All DisplayPort 2.0 Products Are Now DisplayPort 2.1, According to VESA

Enlarge / VESA today released the DisplayPort 2.1 specification. Getty

VESA today released the DisplayPort 2.1 specification. Typically, when an industry group announces a new standard, it takes months or even years for products supporting the specification to become available to consumers. But DisplayPort 2.1 products are already available; in fact, you may already have one. VESA also said today that any product that was already DisplayPort 2.0 certified prior to today's announcement is now also DisplayPort 2.1 certified.

"VESA worked closely with member companies to ensure that products supporting DisplayPort 2.0 would actually meet the new, more demanding DisplayPort 2.1 specification," announces VESA, which also offers DisplayHDR, AdaptiveSync/MediaSync, Clear MR and monitor mounting specifications, stated.

"As a result of this effort, all previously certified DisplayPort 2.0 products, including Ultra-high Bit Rate (UHBR) compliant products, whether GPUs, docking station chips, monitor scalars, repeater PHY chips, such as re-timers, or DP40/DP80 cables (including passive and active cables and using full-size DisplayPort, Mini DisplayPort, or USB Type-C connectors) have previously been certified to the more stringent DisplayPort 2.1 specification,” VESA also said.

Just like that, DisplayPort 2.0 products have been taken up a notch. However, there aren't many DisplayPort 2.0 products to speak of at the moment. DisplayPort 2.0 products were originally expected in 2019 but, due to the COVID-19 pandemic which adversely affected testing capabilities, they only began to become available this year.

The AMD Ryzen 6000 is DisplayPort 2.0 certified, as are some MediaTek and RealTek chipsets, DisplayPort cables, and docking stations, but that's about it. We are not aware of any DisplayPort 2.0 monitors readily available for purchase in the United States. Intel's Arc graphics cards, including the Intel Arc A770 and A750, support DisplayPort 2.0, but Nvidia's latest GPUs, the RTX 4090 and 4080, and AMD's latest cards, the Radeon RX 6000 series, don't.

DisplayPort 2.1 versus DisplayPort 2.0

This brings us to the obvious question: what is the difference between DisplayPort 2.0 and DisplayPort 2.1?

The new DisplayPort 2.1 confirms the use of the same physical layer (PHY) specification as USB4. According to VESA, this change will allow for a more efficient DisplayPort tunnel compared to the last generation of USB-C. As USB-C becomes more and more ubiquitous, it makes sense that DisplayPort plays well with the connector.

Alan Kobayashi, chairman of the VESA board of directors and chair of the DisplayPort working group, said in a statement.

In addition, DisplayPort 2.1 brings an updated bandwidth management feature that VESA claims will allow DisplayPort tunneling over USB4 to coexist with other I/O traffic "more efficiently" than before.

The next version of DisplayPort also requires...