Monster Mac Thunderbolt 5 dock promises port power fest

CalDigit has produced some of the best docks in Macworld’s list of the best Thunderbolt docking stations for Mac since the iconic TS3 Thunderbolt 3 dock, followed by the award-winning TS4 Dock when Apple started adding Thunderbolt 4 to its Macs.

Coming later in April 2025, the Thunderbolt 5 hosting CalDigit TS5 Plus looks like it will boast more top-of-the-range ports than any other Mac docking station on the market. (Read what is Thunderbolt 5 for Mac to find out why that matters).

The TS5 Plus will host 20 ports, including three Thunderbolt 5 ports. The upstream Thunderbolt 5 port can fast-charge even the top-end 16-inch MacBook Pro at 140W, and each of the downstream Thunderbolt 5 ports offers an industry-first 36W charging power—compared to the standard 15W.

There’s also a USB-C port that offers the same 36W of power situated at the front of the dock.

36W is enough power to charge a 15-inch MacBook Air at full speed, or an iPad Pro, which charges at 20W.

Recently, the top docks have started swapping Gigabit Ethernet for 2.5Gb Ethernet as this fast level of network is becoming popular in professional environments.

The TS5 Plus jumps this and even skips 5GbE by including a top-of-the-range 10Gb Ethernet connection with a data rate of up to 10 billion bits per second, which is backwards compatible all the way back to 1Gb networks so is ideal for the fastest networks and future-proofing for later upgrades.

There’s only one Mac docking station that measures up to the TS5 Plus, and that’s a Thunderbolt 4 model. The iVanky FusionDock Max 1 boasts 21 top ports—one more than the TS5 Plus—and the ability to support up to four 6K external displays. It has two video ports and four downstream Thunderbolt 4 ports. It has so many Thunderbolt ports because it has something (or things) no other dock possesses: dual built-in Thunderbolt 4 chips.

The TS5 Plus has just the one Thunderbolt 5 chip but it is the only dock to feature Dual USB Controllers for its ten USB ports. Traditionally docks have one USB controller that is shared by all the USB ports. The TS5 Plus has one 10Gbps controller for the front ports, and another for the back ports, which helps to increase USB bandwidth.

• 1 x Thunderbolt 5 Host Port (Up to 120Gbps)
• 2 x Thunderbolt 5 Downstream Ports (80Gbps)
• 5 x USB-C (10Gbps)
• 5 x USB-A (10Gbps)
• 1 x DisplayPort 2.1
• 1 x SD 4.0 (UHS-II)
• 1 x microSD 4.0 (UHS-II)
• 1 x 10 Gigabit Ethernet
• 1 x Front Combo Audio In/Out (3.5mm)
• 1 x Rear Audio Out (3.5mm)
• 1 x Rear Audio In (3.5mm)
• 1 x DC In (24V 13.75A)

The $499.99 TS5 Plus is shipping in the US in late-April, and in the UK in late-May.

CalDigit

TS5 for lesser mortals

If that is just too many ports for your needs, the CalDigit is more restrained but still highly specked with 15 ports, including 2.5GbE, 140W charging, and four Thunderbolt 5 ports.

• 1 x Thunderbolt 5 Host (Up to 120Gb/s)
• 3 x Thunderbolt 5 (80Gb/s)
• 3 x USB-C (10Gb/s)
• 1 x USB-A (10Gb/s)
• 1 x USB-A (480MB/s)
• 1 x SD 4.0 (UHS-II)
• 1 x microSD 4.0 (UHS-II)
• 1 x 2.5 Gigabit Ethernet
• 1 x Front Combo Audio In/Out (3.5mm)
• 1 x Rear Audio Out (3.5mm)
• 1 x Rear Audio In (3.5mm)
• 1 x DC In (20V 12A)

The TS5 is shipping in the US in late-May, and in the UK in late-June. The US price is $369.99.