Use your laptop as a monitor - how it works

You can only use your laptop as a monitor to a limited extent. The idea is actually clever: working on two screens, but the second screen is the laptop. We'll show you how it works.

Using a laptop as a monitor: what works and what doesn't?

• If you connect two laptops with an HDMI cable, the second laptop cannot be used as a monitor. A direct transfer from the picture is not possible.
• With the free software from SpaceDesk, you can use your laptop as an extended monitor without any problems. Simply install the software on both devices. Tools like MaxiVista also offer this.
• Alternatively, you can control your laptop remotely instead of using it as a second screen. Remote maintenance software such as TeamViewer can be used for this.
• If you would like to use the laptop more often as a monitor, it is worth using VNC software. This streams the screen of the second PC to your own computer. We explain in detail how you can use Windows 7 VNC in an extra article.

Read also how to film your screen under Windows.