3 reasons why your next monitor should be mini-LED

Computer monitors have had a strange technology gap for quite some time now. At the top of the stack are OLED gaming monitors, which offer the best performance and picture quality, and the next most common option seems to be monitors with very basic backlighting, either no local dimming or a very rudimentary implementation of it.

Meanwhile, TVs have gained a huge selection of affordable mini-LED models that offer much of what makes OLEDs attractive but come at a much lower price. The selection of computer monitors using this technology has been relatively small, but there are many great options out there now, and you should consider mini-LED technology as your next monitor for several good reasons.

It's much cheaper than OLED.

Credit: Tim Rattray / How-To Geek

If money is no object, then I will tell you right away that you should buy an OLED gaming monitor. They have become so cheap that even I was tempted a siren's song with perfect black levels, rich color and instant pixel response times combined with extremely low latency.

Yes, OLED is still risky to use as a monitor precisely because of the threat of burn-in. However, modern OLED screens have a variety of ways to solve this problem, and if you combine that with just being smart (and using a screen saver), you'll be fine. Honestly, price is the main reason to avoid OLED, and there's no getting around the fact that OLED technology is expensive and the most coveted new screens are the most expensive of them all.

8/10

Permission: 3840 x 2160 (4K)
Screen size: 27 inches
Brand: Alienware (Dell)
Max. Refresh rate: 240 Hz

A comparable mini LED monitor may cost as little as a third or half the price of an OLED monitor. Again, there's no arguing that OLEDs are clearly superior, but are they three times superior? Are mini-LEDs bad when viewed in isolation? The answer to both questions is a simple “no,” meaning that if your budget isn't limited to OLED displays at their current prices, then Mini-LED is the best option.

It's much better than other LCD displays.

Look at my IPS gaming laptop with a single backlight and terrible glow. This is something that most people with LCD monitors still struggle with. Of the LCD backlight options currently available in the mass market, Mini LED is the best option. RGB LEDs are emerging, and one day micro-LEDs will be the clear successor to mini-LEDs, but if we're talking about variants of the typical LCD monitors that most people can buy, then the option is obvious.

Of course, not all mini LED monitors are created equal. The number of dimming zones varies, and more importantly, the algorithms that control those tiny backlights have a huge impact on the monitor's performance. In particular, the question of mini led bloom must be controlled by the monitor's firmware and can affect whether you are happy with the monitor or not.

Bloom is a glow around bright objects next to dark areas, revealing zones. Until the LEDs have a 1:1 match to the pixels they illuminate, this will always be somewhat of a problem.

Bloom is visible on the iPad Pro M2 screen.

However, the truth is that flowering is usually an exaggerated problem, and there are many ways to solve it. So it's not that there are more problems with mini-LED than with OLED, it's just that the problems are different.

His shortcomings are quickly diminishing.

I recently spent a week using my TCL mini LED TV as a monitor and this experience was an eye opener. I've been using a mini LED screen on my iPad and MacBook for quite some time now, but seeing this technology scaled up to a larger size and working just as well has made me a believer.

Having seen mini LED monitors such as AOC Q27G3XMN priced well under $300, with lots of features, And the offer of a mini-LED backlight really makes me question whether I want to spend $900 on a 27-inch QD-OLED instead. If my last name were “Gates” or “Bezos”, I wouldn't think twice. Unfortunately, my last name is “blogger,” so why not enjoy some cheap thrills?