Mac Studio Display Resolution- What Setting Are You Using?

I got my Mac Studio and Studio Display last week and both are working fine and are fully updated. I previously owned a 2017 iMac with a 5K Retina display, no external monitor, so tinkering with an external monitor on a Mac is a little new to me. When I set up the studio display, by default it is set to the “Default for Display” setting, which is not maximum resolution. My old iMac was set to the “More space” setting which I liked because I could fit more things on the screen. I read quite a bit online about settings for the new Studio Display and from what I could tell it is best to leave it set to “Default for Display.” I am curious as to what resolution setting fellow Mac Power Users are using and why.

Does the System Settings Display panel give you actual resolution by the numbers in the left panel when you point to a choice in the right panel? I almost always prefer the pixel-doubled setting (2560 x 1440 for this monitor, I think) although that setting might give you less “room” than you would like.

I don’t have a Mac Studio, but I do have an M1 Max MBP that I use with a 28" 4K external display (waiting for delivery a Studio Display :slight_smile: ), so very similar hardware to yours. I use a scaled resolution of 2560x1440 (which is not pixel-doubled on a 4K display, but produces output that’s very close to the Apple default) and it works very well.

So the “recommended” is just what you are using (2560x1440). But this is a 5k display, so I am wondering why the “recommended” setting is what a 4k monitor uses.

Me, too. This represents a change in practice for Apple. The resolution marked as Default for my M1 MacBook Air is 1440x900 which is not the pixel-doubled value. I have selected the pixel-doubled resolution for my screen of 1280x800 in order to get the best viewing (in my opinion). My guess is Apple has noticed that lots of people select “more space” and seem happy with the quality of the scaled display and have adjusted their default values accordingly. :slightly_smiling_face:

Isn’t 2560x1440 the pixel-doubled resolution on the new Studio Display?

Yup, it is. 4K and (Apple’s) 5K displays have the same aspect ratio, but 2560x1440 is exactly pixel doubled on a 5K display, whereas it’s a scaled resolution on a 4K display.

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Mine hopefully arrives next week. :crossed_fingers:

The approach I usually use is to set it to the highest resolution I think is reasonable, because I want to fit lots on the screen at once, but then later accept that it’s not quite comfortable viewing and decrease the resolution by one step. Repeat as necessary.