Apple plans to add support for dual external monitors when the lid is closed for the 14-inch M3 MacBook Pro in a future macOS update, the company confirmed to 9to5Mac.
When the 14-inch M3 MacBook Pro was first announced in October, it supported a single external monitor with up to a 6K resolution regardless of whether the lid was closed or not. However, today’s announcement of the M3 MacBook Air reveals that the M3 chip can support two external monitors at 5K when the laptop’s lid is closed in what is known as clamshell mode.
The dual-monitor setup is currently not supported on the entry-level 14-inch MacBook Pro despite it being powered by the same M3 chip as the refreshed MacBook Air devices. Apple plans to bring parity to both MacBook lineups by supporting two external monitors on the M3 MacBook Pro in an unspecified future update for macOS Sonoma. Like the MacBook Air, dual monitor support for the M3 MacBook Pro will only be available in clamshell mode.
On the other hand, the M3 Pro and M3 Max configurations of the 14-inch and 16-inch MacBook Pro already support multiple external displays. The M3 Pro is capable of driving two 6K monitors at 60Hz, whereas the M3 Max can power four 6K 60Hz displays.
