Sometimes, size really does matter. When it comes to gaming monitors, while you can absolutely have a great experience with a small display, big screens will put you right into the action. We've found two of our favorite big-screen gaming displays on discount, and while they're very different form factors, both will deliver incredible visuals at a size and resolution you can really appreciate at its best.
Let's kick things off with the Asus ROG Swift PG42UQ, currently available at Amazon for $949. In terms of aspect ratio this is a conventional 16:9 display, but everything else, including its size, is supercharged.
For a start, it's a 4K OLED panel, meaning that colours are ultra-vivid and black levels are as dark as can be. It's also got a 138 Hz OC'd refresh rate, making it a slightly faster version of the same panel found in one of the other top-rated OLED gaming displays, the 120 Hz LG OLED C2.
The LG, however, is a TV, whereas we discovered in our review that the PG42UQ is much more of a proper gaming monitor. It's got a 0.1 ms (2 ms GTG) response time, G-Sync support, and a matte finish that might not make images visually "pop" in quite the same way as the big LG, but is much better at rejecting reflections.
It's even got great HDR handling, with a 750 nits brightness rating in HDR mode.
Connectivity-wise, you've pretty much got it all. Displayport 1.4, two HDMI 2.1 connections, two HDMI 2.0, four USB 3.2 Type-A, one USB 3.2 upstream, and a 3.5 mm audiojack. While this is definitely a gaming monitor more than a TV set, you could absolutely make it the central display for all your media viewing, with all your various devices hooked in.
And did I mention it's massive? 42-inches is about the top of what we'd say is useable for a 16:9 desktop monitor, but if you do decide to use one as your main display, it's worth noting that it does suffer from a bit of text-colour fringing. Not only that, but being an OLED, burn-in is always a potential concern.
So what if you're looking for something even bigger, without those caveats? Perhaps even, ultrawide?
The Samsung Odyssey Neo G9, currently available for $1,699.99 at Amazon, is what we like to refer to as a "silly-wide", and sits as our top recommendation for best ultrawide in our best monitor guide. It's essentially two 4K 32-inch screens welded together, which sounds like a horrible idea until you see the seamless result.
That fusion creates a display with a resolution of 7,680 x 2,160, which means even the almighty RTX 4090 needs some upscaling help to push it at very high frame rates. But that's really not the point of an ultrawide this, well, wide, as that 57-inch screen size and immense width creates possibilities that other monitors can only dream of.
How about a game running on one side, with a bit of background YouTube on the other? Or keeping track of multiple productivity windows across a display that's got room for them all?
Whatever you use it for, the Neo G9 is going to look pretty fantastic. It's got DisplayHDR 1000 certification with full-array local dimming and 2,392 zones with a 350 nits minimum and 420 nits typical rating for SDR content, but our Jeremy found in his review that it looked a lot punchier than a regular 400 nit panel. And as for HDR, he reckoned it was well beyond 1,000 nits of brightness. And if anyone would know, it's Jeremy.
Pixel density is also superb, with crisp clear fonts across the entire display, meaning all those productivity windows will look pin-sharp no matter where you put them.
Downsides? Well, if you hadn't noticed, it's really, really wide. That means neck craning, and also a massive amount of desk space to put it on. It's also not an OLED panel like the Asus above, so don't expect super-inky blacks.
That being said though, it's something of a singularly impressive display, and one that won't fail to wow anyone that sets eyes on it.
So, there we go. Two massive monitors, both at prices much lower than their MSRP. Which you pick will very much depend on your use case—and how much room (and cash) you can spare—but either are ready to give you huge amounts of visual real-estate, in this case, for less than you might have expected.
