Mac Won't Offer Your Monitor's Resolution (3440×1440 Missing or Wrong): How to Fix It

Updated 2026-10-16

Your monitor is 3440×1440 (or 2560×1080, or 4K), but System Settings › Displays doesn’t offer that resolution, the picture is stretched, or you are stuck at a lower refresh rate. This page walks through the causes in the order they usually happen, and ends with the fix for the one case macOS cannot solve by itself: a mode that is missing from the monitor’s EDID.

Symptoms

• The native resolution is not in the list of resolutions, even with every option shown.
• The image is stretched sideways on an ultrawide, or soft because macOS is scaling a lower mode.
• The resolution is there, but only at 50 Hz, or only on one of the monitor’s inputs.

These come up again and again on Apple’s forums and Reddit (“I cannot find a 3440x1440 display option”).

Step 1: Rule out cables, adapters and docks (most cases)

Apple’s own checklist covers the common causes. In order:

1. Cable and adapter. If the cable or any adapter in the chain cannot carry the resolution and refresh rate, macOS uses a lower one. USB-C and Thunderbolt adapters must support DisplayPort Alt Mode (or Thunderbolt 3/4).
2. Docks and hubs. Connect the display straight to a port on the Mac. Many docks cap resolution or refresh rate, and DisplayLink docks work differently altogether.
3. Your Mac’s limits. Each Mac model supports a set number of external displays at given resolutions and refresh rates; check the specifications page for your model.
4. Re-detect. Unplug and replug the display, sleep and wake the Mac, or open Displays, hold Option and click Detect Displays.
5. The monitor’s own menu. Some monitors switch an input to an older HDMI mode, or change the EDID while picture-by-picture is on. Check the input settings in the monitor’s on-screen menu.

If 3440×1440 appears after any of these, you are done. HDMI bandwidth is a common one: as a Hacker News commenter points out, 50 Hz is what an HDMI 1.4 link can carry at 3440×1440.

Step 2: Check whether the mode is missing from the EDID

Every monitor sends the Mac a small data block, the EDID, listing the resolutions and refresh rates it supports. macOS only offers what is in that list. If your cable and port are fine and the mode is still missing, look at everything macOS offers: open System Settings › Displays, select the monitor, click Advanced…, turn on Show resolutions as list, then Show all resolutions.

If the resolution you want is not in that list, the monitor’s EDID simply doesn’t advertise it for this input — common on HDMI inputs, KVM switches, and when the monitor is in picture-by-picture mode.

Can macOS fix this on its own?

No. There is no setting to add a mode. Intel Macs can still use EDID override files in /Library/Displays/Contents/Resources/Overrides, but on Apple silicon those files are ignored for EDID replacement; the override has to be applied while macOS is running.

Picture-by-picture? Display Fixes Pro

If the missing mode is the half-screen resolution of your monitor’s picture-by-picture (PBP) mode, Display Fixes Pro adds it for you, offers to switch when you turn PBP on or off, and puts it back after a reconnect, wake or restart. Free for 14 days, then $4.99 once. Details are in the PBP guide.

Any other mode: BetterDisplay Pro

To add an arbitrary resolution or refresh rate, use BetterDisplay’s EDID override, which has a graphical interface. It is a Pro feature (paid, with a free trial), and the app needs to stay running to re-apply the override.

Limits of any EDID override

• It cannot add bandwidth. If the link cannot carry the mode, the screen stays black or shows “out of range”. Unplug the display to go back.
• Private macOS API. On Apple silicon these tools can stop working after a macOS update.
• Not for DisplayLink docks, AirPlay or Sidecar, which do not use this EDID.