The colour space of the screen was quite a lot wider than the sRGB reference (used for SDR content) and we measured a 126.2% relative coverage. There was over-coverage of sRGB in red and green shades, causing those to look more neon and vivid than intended. As normal with any wide gamut screen, measuring the accuracy of sRGB colours results in high dE errors, with an average of 5.0 and a maximum of 11.9. This is further exacerbated by the overly cool colour temp leaving a poorer colour accuracy than might otherwise have been offered if it had been closer to our 6500K target. Out of the box at these default settings, the screen is really not accurate for sRGB / SDR content.

Regardless, these issues will happen over hundreds and hundreds of hours of playing the same kind of content, so don’t worry about it too much…just a little. As long as you let these features operate as intended and don’t leave the screen showing bright static elements for a long time, the LG 27GR95QE shouldn’t burn-in. Features We calibrated the screen at a software level using Portrait Display’s Calman Ultimate software and our calibration tools. We will also look at hardware level calibration afterwards.

If you want to improve the colour accuracy further, the 27GR95QE works with LG’s Calibration Studio software though you will need one of the listed colourimeters to use. When you enable an HDR input source you are left with a few available preset modes in the menu – Gamer 1, Gamer 2, FPS, RTS and Vivid. Most other picture related settings are greyed out, but brightness remains available in case you wanted to turn that down at all, and sharpness too in case you wanted to change that for gaming and movie viewing. The default 100% brightness setting is optimal for maintaining the highest possible peak brightness in HDR content. The LG 27GR95QE-B boasts a 27-inch OLED panel with a 2560 x 1440 resolution, a 240Hz refresh rate, and a 0.03 response time. The OLED module’s brightness is rated at 200 cd/m2 while its contrast is listed at 1500000:1. This model is capable of fantastic HDR performance even if it doesn’t reach the usual 1000 cd/m2 peak outputs from its mini-LED counterparts. You can see in the graphs above that in Gamer 2 mode, the brightness in the darker grey shades up to around 20 was a bit higher than the target line, whereas in Gamer 1 it was a bit lower. Also at the top end for the lighter greys, the brightness was a bit more consistent and slightly higher. It’s the higher brightness in these areas that’s really the only difference here with Gamer 2, but this might be useful to bring out more shadow detail or for a slightly brighter dark HDR experience. Newer firmware April 2023– Gamer 2 mode now updated, but much cooler

You’re meant to control the monitor with the included remote, but even with that, the UltraGear OLED 27 runs into issues. For starters, the battery slot on the remote requires a screwdriver to get open, and LG doesn’t include the coin battery you need to power the remote. This wouldn’t be a problem if you could control the on-screen display with the button on the monitor, or if LG had included the battery, which very few people are likely to have laying around, but neither of those things are true. Jacob Roach / Digital TrendsThe LG 27GR95QE has a 2560×1440 screen resolution, which results in a pixel density of 110.84 PPI (pixels per inch) on the monitor’s 26.5″ viewable screen. You get plenty of screen space as well as sharp details and text without having to use any scaling. Note: we turned off “Smart Energy Saving” from the OSD menu which could otherwise impact screen brightness. In early April 2023 LG released an updated firmware for the 27GR95QE designed to supposedly help improve screen brightness. We have unfortunately had to return our screen sample, but our friends over at Monitors Unboxed have updated the firmware on their screen (done via the LG OnScreen Control software) and re-tested brightness in both SDR and HDR modes. The Gamer 2 HDR mode has now been changed to be much cooler than before, reaching around 8900K in their measurements. This does however deliver a brighter image, reaching up now to 882 nits max (2% APL) but at the cost of a much cooler and bluer image. This is a common cheat method on OLED screens to try and reach a higher peak brightness, and we would not consider this useful unless you specifically like a very cool looking image. Where is the 1000 nits peak HDR brightness? Peak brightness in default Gamer 1 HDR mode, with a white point close to 6500K at 6847K While the difference in fine details and text clarity is quite noticeable when comparing 27″ 4K and 27″ 1440p monitors, that difference is barely visible in video games and when watching videos, so those who are looking for a monitor mainly for gaming and content consumption will be completely satisfied with the 27GR95QE.

That’s annoying, but it’s an easy problem to solve. What the UltraGear OLED 27 gets right is adjustment. Ironically, you don’tneed a screwdriver to set up the sturdy stand, and it enables just shy of four-and-a-half inches of height adjustment, 20 degrees of swivel, 20 degrees of tilt, and the ability to turn the monitor vertically. The LG 27GR95QE-B renders more than 100% sRGB and 98% DCI-P3 for stunning color in games and movies. Its default accuracy isn’t great when it is measured against the sRGB gamut, with its deltaE average reaching 3.71. However, that changes if you test it relative to DCI-P3 with an excellent dE average of only 0.81. Using the monitor’s sRGB mode did not help much, but it did limit the dE score to 2.51, which is better and more balanced. Peak brightness in this default mode reached a maximum of 609 nits in our tests, and that was on a 10% APL window. It was also at approximately that brightness for smaller APL window sizes, but sadly didn’t reach higher, and certainly nowhere near the spec of 1000 nits from LG. We will examine other modes and whether you can get higher peak brightness in a moment. At a full white windows (100% APL) the sustained brightness was only 141 nits, which was quite a bit lower than a 100% window in SDR for some reason (~192 nits). We would have liked to have seen better HDR brightness here really. Newer firmware April 2023– no change to brightness Unlike most gaming screens, including all the other 27″ 240Hz OLED monitors announced so far, the LG 27GR95QE includes support for hardware level calibration. With the use of a compatible calibration device, you can calibrate the screen at a hardware level, stored to the monitors internal LUT directly, and therefore active in all applications, multimedia and games. You aren’t reliant on normal software level profiling and colour aware applications; the accuracy and settings apply everywhere. Gradient handling was good though with no visible banding issues, and only minor gradation in darker tones. sRGB Emulation ModeAs much as I am impressed by the picture quality, the LG can't escape the common problem that plagues some OLED gaming monitors: brightness. In my testing, the OLED's non-HDR peak brightness sits just above 200 nits which is frankly abysmal. LG claims you can get around 800 nits with HDR on, but will only apply to small, bright objects. So, it will be gaming-relevant, but you can't expect anything close to the brightness you'd get from a screen that can actually do 800 nits full screen. There are 7 monitors using the same panel with different design, features, connectivity options, warranty and pricing.

Default setup is overly cool and not very accurate, but thankfully there’s a nicely configured sRGB emulation mode with accurate performance, and it’s not hard to tweak things in the wide gamut mode either for a better performance. The inclusion of hardware calibration is a nice-to-have and offers some further accuracy potential for those with compatible devices, although it’s a shame it has limited reporting capabilities and cannot be used in HDR mode at the moment. Perhaps LG will update their software at some point to make this better. Brightness in SDR mode would be considered “limited” compared with LCD monitors, but we think perfectly adequate for most people still. It might be a bit dark if you’re used to pumping up the brightness for gaming or movies though. At least in SDR there is no need for the screen to use ABL, so you get consistent screen performance and brightness regardless of your image and content. HDR brightness was disappointing and didn’t get anywhere near the advertised 1000 nits peak brightness in any sensible colour temp mode, although the setup and accuracy was decent and the OLED panel offers the usual excellent contrast ratio and HDR experience. Where to BuyThe LG 27GR95QE monitor has a high 240Hz refresh rate, which when paired with OLED’s instantaneous pixel response time speed results in incredible motion clarity without any ghosting or pixel overshoot. HDMI-VRR is supported thanks to HDMI 2.1 from both consoles. ALLM is unfortunately not supported, and although the input lag will be consistent across all preset modes (the main reason for this setting is to turn a TV in to its game mode for lower lag), it could have been useful if it had switched to a gamer preset mode, as opposed to perhaps your normal working mode like sRGB or a calibrated preset. HDR mode performs better in this regard, with it reaching up to 700 cd/m2 peak brightness. Unlike most LCD monitors which support DisplayHDR 400 or DisplayHDR 600 certification, but usually amount to little difference, the HDR on the 27GR95QE makes a notable difference in the image quality as it is able to utilize the HDR data to a much greater effect. As such, games and movies on the monitor looked expectedly stunning, so much so that there was little difference between it and my LG C9 OLED TV. We measure the screen at default settings (with all ICC profiles deactivated and factory settings used), and any other modes that are of interest such as sRGB emulation presets. We then calibrate and profile the screen before re-measuring the calibrated state. Note that in the Gamer 1 preset mode, the contrast setting in the OSD is at 60% by default, but considering it is set at 70% in most other modes, including the default “calibration” profiles and the sRGB mode, this seems to be a better optimal setting for contrast. Visually it only makes minor difference though in greyscale rendering and shadow detail. We prefer to change this to 70% to match the more accurate preset modes on the screen for this section.