What to look for when buying a monitor
Before you jump into individual reviews, it’s worth considering the bigger picture when selecting which display is right for you
Colour giveaways
The days when a bog-standard monitor produced terrible colours are long gone: even entry-level displays will cover a solid range of colours with respectable accuracy. But that doesn’t mean you need to settle for mediocrity. If you want a display with colours that punch you between the eyes, or you prize accuracy over wide gamuts, there are clues.
The first clue comes in the type of panel (see IPS vs VA, below). This rule of thumb still holds: IPS produces the whitest whites, OLED the most vivid colours and richest blacks, and VA sits somewhere in the middle.
But if you’re willing to dig into the specs you’ll find more hints. As we discuss in “The magic of FRC” opposite, a -bit panel will produce more colours than an -bit panel and an -bit panel more than a -bit panel – until FRC gets involved. And it can be surprisingly effective.
Reputable manufacturers also put their monitors through their own tests to produce colour coverage claims. You might see NTSC, sRGB and DCI-P coverage quoted, for instance. Around % coverage of NTSC is good, and roughly equivalent to % of sRGB and % of DCI-P. But for films and photos to look their best, you want close to % for all three spaces.
Contrast ratio shouldn’t be used as a proxy for quality, but it will tell you how impactful blacks will look. Nor is average Delta E (a measure of colour accuracy) the indicator it used to be. Almost all the monitors on test achieve an average Delta E of less than one, which used to be quite an achievement as it indicates near-perfection so far as the human eye is concerned.
There’s only one way to truly see how good a panel is, and that’s to read independent tests such as PC Pro’s.
Gaming choice
This group test doesn’t include gaming monitors as they are a niche to themselves. However, if you’re looking for a general-purpose display that also makes games look good there are three things to look for.
The first is refresh rates. Most monitors stick at Hz, which is fine for day-to-day use, but once you go above Hz you’ll find that fast-paced in-game action looks smoother, and gives you a competitive advantage too. Ideally you want adaptive sync support as well, as this synchronises the refresh rate of the monitor to the output of the graphics card. AMD FreeSync is bog standard. If you’re serious about gaming, you want one of Nvidia’s G-Sync processors inside (see tinyurl.com/ gsync). Finally, look for low response times. For most, ms grey-to-grey is fine, but gaming monitors will go far lower.
Curved vs straight
Some people swear by curved monitors, especially gamers as it helps them feel more immersed in the action. Even more so if you opt for a setup with two, or even three, curved monitors. You’ll see that all three of our curved monitors this month have a R rating, which means that if they formed a circle around you the radius would be ,cm – so, one-and-a-half metres.
If you’re using a single in or
in monitor then the effect isn’t so notable, but it’s true that it reduces the amount of head movement required to see the corner of the screen. We don’t think it’s a killer reason to choose one screen or another at this size, however.
IPS produces the whitest whites, OLED the most vivid colours and richest blacks, and VA sits somewhere in the middle
IPS vs VA
All the monitors here use in-plane switching (IPS) or vertical alignment (VA) panels. IPS panels tend to give cleaner whites, so are often favoured for business use, while VA panels tend to offer greater contrast and lower response times. They’re also easier to use in curved monitors.
But “tend” is an important word there. For instance, the IPS panel in Eizo’s ColorEdge CGX had a greater measured contrast ratio than one of the VA panels on test, and NEC uses VA technology in its MultiSync EFL monitor – and that delivered fantastic whites.
Those rules of thumb still hold, but don’t base buying decisions on them. Instead, look for independent testing.
Flexible choices
Only one monitor in this group test, the AOC BCA, doesn’t include a height-adjustable stand. And we feel such a stand is now crucial so that you can put the monitor at exactly the right height (the top of the screen should be at eye level, or slightly below, so that you’re always looking downwards – it’s all about posture).
You’ll never regret having a flexible stand, so look for the capability to pivot it through £° and to tilt a generous amount. ViewSonic wins here, with both of its monitors providing a superb ° backwards tilt compared to the typical ° to °.
Having a VESA mount slot means that you can buy an arm or wall mount, which isn’t mainstream but some people love them.
You’ll never regret having a flexible stand, so look for the capability to pivot it through 90° and to tilt a generous amount
How big should you go?
There’s no right answer to the size question. We set in as the minimum for this group test, but you may find a in panel makes more sense, especially if your budget only extends to p screens. On a in screen, this gives a density of pixels per inch (ppi) and that means text can look fuzzy. A in Full HD screen has £ppi, so looks sharper, but now eyesight comes into the equation: if you must increase the dpi in the OS to make everything easier to read, you’re losing out on resolution.
On the other hand, we review three in screens with a K resolution in this Labs, and ended up loving the sheer amount of detail on offer. Plus you don’t need to move your head around to see what’s going on, as you do with a in panel.
As we said, there’s no right answer. So let’s instead go for yet more rules of thumb. For most people, a pixel density of over ppi will look sharp. And generally, in terms of screen size, bigger is better. We’ll leave the rest of the decision to you.
Time to dock
Anyone who uses a laptop powered by USB-C should seriously consider a docking monitor. One that includes a USB-C port, that ideally features an RJ port for wired networking, and that includes enough ports for your peripherals. Just make sure that its USB-C port delivers enough power. In general, W and above is fine, but demanding laptops (especially those with discrete graphics) may want more.
Some people also like to plug multiple computers (or a console) into their monitor, in which case look for a USB-B port as you will then be able to share connected peripherals between devices.
Look at the warranty
People often skirt over the warranty when buying electronic goods, and that’s fine if things don’t go wrong. If something does happen, though, you’ll be extremely pleased to have paid a little more for a monitor with an on-site swapout warranty, as the company will swoop in, remove your faulty display and replace it with a working unit. With a collect-andreturn warranty, they will arrange collection and attempt to repair it, usually within days. And with a lowly return-to-base warranty, you’re responsible for sending it back to the repair centre.
Fortunately, monitors are some of the most reliable IT kit around, which we know from our annual Excellence awards ( see issue , p ). You can see how satisfied our readers are with each company with the scores in the feature table on p.
Sustainability questions
Finally, we come to sustainability. Monitors are not a product that you will be able to repair yourself, so we’re looking for circularity
(how easy it is to reuse components at end of life), recyclability and the environmental cost of building and shipping each monitor.
Naturally, we have to rely on the companies’ own environmental claims (for example, use of postconsumer recycled plastic) and third parties for this. While imperfect, EPEAT is the best proxy we’ve found, as it examines supply chains for the parts used in manufacturing and delivers a wider verdict on each company’s actions. This is summarised in the EPEAT rating on the feature table on p.
One final word: a product that is thrown away after three years of use is far less sustainable than one that delivers great results for ten years. This is one of the reasons why we will often recommend Eizo’s monitors, for instance, despite their high initial purchase price.