Amy Skorheim has an English degree from UCLA and has been a commerce writer for six years, covering tech, men’s gear and outdoor paraphernalia. Her work has appeared in publications that include Futurism, Digg and Huckberry. After four years as the managing editor of GearMoose, she joined the commerce team at Engadget in 2022.
Engadget has been testing and reviewing consumer tech since 2004. Our stories may include affiliate links; if you buy something through a link, we may earn a commission.
Both docks and hubs make it easy to grab your laptop off your desk for a meeting or other brief relocation and when you get back, plugging in one cable gets all your accessories reconnected.The first port to consider is the one on your laptop or tablet. For a USB-C hub to work, it needs to connect to a port that supports video, data and power — all of which is covered by anything listed as USB 3.0 or better. The port, of course, needs to be Type-C as well.
Standard SD and microSD slots are useful for transferring data from cameras and the like. Ethernet ports may deliver faster internet speeds than your Wi-Fi and a hub with a 3.5mm jack can bring back the wired headphone connection that some laptops have ditched.Nearly all of the USB-C hubs I tested support passthrough charging. That means if your laptop or tablet only charges via USB, you don’t have to take up another port on your laptop to keep everything topped up.
One variation that could tip the scales is the length of the cable. A longer one will give you more freedom as you arrange the hub on your desk, potentially even letting you hide it behind your laptop. Or you may prefer a shorter one to keep the hub neatly set beside your laptop.Before we test anything, we take a look at what’s available and how they’ve been received by shoppers, forum-goers and other publications.
The 4K resolution and 60Hz refresh rate looked great on my test monitor and the data transfer rates were ahead of other hubs in its price range. The speed test on an Ethernet cable was on par with that of a more expensive docking station, and I appreciated the design of the microSD slot. Most readers have you insert the card all the way in, relying on a spring mechanism to push it back out when you’re done. Here, the end sticks out just enough that you can simply pull the card out.
The cable is also braided, making it feel more premium than its $30 price tag would suggest — which is the general theme here. The HDMI 2.0 port can handle a 4K external monitor at 60Hz, which should be plenty zippy enough for an average workday, and I found the resolution and lack of lag to be just as advertised.
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