Thunderbolt 3 runs longer than 18-inches can be passive or active. The passive ones have lower speed, with the max data rate hitting about 20Gbit/second at two meters of cable length.

The Thunderbolt 3 cable is active, rather than passive. Instead of carrying up to 5 Gbps of USB 3.1 Gen 1 data, these active Thunderbolt cables throttle down to USB 2.0 speeds, offering about ...

(The passive/active difference could also cause significant confusion if you connected two USB 3.x devices with a Thunderbolt 3 cable. A passive Thunderbolt 3 cable supported USB 3.1 at up to 10 Gbps, ...

Apple has quietly started selling its 2-meter Thunderbolt 3 cable priced at $129, offering a braided design and active cable technology that supports full Thunderbolt 3 data transfer speeds of up ...

Active Thunderbolt 3 cables feature integrated circuitry, which results in a slightly larger area where the cable terminates at the USB-C connector when compared to the passive cables in my ...

While not technically Thunderbolt 4, OWC’s new 15-foot cable offers Thunderbolt 4-level throughput of 40Gbps for less than Apple’s 3-meter alternative.

Passive Thunderbolt cables have a maximum length of about 0.8m, but this is an active cable. That means there are chips and retimers inside of it working together to reduce signal jitter.