Apple’s M1 chipset based MacBook Air and Pro don’t support eGPUs: Here’s what it means for you

Apple launched its new M1-chipset based MacBook and talked about a host of features in Air and Pro. It also mentioned the ports, one of which was the USB-C with Thunderbolt 3. Although this might suffice the needs of majority of the users, a specific set of audience might face some disappointment. That’s because the two laptops don’t support eGPUs.

What are eGPUs? In simple words, with an eGPU, you can connect an external graphics card to a Mac using the Thunderbolt 3 connection. Pro users might use this more as they often connect more powerful GPUs to render videos or graphics when the internal GPU is not sufficient. Unfortunately, they can’t do it with M1-based MacBooks, reports TechCrunch.

Also read: New Apple MacBook Air vs MacBook Pro: What's different

The reason for this elimination has not been specified though. So, it is not for sure if this was Apple’s decision or a technical limitation. Apple however, during the event said that M1 chipset is a self-developed SoC. This means it has all CPU, GPU, RAM and storage embedded in a single chip and all of it has been developed by the company itself.

For what’s worth, the Thunderbolt connection was created by Apple in partnership with Intel and recently the latter firm made it possible for other firms to use Thunderbolt 3 even if they didn’t come with Intel processors. So, looking at this, it is only natural to assume that Apple might have decided to not include it in new MacBook Air and MacBook Pro.

That said, Apple stressed a lot on the GPU performance of the new M1 processor during the event.