Apple has finally dropped the ultrawide virtual display for Vision Pro in beta, giving the existing virtual display feature the ability to stretch to wide and ultrawide widths for extra screen real-estate. Out of the box it’s impressive, but default MacOS window management makes it kind of a pain to use. But with the right third-party window manager, it’s even better than I hoped for.

I’ll be honest, I didn’t know just how useful the new ultrawide feature would be. I’ve used Vision Pro’s virtual desktop feature many times before. It’s a great way to get some extra screen real-estate out of my MacBook Air (M2). But it was limited in that it could only really act like a single, large 16:9 monitor.

My productivity workhorse is my desktop PC on which I’ve used two side-by-side monitors for years. For a power-user like me, having the extra width to have multiple things on screen at once is great; constantly minimizing and maximizing apps is a pain. I also combine my dual monitors with additional virtual workspaces, meaning I can group applications together on a specific workspace for a specific task.

I’ve yet to make the leap to a single ultrawide monitor over dual monitors. They’re pretty damn expensive and physically take up a lot of space.

But with a little software update, Apple just gave me an ultrawide monitor that I can take with me wherever I take my Vision Pro. The ultrawide setting essentially gives you two 16:9 monitors side-by-side, but without the seam in the middle if you were using dual monitors.