That is what you’ll want to learn about USB port colours

It is a frequent joke that the “U” in USB is a mistake. The format is hardly common. There are a number of connector sorts — largely USB-A and USB-C, today — and regardless of which one you are coping with, it is typically laborious to inform what kind of data speeds you will be getting, not to mention energy supply. Think about that 2025’s entry-level iPhone 17 has a USB-C port, however can solely transfer information at USB 2.0 charges, even though the two.0 spec initially launched a quarter-century in the past. Hope you’ve got an hour helpful in case you’re attempting to backup your telephone, or switch giant quantities of 4K video.

As if that weren’t complicated sufficient, a number of the ports on laptop computer, desktop, and pill PCs (together with their equipment) come in several colours. That is one thing I by no means paid a lot consideration to till just lately, if I am trustworthy. However as I’ve realized, it could actually probably type out a number of the chaos on older machines. That is not the case on newer ones, as I will illustrate.

What do the completely different USB port colours imply?

A naive however well-meaning effort

The colours are the brainchild of the USB Implementors Discussion board, or USB-IF, an business group that oversees all USB requirements. Its members embrace firms like Apple, Intel, HP, and Microsoft — some fairly heavy hitters. This explains why Macs are sometimes on the vanguard of port expertise, even when Apple needed to be dragged kicking and screaming into adopting USB-C on iPhones as a substitute of Lightning. Finally it took new rules from the European Union, however I digress.

Again on subject, the colours are largely meant to sign what information switch speeds a port is able to. In some circumstances, they will point out energy capabilities as effectively, if not at all times the precise wattage you will be coping with. That is extraordinarily necessary in the case of tablets and laptops — whereas some merchandise can cost by way of USB-C as a substitute of a devoted energy brick, you will not be capable to cost a 240W gaming laptop computer that manner if its ports max out at 100W.

There are six colours you would possibly discover within the wild: white, black, blue, purple, yellow, and orange. These are all steadily changing into irrelevant, although, for causes that can turn out to be clear within the subsequent part.

• White: You are unlikely to see this anymore, because it’s tied to USB 1.x — a typical that was solely round for 4 years earlier than being fully eclipsed by USB 2.0. 1.x ports are solely able to 1.5 to 12 megabits per second (Mbps), which at greatest would take over 11 minutes to switch 1GB of knowledge. Energy is capped at 2.5W, which is barely sufficient for a mouse or keyboard.
• Black: As initially meant (extra on this in a minute), black alerts USB 2.0 speeds as much as 480Mbps. Charging is unaffected. When unsure, assume {that a} black port will not do any higher than 2.5W.
• Blue: This is among the most typical colours you will see, flagging USB 3.0 information speeds as much as 5 gigabits per second (Gbps). Since USB 2.0 is more and more a relic of the previous, you will typically see it on equipment that don’t have anything to do with information, like moveable battery packs.
• Yellow: This can be used for each USB 2.0 and three.0 ports, which is a useless overlap, for my part. In any occasion, the primary function is to indicate assist for always-on features in addition to passive energy supply. A telephone related to a yellow USB port ought to be capable to proceed charging even when your PC is asleep, as an example.
• Orange: I’ve by no means seen this shade in particular person, and it is not laborious to know why — this means the identical energy expertise as yellow, however solely for USB 3.0 connections. The three.0 normal continues to be very a lot round, however any fashionable {hardware} maker that cares about each information and energy might be going to make use of a more moderen normal.
• Pink: This factors to both USB 3.1 Gen 2 or USB 3.2 speeds between 10 and 20Gbps. For a measure of how fast that’s, contemplate that 1GB switch instance I pointed to earlier — with a 20Gbps connection (together with a appropriate cable), you possibly can copy the identical information in about 0.4 seconds. A purple port additionally tends to indicate always-on features, however this can be moot, since that and passive energy supply are sometimes de facto on fashionable PCs.

What about USB 4 and Thunderbolt?

An indication of the occasions

For those who’re comparatively new to the PC area, you is likely to be questioning if I am hallucinating these colours. Certainly, on the Lenovo gaming laptop computer I purchased just lately, all the USB ports share a single shade — black — even though they’re rated for at the least USB 3.0 efficiency, and considered one of them is a USB 4 port I exploit to connect a Thunderbolt 4 dock. The identical is true of many different computer systems, together with Apple’s Mac lineup. It does not matter in case you have a 13-inch MacBook Air or a decked-out Mac Studio.

What provides? The reply is that the USB-IF and producers have largely deserted shade coding, presumably as a result of few folks have been conscious that it had any significance. There’s been nearly no promotion — I have been in tech journalism for many years, and I nonetheless needed to exit of my approach to be taught the issues offered right here. It is as if the USB-IF opened a brand new retailer on the town, then puzzled why nobody bothered to indicate up when the one promoting was a tiny garden signal.

Another excuse for the shift is the accelerating transition to USB-C connectors, often related to USB 3.1 or later. It isn’t a lot that USB-C ports are tiny — it is that they have been multi-purpose from the beginning, so there is no must flag one as constructed for charging or high-speed information. Some ports will certainly carry out higher than others, however in that regard, colours could not presumably cowl all of the completely different pace and energy configurations with out changing into much more head-scratching.

As an alternative, the transfer has been towards one thing apparent: labels. My laptop computer’s 10Gbps port has that in writing, and its USB 4 connection is topped by a lightning icon, representing Thunderbolt assist. All of the USB 3.0 ports are marked with the USB SuperSpeed (“SS”) brand. I should still must verify my system’s official specs to see how a lot energy USB-C equipment can faucet, however for each different state of affairs, there is no want to take a look at paint swatches.