In recent years, more and more laptops have started using lightning interfaces. Someone asked if the Thunderbolt interface looks exactly the same as the Type-C interface, what is the difference between them? Are the functions exactly the same? Today, let's take you in depth to understand the difference between lightning interface and type-c interface.

The shapes of commonly used USB interfaces are mainly divided into three types: USB A/B/C. Type-C is a type of connection interface for USB interfaces, and its biggest feature is that it can be inserted on both sides, making it very easy to use and quickly popularized. But ultimately, type-c is just a specification of the interface, while Thunderbolt 3 is different. Its English name is Thunderbolt, and the physical layer uses the type-c interface, which is a connector standard released by Intel.

Although the interfaces of Thunderbolt 3 and USB type-c look identical, they are paired with different transmission protocols, namely Thunderbolt 3 and USB 3.1. Thunderbolt 3 not only has powerful information transmission capability, but also can simultaneously transmit data and video signals at a transmission speed of up to 40Gbps. It can also connect multiple displays and expand multiple high-performance graphics cards through daisy chain connection, and can connect up to 6 devices and one display device with a native DP interface. Players can achieve many operations through this. Compared to the Thunderbolt 2 interface, Thunderbolt 3 is also more energy-efficient and can provide 100W of power transmission.

Nowadays, many laptops on the market only have a Thunderbolt 3 interface, and many players may worry that this type of laptop cannot meet different usage needs. But in fact, the Thunderbolt 3 interface is compatible with various transmission protocols on the market, such as the USB 3.1 protocol, Thunderbolt 1st and 2nd generations, as well as DisplayPort and PCI express, and can almost replace various traditional interfaces in laptops. From the current trend, Thunderbolt 3 is also increasingly popular among manufacturers and players in the market. In addition to Apple's MacBook series notebooks, more and more Windows notebooks also favor the Thunderbolt 3 interface, and there is also a Thunderbolt "lightning" sign next to the Thunderbolt 3 interface, which is convenient for players to distinguish. Direct use of the Docking station can achieve or even surpass the performance and functions of traditional notebooks.

In summary, type-c port is a form, but Thunderbolt 3 has the standard of type-c form. The two complement each other and can be said to have jointly achieved the other.