WhatCable 1.1.7
WhatCable explains cable speed, charging limits, e-marker data, and connected devices in plain English. Name a cable and it tracks how the cable actually performs over time, so you can spot the one that has started misbehaving. No more guessing why a cable charges slow or refuses to drive your display.
Via Norbert M. Doerner:
It is open source, free, and definitely a tool to look into, if you have external drives on your Mac!
Previously:
Update (2026-07-10): Dan Moren:
For example, after looking at it, I realized that my backup drive was only connected via a USB2 cable. Fine in general for overnight backups, but when it reminded to me when I was troubleshooting some backup issues that maybe I should switch to a high speed cable that supports USB-3.
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For a £9.99 one-time purchase, you can unlock WhatCable Pro, which works on up to two Macs, lets you assign names to cables so you can remember which one it is when you plug it in later, provides more in-depth diagnostics, offers live power metering to see how much juice is being delivered right now, and even more.
3 Comments RSS · Twitter · Mastodon
This is awesome!! I had no idea that my LG 5K put out 85 watts. For some reason I thought it was stuck at 60!
Never heard of this before, so I'm now downloading it to try it out. I purchased a bunch of new cables a few months back and was using the System Information app to try and figure out if I actually bought the right thing. The webpage for the app emphasizes USB-C, but it seems it also works for Thunderbolt cables? I guess by "USB-C" they mean specifically the "USB-C" connector, not just the USB protocol (which I guess Thunderbolt is required to support?).
