Is there any way I can let my PS5 use my M2 14" Macbook Pro as a display?

Hi,

Since iOS 17 is now possible to use the iPad Pro as a display for PS5 or other consoles.

I was wondering why it's still not possible to do the same with your Mac? Can anyone explain? Thank you!

The Apple standard for its built-in hardware-accelerated displays, makes them suitable for full-motion video for production/display of cinema-quality video with NO dropped frames, and NO dropouts or partial-blank scan lines due to memory under-runs or other issues. This requires a hardware rasterizer/display-generator for each fully-accelerated display, and a substantial amount of RAM memory holding the screen image. 

The quality, color fidelity/number of colors, and frame rate of the pictures you can put on your iPad in real time is only a dim echo of the quality and refresh rate of an Apple Hardware accelerated display, such as the direct CABLE outputs of The MacBook Pro.

executive summary: Yes you can get a picture on an iPad. No, it is not full-motion video at quality comparable to the direct cable output of a MacBook Pro.

<< I can literally connect my MacBook to my ipad and use it as another display for whatever I want >>

Yes, you can make the connection, but NOT for 'whatever you want' unless you accept lower signal quality. It is perfectly adequate for slow-to-change data such as program listings, spreadsheets, and stock quotes. But that connection is not a Hi-color, full-motion Video connection, and you will see dropped frames and/or a major decrease in video quality and/or decrease in number of colors in the images when you connect it that way.

Full-motion, Full-color Video is THE highest data rate of anything you ask a display to do for you. The cables that support it properly use tuned dual-rail Driver and Receiver circuits and are limited to under a Meter in length.

You are not providing anything even approaching the 32,000 M bits/sec pathway provided by an appropriate ThunderBolt or USB-C cable used for full-motion video at high resolutions if you connect it that way. You can't get those data rates 'over-the-air' using high-end fast 1,000 M bits/sec Ethernet or Wi-Fi.

Accepting external Full-motion, Full-color Video at those ferocious data rates and displaying it properly is a very difficult job for any electronics system. You would need a purpose-built device ready to accept and display those signals directly. The MacBook Pro is not built for that purpose, and my answer was never intended to be an arrogant jab at you, just the facts.

The ideal device to support such a data stream would be a TV set or a stand-alone display. There are some good, affordable device on the market now that were built for that purpose.

WhiteX wrote:

EDIT: after reading your explanation again, what I understand from it is that it will never be possible to use the MBP as a display for the PS5 due to its specifications being too high for it to work as efficiently as an iPad Pro. Is this correct?

Again, I appreciate your technical explanations. What I think is people aren't looking for incredible quality when they connect their PS5 to an iPad Pro — they're expecting a solution that works on the go. This one works pretty well.

What you wrote makes it even more desirable to have a similar solution for the MacBook Pro.

In any case, I encourage you to check the current solution for the iPad Pro. It's pretty impressive — there are several reviews online.

I encourage you to provide feedback to Apple: Product Feedback - Apple

Apple is not here. Apple will not see your suggestions or desires posted here. You need to tell Apple.

WhiteX wrote:

Since iOS 17 is now possible to use the iPad Pro as a display for PS5 or other consoles.

I was wondering why it's still not possible to do the same with your Mac? Can anyone explain? Thank you!

Did you read the post immediately above yours? I think it gives some excellent context.

As to why Apple does or does not do something, no one here in this user-to-user forum would know.

EDIT: after reading your explanation again, what I understand from it is that it will never be possible to use the MBP as a display for the PS5 due to its specifications being too high for it to work as efficiently as an iPad Pro. Is this correct?

Again, I appreciate your technical explanations. What I think is people aren't looking for incredible quality when they connect their PS5 to an iPad Pro — they're expecting a solution that works on the go. This one works pretty well.

What you wrote makes it even more desirable to have a similar solution for the MacBook Pro.

In any case, I encourage you to check the current solution for the iPad Pro. It's pretty impressive — there are several reviews online.

"As to why Apple does or does not do something, no one here in this user-to-user forum would know."

A lot of people in this forum happen to know why Apple does or doesn't do things as long as it's public technical info, which I didn't find on Google. That was my question: is there a technical reason why Apple doesn't allow it?

Nevertheless, I appreciated your technical explanation. For real. But have you noticed that you could replace "The MacBook Pro" with "iPad Pro" in your answer? "The iPad Pro is not a display, it is a specialized portable computing device with a built-in display, connected internally."

I guess we're lucky that the developers who made it possible (to connect the PS5 to an iPad Pro) didn't think this way :) it works beautifully, there are many videos out there — zero latency or lag.

Maybe we'll see an official release from Apple in the future — marketed as a groundbreaking feature, of course. It happened in the past. For now, I guess we can hope that the same developers make it possible on the MacBook Pro.

Arshdeep_Thind wrote:

Please don’t try to be clever by pointing out the obvious….I can literally connect my MacBook to my ipad and use it as another display for whatever I want. I don’t see the reason why I cant use a Mac as one.

If you are referring to Sidecar, that's not based on the iPad having any dedicated hardware video input that would allow it to act as a generic hardware monitor. It's based on something like AirPlay. Even if you run a USB cable, it won't be carrying a high-data-rate, uncompressed, DisplayPort / HDMI / Thunderbolt signal.

You can't use your Mac as a hardware display for a PS5 because it is not designed to take video input.

It might be possible to buy an external. video digitizer (and corresponding software) for the Mac, and use that to monitor video from a PS5 or other source. However, by the time that you've spent the money for a decent video digitizer, you probably would have been better off just buying a TV – unless your only goal was to record video.

The MacBook Pro is not a display. it is a specialized portable computing device with a built-in display, connected internally.

To use your playstation, connect it to your TV set.

Then do do and move on.