5 Reasons You Can Skip a 4K Monitor

The 4K monitor price is finally getting more affordable, so you might be considering upgrading a 1440p or even 1080p monitor to a monitor with more pixels and clearer images.

But before you are excited to cast more than 8 million pixels into your eyeball, there are a few things you need to remember, which may mean that a 4K display isn't for you.

Resolution is not the only factor in image quality

The quality of the image you perceive in your eyes depends on a number of factors, with resolution just one of them. That's why my old 51-inch 720p plasma TV made all 1080p LCD TVs look like faded photos at the time. Contrast, dynamic clarity, color gamut, and many other factors determine whether your brain thinks the image looks good.

With a given budget, you always sacrifice something for something else. If the monitor you buy is excellent in every way, you are sacrificing your budget. So if you buy a 4K monitor, the extra resolution may come at the expense of panel technology, which has poor contrast, low refresh rate, or a smaller screen than you could have afforded, and so on.

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What factors matter most to you depends on what you need the monitor to do. If you edit photos or do other visual design work, color accuracy and color gamut may be more important than the original resolution, while if you are a gamer, you may be more concerned with super high refresh rates and blur-free movement. Of course, if you have a lot of money, you can solve almost all of these problems by spending more money.

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Related Articles 4K games require high configuration

It takes a lot of rendering power to run a game at 4K resolution, especially if you want higher graphics settings or (surprisingly!) heavy options like ray tracing are enabled. To get the most out of 4K monitors in gaming, you'll need to spend $1,000 to $2,000 on your GPU (such as the RTX 5080 or 5090), which doesn't include other computer configurations that these GPUs need to perform at the best performance.

Of course, thanks to technologies like DLSS and FSR (using AI to upgrade lower resolution graphics), it is now possible to get a good value for money at "4K" with mid-range GPUs, but it makes sense that PC gamers tend to see 1440p as the best balance between image sharpness and excellent performance. If gaming is the main reason you want a 4K monitor, you may need to shift your budget to buying a lower resolution screen with better specifications in other aspects, which may make your gaming experience better.

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Related Articles Many 4K monitors are too small for this resolution

The above figure roughly illustrates the distance you need to keep from your 4K screen at a given screen size to benefit from the extra resolution. Now, before you ask this question, such charts are based on use cases like watching movies or playing video games where you want the entire screen to be within your field of view.

If we're talking about computer work, then that's different because you might check a small portion of the screen more carefully than just watching a video.

But, it is undeniable that once you increase the pixel density above a certain level, you can't actually tell the difference in resolution, because you've exceeded your eye's ability to even see that detail. That's why almost no phone manufacturer has bothered to install a 4K panel in their phones, and why even Apple doesn't bother to install a 4K screen in its 14-inch MacBook. There is no practical benefit to doing this.

This is not to say that people with sharp eyes cannot tell the difference between a 24-inch 1440p and a 4K UHD display at normal viewing distance. Just any difference perceived cannot justify the cost and complexity involved. Personally, I found that the 32-inch widescreen and 34-inch ultra-widescreen 1440p monitors look clear enough, but that's still something you need to judge for yourself.

Anyway, I think the 27-inch is the lowest range of 4K with any practical significance, and in fact, its advantages are obvious only at larger sizes.

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Related articles You will eventually zoom in on the UI

One of the reasons 4K monitors are attractive is that you can get more information on the screen. However, this is correct only if the on-screen UI (user interface) elements are scaled 1:1 with the display's pixels. Unless you buy a real large monitor (or 4K TV), content like text, icons, and menus are hard to read, or even harder to click.

Operating systems like macOS and Windows 11 automatically scale their UI elements if the screen size requires it to provide a comfortable experience on high-resolution displays. On my 34-inch 1440p ultra-wide monitor, no zooming is required.

However, if this is a 4K display of the same physical size, you have to zoom in on the elements to get the same comfortable UI experience. Now you have the option to disable this feature manually, if you have good eyesight and don't mind small text, you'll get huge space on your desktop, but if you can't handle this, you'll get the same amount of screen space, but with clearer text and graphics.

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Related Articles A wider screen may be a more useful option

There are many ways to increase the screen pixel without increasing the pixel density. Specifically, if you change the aspect ratio of the screen, you can add more space. Wide the 2560x1440 screen to 3440x1440 and you will have so much room for activity. If you are primarily concerned with 16:9 content, then this is certainly not a solution, but gamers and those working on computers can benefit from the ultra-wide aspect ratio.

For me, it's more useful to have a widescreen, especially since it's like placing two monitors side by side without borders. Splitting the 16:9 screen in two will result in the windows being too narrow for my needs, but they are beautiful and square on the 21:9 monitors!

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There are many good reasons to buy 4K monitors, but the truth is that most people don't need them, and even if they get them, they won't see huge benefits from it. If you really want a 4K monitor, don't let this stop you from buying, but at the same time, you shouldn't feel like this is the inevitable upgrade path you should take. More pixels don't always make things better!

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Let your eyes enjoy the brilliant 4K monitor.

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