It finds the cable and uses it.

Privacy

Nothing leaves your desk.

Your screen travels down the Thunderbolt cable between your two Macs and stops there. It never touches the internet, our servers, or anyone else's — there is no cloud in this product to send it to. Nothing you do on that screen is recorded, stored, or transmitted, and there is no account to create in the first place.

Requirements

Thunderbolt 3
or higher. Only.

Sending a full 5K picture sixty times a second is roughly 10.6 Gbit/s of data. Thunderbolt is the only cable on a Mac that carries that much. That single restriction is what buys you the whole picture — and a connection that behaves the same on the hundredth day as on the first.

Sending MacReceiving Mac
macOS13 Ventura or newer13 Ventura or newer
PortThunderbolt 3 or higherThunderbolt 3 or higher
For 5K at 60 HzApple silicon or recent Intel MacRetina 5K iMac, 2017 or later
For 120 HzApple silicon MacMacBook Pro with a 120 Hz display
CableOne Thunderbolt cable, directly between the two Macs. No dock, no switch, no router.

And what it deliberately is not

  • Not wireless. No Wi-Fi mode, no Ethernet mode. One path, always the fast one.
  • Not remote control. No keyboard or mouse relay — you keep working on the Mac you are sitting at.
  • Not a mirror. The second Mac is an additional display, not a copy of the first.
  • Not a utility drawer. It turns a Mac into a display. That is the entire feature list.

Questions

Before you download.

Do I need it twice, for both Macs?

No. The Mac that shows the picture never needs a license — that is the point of shipping one app instead of two. Only the Mac sending its screen is licensed, and one license covers three of them.

Will it work over Wi-Fi or Ethernet?

No, and it never will. A full 5K picture at 60 Hz is about 10.6 Gbit/s. Wi-Fi and Gigabit Ethernet are one to two orders of magnitude short of that, so anything wireless has to throw most of the picture away to fit. We would rather ship one path that always works than four that sometimes do.

Which iMac do I need for 5K at 60 Hz?

A Retina 5K iMac from 2017 or later. That is also the oldest iMac Apple still gave macOS 13 Ventura to, so the two requirements line up. Other Macs work fine as displays — they simply run at their own native resolution instead of 5K.

License

Bought once, not rented.

Try everything for seven days first — no card, no account. A license is then $29 one time and covers up to three of your Macs; every receiving Mac stays free.

  • Up to 3 of your Macs may send their screen
  • Unlimited receiving Macs, free forever
  • Free updates throughout 1.x
  • After the trial the app still receives forever
  • Refunds within 14 days

Buy a license ›

Give that iMac
something to do.

7-day full trial · macOS 13+ on both Macs · one Thunderbolt cable