5 Best Gaming Monitors for 4K Resolution and Variable Refresh Rates

There’s a lot of terminology to wade through when searching for a gaming monitor. For the folks fed up with all the acronyms and numbers, here’s a breakdown of the essentials. The technical basics, if you will, of PC gaming.

Resolution: 4K refers to the screen resolution or pixel density, basically how many pixels are on a screen. In gaming, the higher the resolution, the better your game will look. 4K is standard at 3,840 by 2,160 pixels. TVs are even edging toward 8K right now. Other common resolutions are 1440p (essentially 2K) and standard HD at 1080p.

Refresh Rate: Refresh rate measures how many times per second an image gets updated. This impacts smoothness, frame rate, and input lag. This is where a good refresh rate, measured in hertz (Hz), comes in. If you have a 144Hz refresh rate, the monitor redraws what you see 144 times a second. A high refresh rate is a must for competitive gaming, where split seconds make all the difference.

Aspect Ratio: The aspect ratio of a display measures the proportion of width to height. The standard wide-screen aspect ratio is 16:9. Some monitors support ultrawide aspect ratios of 21:9 and 32:9.

Screen Size: Equally as important as aspect ratio, screen size is important for more than just figuring out if the thing will fit on your desk. For most gamers, 32 inches is a standard-sized monitor that will do them just fine. For competition purpose, pros often prefer smaller monitors. Monitors from 25 to 27 inches are commonly used in e-sports.

Your PC: This might be the most important factor, and it has nothing to do with any of these monitors. How powerful is your PC, and how hard can you push it? If you can’t get consistent performance above 60 fps in most modern games, chances are you don’t need a monitor with a 240Hz refresh rate.