The square USB plug is intentional. USB-C is not always the best plug. Take a look at USB channel loss budgets[1]. This is a very simple read, even for people w

The square USB plug is intentional. USB-C is not always the best plug. Take a look at USB channel loss budgets[1]. This is a very simple read, even for people who are not at home in electronics and signals. To summarise the document, the "square USB plug" aka USB-B was conceived when USB client devices were simple, had short traces, little noise, and thus were expected to emit a signal with very little signal loss. This allowed for a relatively long cable. USB-C was conceived to deal with complex devices, which incurred more signal loss, allowing for a shorter cable to keep the total signal loss in the system in check. So even today, A-to-B cables can be longer than C-to-C (even though it is only marginally). The odd thing is that the spec defines legacy C-to-B cables at far below their true capabilities. According to the spec the loss budget for a C host device is 6.5dB, as opposed to the 10dB of an old A/B host. This should allow for a cable assembly with a channel loss of 11dB! And yet the spec insists on a mere 4dB. So technically someone could make a "non-standard" 11dB cable that should just work, given the guarantees by the rest of the spec. [1]: https://usb.org/sites/default/files/USB_3.1_Loss_Budget_Rev_1.0_-_2015-03-02.pdf https://usb.org/sites/default/files/USB_3.1_Loss_Budget_Rev_...