Apple announces a pair of new Studio Displays

Pairing with the newly announced MacBook is a new pair of external displays that Apple has also unveiled: the Studio Display and the Studio Display XDR.

The 27-inch Studio Display is largely unchanged from its predecessor, introduced in 2022: it’s a 5K Retina display with a 5120-by-2880 resolution at 218 pixels per inch, 600 nits of brightness, a 60Hz refresh rate, and an optional nano-texture glass coating.

The XDR model, which seems to replace the old Pro Display XDR, is a souped up version of the Studio Display, but it’s also a 27-inch 5K Retina display with the same resolution. However, it offers a Mini-LED backlight with 2304 dimming zones, up to 1000 nits of brightness in SDR and 2000 nits of peak brightness with HDR. It also has a 120Hz refresh rate and Adaptive Sync technology that adjusts frame rates on the fly to suit the content being shown, such as video or games.

Both models offer a 12MP Center Stage camera, which Apple says offers “improved image quality”, a sore spot for some on the previous Studio Display—how true that is remains to be seen. Like the 2022 Studio Display, there are six speakers with Spatial Audio, a three-microphone array. About the only major difference in the base level Studio Display is the addition of Thunderbolt 5 connectivity, with one upstream port and one downstream port. There remain two USB-C ports.

By default, the Studio Display still comes with a tilt-adjustable stand, though there are options for both a height-adjustable stand or a VESA mount. The Studio Display XDR gets the height-adjustable stand by default, and can also be configured with a VESA mount.

The pricing is, as always, a big question: the Studio Display starts at the same $1599 price point as its predecessor, with the nano-texture option jacking that up to $1899, and the height-adjustable stand adding an additional $400. (The VESA mount version starts at the same base $1599.)

The XDR is a pricey one: it starts at $3299, with the same $300 premium for nano-texture though, hey, at least you get that height-adjustable stand by default. That’s cheaper, at least, than its predecessor, the Pro Display XDR, which started at $4999, with an additional $999 for the stand.