Thunderbolt 4 is great. Thunderbolt 5 is even better. But just like a lot of the newer standards coming out today, it might actually be overkill for most people. Here's why.
How fast is Thunderbolt 5?
Shutterstock/ Sandu Herta
Don't get me wrong. Thunderbolt 5 delivers a massive leap in data transfer capabilities compared to its predecessors, and it's actually insanely good. At its baseline, the standard provides 80 gigabits per second (Gbps) of bi-directional bandwidth. This means it can send and receive data at 80 Gbps simultaneously, effectively doubling the maximum capacity of Thunderbolt 4.
However, the true engineering feat of Thunderbolt 5 is its asymmetric Bandwidth Boost feature. When the connection detects a high demand for video output—such as a user connecting multiple high-resolution, high-refresh-rate monitors—it can dynamically reallocate its data lanes. In this specialized mode, it pushes up to 120 Gbps of bandwidth in one direction to the displays, while maintaining a steady 40 Gbps for receiving data. This is achieved through the use of PAM-3 (Pulse Amplitude Modulation with three levels) signaling technology, which allows the physical cable to transmit more data per clock cycle than older encoding methods.
Furthermore, Thunderbolt 5 doubles the data throughput for PCI Express (PCIe), stepping up from 32 Gbps to 64 Gbps by utilizing PCIe Gen 4 architecture. This specific upgrade allows external devices like graphics cards and high-speed NVMe storage arrays to operate much closer to their native, internal speeds without severe bottlenecks. It also incorporates native support for DisplayPort 2.1, ensuring compatibility with the absolute latest generation of ultra-high-definition screens.
The standard continues to utilize the ubiquitous USB-C connector shape and offers up to 240 watts of power delivery, meaning a single cable can easily fast-charge a high-performance workstation while simultaneously handling massive data transfers.
Why is it overkill?
Ugreen
This is all nice and dandy, but despite the impressive technological leap, the staggering speeds offered by Thunderbolt 5 are vastly disproportionate to the daily computing needs of the average consumer. For the vast majority of users, a standard Thunderbolt 4 or even a basic USB 3.2 connection provides far more bandwidth than their peripheral devices can physically consume.
When you transfer photos, download files, or back up data to an external hard drive, the limiting factor is almost always the internal read and write speeds of the storage drives themselves, not the cable connecting them. Even premium consumer solid-state drives rarely saturate a 40 Gbps connection, let alone an 80 Gbps one. Similarly, when it comes to visual output, standard connections are already highly capable.
A typical user operating a standard dual-monitor setup with 4K resolution at 60Hz can comfortably run their workstation on older standards without experiencing any lag, frame drops, or degradation in visual quality. Thunderbolt 5's ability to push 120 Gbps for multiple 8K displays is a solution to a problem most people do not have, simply because 8K monitors remain exorbitant luxury items rather than standard home office equipment.
Furthermore, upgrading to Thunderbolt 5 requires a comprehensive and expensive ecosystem overhaul. You cannot simply buy a new cable to unlock these speeds; your laptop's motherboard must have a dedicated Thunderbolt 5 controller, and the dock, external drive, or monitor you are plugging into must also be certified for the new standard.
Who would actually benefit from Thunderbolt 5?
IKEA
It's entirely unnecessary for the general public, but Thunderbolt 5 is a transformative technology for specific subsets of professional creators and power users whose workflows are constantly bottlenecked by hardware transfer limits.
The primary beneficiaries are video production professionals working with uncompressed, high-bitrate footage. When editing multiple streams of 6K or 8K raw video in real-time, the data throughput requirements are astronomical. Thunderbolt 5 allows these editors to scrub through massive video files stored on external NVMe RAID arrays with the exact same fluidity as if the files were stored on the computer's internal motherboard, entirely eliminating the need for time-consuming proxy workflows. It would also benefit visual effects artists and 3D animators who require multi-monitor setups with extreme resolutions and pristine color accuracy. The 120 Gbps Bandwidth Boost enables them to connect multiple 8K reference monitors running at high refresh rates through a single cable, vastly simplifying their complex and cluttered workstation configurations.
Additionally, the doubling of PCI Express bandwidth is a major turning point for the external graphics processing unit (eGPU) market. Gamers with ultra-thin laptops and researchers training machine learning models locally can connect high-end desktop graphics cards to their portable machines with significantly less performance loss. Previous iterations of Thunderbolt severely choked the processing power of top-tier graphics cards due to PCIe lane limitations, but Thunderbolt 5 provides enough bandwidth to make eGPUs a highly viable desktop replacement for resource-intensive computing.
Finally, professionals managing massive data sets, such as data scientists or enterprise IT administrators performing full-system backups and data migrations, will save hours of transfer time.
