Wondering, is your 24-inch iMac can be used as an external monitor? Unfortunately, you cannot use 24-inch iMac 4.5K Retina Display as an external monitor or target monitor. This is because the Mac before 2014, have official support to add the Target Display/External Monitor, and from 2014 or later Mac, Apple lift this support. However, with time, Apple has added much more improvements which makes it easy to share and use other displays and tablets as External Monitor with Apple devices.
In addition, there is no confirmation or news from Apple to let us use 24-inch iMac as a Monitor. However, if you have an alternate display, then it can be used as an external monitor with up to 6K Resolution Monitor. There are plenty of External Displays available that works with iMac, Mac Mini, and many other computers, without any compatibility issues.
Though, the newer macOS and iPadOS update added an amazing feature that lets you screen share the Mac and iPad screen with each other, which is known by the name SideCar. Make sure to update the Mac and iPad to the latest version and refer to our detailed article on What is SideCar: Compatible Mac and How to Use SideCar.
Supported iMac and macOS
MacOS High Sierra and Earlier macOS
Supported iMac models that are introduced in 2019 and Earlier – 2011 iMac, 2012 iMac, 2013 iMac, and Mid 2014 iMac. here’s How to Know your Mac Model? Apple logo from top Mac menu > About This Mac > See mac model year and name
Two Macs are connected with Thunderbolt and Thunderbolt 2 Cable
24-inch and 27-inch iMac models in 2009 and 2010 – Cable connecting Two Macs must be Mini DisplayPort.
🙊Winding up the post, 24-inch M1 iMac or an iMac 2014 or newer cannot be used as an external monitor, and as I mentioned earlier, it’s quite difficult that Apple will be expanding this support for us in the coming days. Update the Mac and get hands-on the latest available features in Mac MacBook.
How to Connect or Start Target Display Mode
Make sure, your Macs are following the above requirements. Press Command + F2 from the keyboard to start mirroring. To see the desktop of another mac.
How to Disconnect or Stop Target Display Mode
Again, Press Command + F2 from the keyboard to stop. or Disconnect the cable or Restart any mac.
If you’ve more questions about M1 iMac, MacBook Pro, MacBook Air, feel free to leave us your questions in the comments or shoot a mail, we’ll get back to you with a solution.
