Pixel 8 wrongly thinks external display is still connected, no way to correct
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My Pixel 8 seems to be stuck thinking that an external monitor is still connected, despite having disconnected it hours ago.
My friend let me connect my Pixel 8 to his portable monitor via USB-C to try it out. That worked fine and then I disconnected it. But now, hours later, I still see the external display icon in the top bar and I see "External Display" listed as "on" under "Other devices" in Settings > Connected devices.
Beyond this, there are other oddities: I get no sound from my phone when I play videos (because it's trying to play sound on the phantom display?). When I take screenshots, I get two at a time (one of the phone screen, one of the phantom display?).
As far as I can tell, there is no way to tell the phone that it's disconnected. Tapping on "External Display" takes me to a screen that lets me change the rotation on the external display and shows its resolution, but there's no control to disconnect. Long pressing, swiping, etc on "External Display" do nothing. I don't see any way to make the phone realize the display is not connected.
I've tried a few other things to try to fix it:
- Connecting my phone to my PC with a different USB-C cable
- Connecting to a monitor of my own with USB-C to DisplayPort (although, the phone doesn't recognize this monitor)
- Plugging a USB-C cable in to the phone with nothing on the other end
- Unplugging the USB-C cable
- Turning airplane mode on and off
- Locking/unlocking
I haven't tried restarting yet, because it seems crazy that my phone is stuck thinking it's got a display attached when there is literally nothing connected.


Asked by user3427070
(101 rep)
Jul 30, 2025, 10:12 AM