The Xebec Snap is both innovative and impressive, providing a versatile dual or tri-screen laptop solution. Its magic lies in how easy it is to set up and even change to meet your needs. Its bright 13.3-inch magnetic screens can flip and tilt to match your workspace and getting up and running is, well… a snap. It’s the easiest multi-screen laptop solution we’ve tested but comes with a price tag to match.
Specifications
- Current Price:
- Screen
- Display Size: 13.3” diagonal
- Weight: 1lb
- Dimensions: 12.4” x 7.4” x 0.33”
- Material: Anodized Aluminum with LCD display
- Resolution: 1920 x 1080
- Aspect Ratio: 16:9
- Refresh Rate: 60Hz
- Brightness: Adjustable up to 400 nits
- Chips & Drivers: DisplayLink 6000 series chip embedded. Connection via USB-A requires the free DisplayLink driver download.
- Snap Bracket
- Laptop Size Range: Fits 13” to 17” laptops
- Dimensions: 0.75” x 5.75” x 11.75” (18.5” fully expanded)
- Snap Wing Dimensions: 3.75” x 3.5” x 0.25”
- Pass-through Charging: Compatible with USB-C laptop chargers 45-100 watt. Note - Some Dell laptops with smart chargers do not allow pass-through charging
- Range of Motion: 225°
- Weight: 1.5lb
- Material: TPE and ABS/PC blend
- Connection: 2 x Integrated USB-C Cable (replaceable) + 2 x USB-C to USB-A adapters (optional)
- Kickstand: 1.75” x 0.37” x 4” (6.4” fully extended) & 180° rotation
Xebec Snap - Design and Highlights
The Xebec Snap is a multi-screen laptop extension system that easily allows you to add a second or even third screen to your laptop. It’s hardly alone in its ability to do this — there are lots of similar systems, even from Xebec itself, but the Snap takes things to the next level with just how easy it is to work with.
Like most multi-monitor laptop solutions, the Snap works with a bracket that attaches to the back of your laptop’s monitor, but it’s also this bracket that makes it so special in this space. The first piece is that it’s spring loaded and can extend to fit displays from 13 to 17 inches — all but the biggest gaming laptops. There are no tools required and there’s no need to attach anything permanently to your monitor. The inner surface and frame are also coated in thick silicone to protect your laptop’s built-in screen.
I also have to note the neat scene that’s molded into this silicone guard. It shows a camper set up alongside a desert road. It’s a fun little touch that shows how Xebec has gone the extra step, and it’s just the first of a number of similar touches.
The bracket simplifies and enhances the setup process. Instead of having the screens permanently attach or fasten with any kind of tool, they’re instead held with strong magnets. Two fold-out wings extend from the back to flank your screen and fold back when it’s time to put everything away. Each wing has a POGO pin terminal that matches with one of three ports on the back of the screen. Simply line the screen up and the magnets pull it into place with a “snap” so you know you have a strong connection.
There are no cables to attach the screen to the bracket or even directly to your laptop. Instead, it’s the bracket itself that connects using one or both of two hidden USB-C cables, smartly tucked away with wrap-around cable management. These cables connect to the USB Type-C ports (or USB Type-A) on your computer. The screens should work natively with USB Type-C but for Type-A, you’ll need to download a driver from the Xebec website.
If you’re running a thin and light laptop, it’s likely that you may only have one or two USB-C ports total and will still need one for charging — especially since these monitors don’t have batteries of their own and will take your laptop’s power. On either side, tucked beneath the cable channel, is a power passthrough that’s capable of delivering up to 100 watts of PD charging. When using two screens, you can charge using the port on either side but if you’re using one, you’ll need to use the port on that side.
The displays both run at 1080p and reach 400 nits of peak brightness. This allows them to look sufficiently bright and vibrant, if not as bright as many screens on more expensive laptops. My own Asus Zenbook 14 OLED (2024), for example, peaks at 500 nits brightness. In most cases, however, I don’t run the screen at full brightness anyways, so it’s still possible to find a level balance between all three displays. I was also impressed with their stock calibration. If you’re doing professional creative work, you’ll still want to use a colorimeter, but they were closer than any other portable monitor I’ve tested and is accurate enough out of the box for gaming, productivity, or hobbyist creative projects. Do note, however, that if your laptop uses an OLED display, there will naturally be some differences due to the differing display technology.
The wings that hold the monitors have a wide 225 degrees of movement. This is enough to position them from completely flat, matching your built-in screen, to angled inward, which I preferred. Depending on your orientation, you may prefer a deeper or narrower angle, so it’s nice to be able to position them accordingly.
The entire package feels very well designed and exceptionally well-considered. It feels like Xebec thought of just about everything. The USB cables, for example, are just long enough to connect without leaving a lot of messy slack wire protruding. The silicone on the frame wraps around just enough to grab the built-in monitor without covering any of the screen, even if you have very thin bezels. If you tilt the screens inward, they also extend far enough down that it acts like a bumper and no part of the monitors actually touch each other.
It even includes a kickstand that snaps into the back of the bracket and locks into place when not in use. This is important because the screens add enough extra weight that you’ll need to find a balance with the tilt of your screen. Without the kickstand, the screen can begin to fall backward if you’re titled too far back, but the stand holds the setup well and tucks away flush with the back when not in use.
Xebec Snap - Performance
Over the course of my time in tech journalism, I’ve been able to test a number of different portable monitor setups. The Xebec Snap is the hands-down easiest and most versatile I’ve ever encountered. The magnetic attachment system is a game-changer. It’s the multi-monitor setup I’ve actually stuck with.
Note: In this image, I neglected to reset my laptop's color settings. The integrated display is also an OLED while the Xebec are LCD, which accounts for the notable color difference here.
In the course of my work, I almost always have two windows open that I’m bouncing between. I’ve grown to be an alt+tab master. Likewise, when I’m gaming, Discord lives on standby. Yet, whether I’m working on a project or playing a game, it’s just inefficient to be flipping windows, relying on memory for facts and figures, hoping the game doesn’t crash or have some performance issue, sometimes dozens of times during a project or session.
The magic of the Snap is how fast it is to set up and change depending on your needs. It takes seconds to attach the bracket and plug it in, and seconds more to put the displays on their wings. From there, they turn on and by default mirror your desktop. Plugging in the pass-through charging immediately registered my laptop and sent power through as expected.
The three connections on the back of each display allow you to quickly pull each display off and flip its orientation in just a few seconds. In Landscape mode, you can also position it higher than your main display or directly in line. The only thing missing here is a bracket to position a monitor above the built-in display for a stacked setup like the Lenovo Yoga Book 9i.
Now, the first time you plug it in, you may need to adjust some settings. Using the Xebec app, you can quickly change the orientation and positioning of the monitors or use the Windows Display Settings. Using a rocker and button on the side of each monitor, you can also adjust brightness, contrast, and color settings, though the rocker smartly defaults to brightness which is all I found necessary.
Like me, you may also find that you need to update your Thunderbolt drivers to register Display out from USB Type-C. This was related to my particular laptop, though, and the Snap is designed to work out of the box.
Another thing to be aware of is that the kickstand can make using the laptop with a riser more difficult. I had to slide mine out several inches to tilt the screen to a comfortable viewing angle, leaving the chin hanging off the front. Big deal? Not really in my case, but it very well could be an issue with narrower risers.
For gaming, it can offer you a dual-screen experience, but I found it was best to use it for chat or a browser window. They’re limited to 60Hz, which is much slower than many high refresh rate gaming laptops offer (but standard for productivity). Just as importantly, adding a second 1080p can dramatically increase the load on your laptop’s built-in GPU, lowering your frame rates. It’s definitely doable but I found it to be a case by case basis on whether it made sense.
Final Thoughts
In the world of mountable, portable laptop monitors, the Xebec Snap truly delivers an exceptional experience. It doesn’t come cheap, however. At $549 for the dual-screen setup and $999 for the triple, it demands a significant premium over much of the competition. But it also feels much more practically useful than any competing setup I’ve ever tried, and the displays are significantly brighter (even though cheaper displays often claim similar brightness, they often fall very short). If you pick it up with the travel bag ($80), you can easily carry it to and from work or school.
So, is it worth it? If you’re looking for an extra display to increase your productivity and don’t want to wade through the masses of low quality clones, this is a safe bet that delivers exceptional results. If you don’t care about some extra setup or lower brightness and color accuracy, you’ll do just fine with a cheaper alternative. If you value premium quality and ease, the Xebec Snap is hard to beat.
The product described in this article was provided by the manufacturer for evaluation purposes.
