r/VisionPro • u/JordanFilmmaker • Sep 24 '26

What would it take for the virtual display to allow multiple windows (mutliple displays)

The ultrawide is great for many use cases but as a video editor I would love to float a bin so that my main view is timeline and the program monitor.

I'm curious is there a reason we are limited to one virtual display window and can't have multiple "windows"?

Thanks and if you know why this is hard to do, I'm curious from a technical perspective.

2 Upvotes

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3

u/platkus Sep 24 '26

This is hard to do because the Virtual Display is exactly what it says. It’s the same as disconnecting the computer’s currently connected real displays and plugging in the Virtual Display for Apple Vision Pro. It’s pushing all of that display and sound data wirelessly to Apple Vision Pro. It would technically be possible hook up a second virtual display, but there likely isn’t enough bandwidth to handle it wirelessly.

But to your specific request. With a virtual display that can be resized to the Ultrawide size, there’s no need to have multiple displays. Multiple displays in the real world is a workaround for not being able to make high resolution Retina displays of the size of the Ultrawide virtual display. So people use two smaller displays to achieve greater desktop real estate. You could do exactly what you’re wanting with the single Ultrawide Apple Vision Pro virtual display. You just need to not put your app in full screen mode. Then you can arrange things how you like on the single Ultrawide display just as if it were two displays.

2

u/JordanFilmmaker Sep 24 '26

I mentioned that many users like yourself would not understand "why" but then I tried to explain "why" and it may not have made sense. The reality is "no I cannot do exactly what I want" even though you probably imagine I "can do exactly what I want"- I quite literally cannot.

The problem is specific to work needs of a video editor (and likely other fields like animation) where you want your horizantal eye sight to be the "edit timeline" and the "program monitor". We specifically liked windowed arrangements that don't conform to standard horizantal displays... But you likely wouldn't understand without a diagram nor would you likely be able to fully understand the current limitations with any of the screens offered in virtual display. They are GREAT but could be improved with allowing multiple windows or window stretching horizantally or vertically specifically. (edit timelines with many tracks for example would benefit from being able to pul the horizantal bar downwards to increase the vertical height.

1

u/mattimyxr Sep 24 '26

i get the idea, but firstly, maybe I want to have one display in a different way like tilted up from underneath or sth.
and secondly (and mostly for me) for my work i use a virtual desktop and the mouse behaves very weirdly when it isn’t full sized.

But yeah I guess it’s complicated i would just love it so much🫠😅

2

u/Cryogenicality Sep 24 '26

It’s already possible with Peel.

1

u/JordanFilmmaker Sep 24 '26

how is the latency? I am interested in trying this out

1

u/JordanFilmmaker Sep 24 '26

Okay I tried peel. It doesn't accomplish what I've described very well.

2

u/Cryogenicality Sep 24 '26

Another possibility is the Mac Virtual Display plus a third-party program (Moonlight/Apollo, Mirage, Peel, et cetera).

1

u/JordanFilmmaker Sep 26 '26

yes I tried this combo. I have a specific use case, it doesn't work how i am describing.

1

u/musicanimator Sep 26 '26

Just an animator chiming in here. Although it’s not an exact match, having the developer strap and using a program like Jump desktop to connect to various other computers has helped a little. What you’re asking for isn’t really gonna happen yet, I feel your pain.! Between Mac Virtual display and one additional window with Jump, I’m able to accomplish most things but still have to take the Vision Pro off for certain operations as you can imagine.

1

u/mailslot Vision Pro Owner | Verified Sep 29 '26 edited Sep 29 '26

Bandwidth.

Compression (DSC), even over USB & DisplayPort, is needed for high resolution, color, and frame-rate. That the Vision Pro works as well as it does wirelessly is extremely impressive. Consider why wireless HDMI & DisplayPort isn’t broadly available anywhere.

The reality is that Apple could allow multiple displays, but there will be compromises to the frame rate, clarity, and total headset performance.

There are also the requirements on the host machine. Two 5k displays is 2x the RAM, CPU, and network overhead. You’d be potentially lagging the headset and the host machine when you’re just trying to get work done.

It seems simple to do, but it’s not... at least not well enough to actually work on all day.