Professionals who need 6K monitors, high-speed connectivity, and a plethora of ports can now purchase the Plugable 11-in-1 Thunderbolt 5 docking station at a competitive price.
It uses the latest version of the Thunderbolt standard to provide data transfers at up to 80 Gbps with a boost up to 120 Gbps.
Thunderbolt 5 goes (sort of) mainstream with new Plugable dock
Thunderbolt 5 launched in 2023, though the selection of fully compatible accessories stayed small for over a year. That started to change in recent months, partially spurred by the release of M4-based MacBooks and the Mac mini with Thunderbolt 5 support, and there’s now a reasonably wide selection of accessories that use the standard.
Plugable’s 11-in-1 Thunderbolt 5 docking station joined the list on Tuesday. Plugable typically makes accessories that target the consumer market, so its launching a Thunderbolt 5 dock shows that the standard is no longer cutting edge.
Still, the new dock — officially dubbed the TBT-UDT3 — is packed with pro-level features. That includes three Thunderbolt 5 downstream ports that can handle data at up to 10 GBps, which is twice as fast as the earlier Thunderbolt standard.
In addition, the dock supports up to two 6K displays at 60Hz when connected to a Mac thanks to Thunderbolt 5’s Bandwidth Boost.
“With the TBT-UDT3, we’re delivering a forward-looking docking solution that’s ready for the next generation of laptops in partnership with Intel,” said Bernie Thompson, CTO of Plugable. “As we progress in this AI era, our displays become the window through which we multitask and orchestrate all the work being done by our agents. Thunderbolt 5’s 120Gbps connectivity enables more and bigger displays, unlocking real productivity gains.”
Plenty of other ports
Plugable’s TBT-UDT3 is about more than Thunderbolt 5. The dock also includes a pair of USB-A ports that offer 10Gbps transfers, plus a single front-facing USB-A port that hits 5 Gbps.
In addition, there are SD and microSD slots, plus a 2.5Gbps Ethernet port.
The dock works with macOS and Windows systems with Thunderbolt 5, Thunderbolt 4 and full-featured USB4 ports.
Price and availability
More than anything else, the price for the Plugable TBT-UDT3 11-in-1 Thunderbolt 5 dock makes this a pro-level product. It costs $299.95. However, a 15% coupon available at the time of this writing drops the cost by $45.
Buy it from: Amazon
To be clear, that’s quite a competitive price for a Thunderbolt 5 dock. One unveiled in May by OWC costs $330, Anker’s recently released model is $400, and CallDigit launched one that’s now a relative bargain at $280.
Meet the Plugable 11-in-1 Thunderbolt 5 docking station (TBT-UDT3). It features 3x Thunderbolt 5 ports (up to 120Gbps) with 15W Charging and support for up to dual 8K 120Hz displays, 2x USB 10Gbps, 1x USB 3.0, SD and MicroSD slots, 140W charging, 2.5Gbps Ethernet, and Thunderbolt Share.
Ed Hardy has been writing full-time about tech for 25 years, and using it for much longer than that. His intro to Apple was a Macintosh Classic II (which he still has), but now he uses a 13-inch iPad Pro as his primary computer. He’s written for NotebookReview, TabletPCReview, and Brighthand, as well as other sites.
