Apple's PR about the M5 Apple Vision Pro was vague about Mac Virtual Display improvements, but we've since confirmed with Apple that the refresh rate for the feature has been doubled from the previous locked 60Hz max to 120Hz.

When the M5 edition of the Apple Vision Pro was announced, Apple claimed that its displays now supported 120Hz refresh rates. That's an improvement on the original model, which supported variable refresh rates of up to 100Hz.

BUt, there was a key limitation of the Mac Virtual Display. In use, with the M2 Apple Vision Pro, Mac displays were run at 60Hz, regardless if you used the Developer Strap, or streamed over Wi-Fi.

So despite Apple increasing the Apple Vision Pro's maximum refresh rate with the M5, it did not explicitly say whether this applied to the Mac. Apple said only that it would reduce motion sickness, implying that it would at least be present when using visionOS and its homescreen.

There were no further details about any particular apps.

Given that this feature is key to our staffers' use of Apple Vision Pro, we pressed Apple for clarification. Specifically, we asked if the full 120Hz refresh rate would be available when users were using the Mac Virtual Display feature.

Apple has now responded to our query, confirming it.

The Apple Vision Pro's jump from 100Hz to 120Hz is not gigantic, but 60Hz to 120Hz really is. There are motion sickness improvements potentially with the 120Hz refresh, and this extending to the Mac display streaming means that it might be usable for some where it was not before.

AppleInsider will be testing the feature.

More display improvements

Users will also see at least slightly sharper text and images using the Mac through the new Apple Vision Pro than they did with the original device.

That's because, as Apple did announce, the new model's custom micro-OLED displays could render 10% more pixels, in an improvement to foveated rendering given the higher power of the M5 GPU. While only 10%, it should be a distinct improvement, but it is being done with the same displays as in the original model.