What is the fastest ethernet speed I can obtain with a MacBook 12-inch 2016 please?

The airport modem in your Macbook is 802.11ac with a theoretical limit of 866.7 Mbps. The fastest ethernet adapter that you could use (1gb Ethernet) would be 1000mbps. In other words wifi would be very close to the fastest ethernet adapter that you could use.

You would need to find a hub that would support power delivery and ethernet. Something like this

https://www.amazon.com/Dell-Docking-Station-Delivery-DisplayPort/dp/B07S3XHMP1

But after you look at the cost involved, maybe it's not worth it to get that extra 134mbps.

Just occurred to me. A simple solution might be to check if your current multi port adapters usb type a ports are actually usb 3.0 or 2.0. If they are 3.0, you could just get a usb 3.0 (type a of course) to ethernet adapters. As those will also allow the full speed of a ethernet cable.

depending on which one you get you might need to install some software from the manufacturer to get that adapter to work but if that’s fine with you, might be a simple solution without having to buy new things that you already have.

No problem, just thought I can add a bit of background.

I have a 2017 MacBook. In my case I currently have a Tripp-Lite adapter that includes three USB 3.1 Gen 1 (Type-A) and a single Gigabit Ethernet port. Unfortunately, this adapter did not come with a pass-thru USB-C port for power ... so I'm looking into another adapter for myself to satisfy that requirement. Regardless, I get full Gigabit Ethernet bandwidth when using this adapter. I believe OWC will have the adapter that I'm looking for ... and maybe for you as well.

As far as Ethernet cable, CAT-5e is designed for Gigabit Ethernet. Anything (CAT-6 or higher) will not be necessary and I wouldn't bother getting one unless you can find it at the same price as CAT-5e.

FWIW. "Speed" when it comes to Ethernet or Wi-Fi really comes down to two things:

1. Theoretical bandwidth
2. Actual data throughput

For a simple analogy, think of a multi-lane highway. You can increase the bandwidth by increasing the number of lanes. Removing lanes, of course, would have the opposite effect. This has no direct relationship to speed. That is set by law. Of course, for both Ethernet and Wi-Fi, that "law" would be physics. For networks, speed is measured in Mbps or Gbps, as opposed to MPH or KPH, for highways. Staying with Ethernet, Fast Ethernet (an out-dated standard) is 100 Mbps, Gigabit Ethernet is 1000 Mbps, and it goes up from there with newer and newer standards. Like a highway, all lanes must support the same top speeds from point A to B. Any bottlenecks will reduce the overall bandwidth between those same two points.

As with any highway, the more vehicles that are on it at the same time the slower they can go (throughput). Think rush-hour traffic. To alleviate this congestion, you would need to add more lanes (again, bandwidth.)

Now going back to your Mac notebook. It should be capable of having a theoretical bandwidth of up to 1000 Mbps over an Ethernet "highway." However, depending on the amount of "traffic" between it and its endpoint, the actual throughput between those same two endpoints could be anywhere from 95% or less than that bandwidth. The busier the network, the lower the throughput.

Hope that helps.

Glad to have helped! Nice find on that ethernet cable, I have a few that are the flat ones but are cloth braid wrapped. Totally doesn't make a difference in functionality but if it's cool then it goes faster right? haha

Also make sure to install the drivers for that ethernet adapter to work. It says only windows 8/10 will work without drivers being installed. Either comes with the device on a disk... or better yet, download link.

g=grams

b=bit

B=Byte

m=milli

M=mega

G=giga

Make an effort to use the correct case letters.

Looks like you don't know the difference between a g and G either.

I have a MacBook 12" 2016 model.

As ClassicII mentioned, with the WiFi you should expect around 400-600Mbp/s in real world situations. You will need a newer WiFi router that is capable of 802.11ac(now called WiFi 5) Look on the router to see if you find any wording that indicates that to know if it's capable of that. (if you already own a Mac and want to check the router speed the lazy way, make sure your Mac is connected to the router and option click the wifi icon in your menu. You will see a lot of light grey text, look for "Tx rate" and you will see your MacBook's current maximum speed to the router. This is affected by distance so it will change depending on your WiFi environment and distance to your router.

For wired, I would recommend the one made by Belkin, If you buy from them, it will be black, if you prefer the apple one, you can get the white version of the Belkin adapter here. I personally own the white apple variant, it works great, and required no additional software to be installed for it to work. (some of the ones on amazon require installing software like from Anker)

As long as your ethernet cable is under 300ft long, a cat5e will give you the full 1000Mbp/s, anything better will also work as well but will not really do much for you.

Depending on the USB to Ethernet adapter you get, you can expect anywhere form around 600Mbps to up to about 1000Mbps. The Belkin one gives me the full speed. (specifically for the MacBook 12" since the processor is a bit on the weak side, if you are a heavy multitasker and using up a lot of your processing resources, your max speed though the ethernet may drop down a bit, usually not noticeable though.)

If you are using your multi adapter, make sure the usb c port on it is not just a power pass though. (usually will show a line with a dotted line above it) If that is the case then it will not work for the adapter, and you are correct, you may need to use one of the USB ports on it and purchase a USB type A to ethernet adapter instead and will drop to USB 2 speeds, about 400Mbp/s.