If you have a Raspberry Pi 4 or Pi 400, you may well have noticed that it features not one but two micro-HDMI video output ports. With a couple of suitable cables, this means that you can hook your Raspberry Pi up to a dual monitor setup. You can even use two 4K monitors and output 4K video to both at up to 30Hz (fps), or up to 60Hz at a lower resolution.

It’s fairly simple to do and there are options for how to arrange your Raspberry Pi OS desktops on the two monitors. Let’s get it set up…

What You Will Need

For a Raspberry Pi dual monitor setup, you will need the following items:

Connecting the Monitors

If you are using a Raspberry Pi 4, the two micro-HDMI ports are found on the side of the board. If using a Raspberry Pi 400, they are found at the rear of its integral keyboard.

Connect the micro-HDMI end of each of your two cables to one of the output ports. Note that on the Raspberry Pi 4, the primary display port is the one labeled HDMI0, nearest the USB-C power input. On the Pi 400, it’s the one nearest the microSD card. However, you can easily switch the primary display of your dual setup between the two monitors in Raspberry Pi OS’s Screen Configuration options, as we’ll explore later.

Connect the full-size HDMI of each cable to an input on each monitor. Then turn on each monitor and check that its input is set to the correct HDMI input.

Power It Up

Now power up your Raspberry Pi. Note that during bootup, the rainbow color test screen and startup processes info will appear on the right-hand monitor.

Once it has booted up, the Raspberry Pi OS desktop should appear on both monitors. If your primary monitor is on the left, that desktop will have the raspberry icon applications menu at the top left. You can move the mouse pointer past the right edge of the main desktop and it should continue onto the desktop on the right-hand monitor.

Raspberry Pi running two desktops

If this is not the case, and the main raspberry icon applications menu is on the desktop on the right-hand monitor, don’t worry: you can easily switch them around in Raspberry Pi OS.

From the main raspberry icon menu, select Preferences > Screen Configuration. A window will open, showing the layout of the two monitors: HDMI-1 and HDMI-2. To swap them around, select HDMI-1 and drag it to the bottom. Then drag HDMI-2 over to the left. Finally, drag HDMI-1 up to the right of HDMI-2.

Click the green tick icon at the top left of the window to update the screen layout settings. A dialog will appear, saying that changes will only take effect on reboot.

Raspberry Pi Screen Configuration for dual monitors

Click Yes to reboot. Once rebooted, the desktops should be in the correct positions.

Raspberry Pi Dual Monitor Setup

As you can see, it’s simple to hook up two monitors to a Raspberry Pi 4 or Pi 400 to get more screen estate. Note that you can mix and match screen sizes and types. If using two 4K monitors, you can have both running at full 4K resolution at up to 30Hz (settable in Screen Configuration > Frequency).

Alternatively, if you want 4K video output with a higher refresh rate, you can connect a single 4K monitor and run it at 4K resolution at up to 60Hz.