Apple Displays on Linux #

Apple makes two beautiful, premium displays with the 5K Apple Studio Display and the 6K Apple XDR Display. If you're coming to Linux from the Mac, you might already have one of these, and you might wonder how to get it working on Linux.

First, you need a DisplayPort + USB-A => USB-C cable cable. I can attest that the one from WJESOG works great, but there are other options that look identically, and will probably work too. It's a lot more reliable than using USB-C directly (due to Apple's weird DP-Alt mode implementation, which broadcasts 2 different displays, at random, and one is a dummy), and it also gives you both webcam + speaker support on the Apple Studio Display.

Second, you need a way to control brightness, because Apple didn't add any physical switches to do that. In Omarchy, Ctrl + F1 turns down the brightness, Ctrl + F2 turns it up, and Ctrl + Shift + F2 turns it to the max. This just works out of the box. In Omakub, you first have to install the asdcontrol optional install via the Omakub TUI, but then the hotkeys are automatically mapped and the same.

Alternatives #

If you're looking for an alternative to the Apple Studio Display, there are quite a few options now, but the best one looks to be the Asus ProArt 27" 5K. It's half the price of the Studio, and it comes with the matte finish by default.

If you're looking for an alternative to the 6K XDR, there really isn't anything great yet, but Asus has announced a ProArt 31.5" 6K dispay for less than a quarter of the price of the XDR. It just isn't shipping yet. And LG has also announced a new good-looking 6K monitor.