With dual peak refresh rates depending on the resolution, LG’s 32-Inch UltraGear OLED Gaming Monitor ($1,399) can switch from a 4K/240Hz monitor to a 1080p/480Hz one with a single button press. This novel feature means the monitor is equally suited to maxing out frame rates at lower resolutions and to high-fidelity gaming at lower peak refresh rates. The minor downsides are a few missing non-gaming features that we expect from a panel in this lofty price range. Though this is an impressive gaming monitor, it’s not quite as excellent as the Editors’ Choice-winning Samsung Odyssey OLED G8, our top pick for 32-inch 4K OLED gaming monitors. Design: Familiar OLED Tech With a TwistThe market for premium gaming monitors has gotten crowded in 2024. With a familiar form factor of 32 inches, LG’s latest offering doesn’t look much different than other UltraGear monitors or competing ones from other companies. Thin bezels frame the OLED screen, which is perched against a bulky stand. The UltraGear is matte black all over, with an arch wrapped around its cabinet back, equipped with just a hint of RGB lighting.
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(Credit: Joseph Maldonado)
The LG OLED measures 24.7 by 28.1 by 11 inches (HWD), making it bigger than most 32-inch competitors. But it’s it’s not as heavy as it looks, weighing 19.8 pounds with the stand. The monitor attaches to the stand with a knuckle that offers ample tilt, height, and swivel options. The wide pentagon base of the monitor is the perfect size to support the length of a gaming keyboard, shaped in a similar way as the Alienware 500Hz Gaming Monitor’s base, allowing gamers to press their boards up against it during intense play sessions.
(Credit: Joseph Maldonado)
Turning the monitor around, you’ll find a port hub tucked under. Here are two HDMI 2.1 ports, a DisplayPort, a headphone jack, two USB-A ports, and a USB-B connector. That’s a modest mixture of ports for the price. This monitor also lacks extra productivity features like USB-C connectivity or a KVM switch, so it’s really not suitable as an all-around work-and-play monitor like the Samsung Odyssey OLED G8 is.
Still, the missing non-gaming features might be forgivable when you start to explore the monitor’s big selling point: Dual Mode. With a press of a button, the monitor can change resolutions and peak refresh rates. By default, you’ll get a full 4K resolution (3,840 by 2,160 pixels) at 240Hz, but by navigating through the on-screen display (OSD) menus, you’ll find three additional display options. Each of them drops the resolution to 1,920 by 1,080 pixels while cranking the refresh rate up to 480Hz. But in case that isn’t impressive enough for pros, you’ll also be able to shrink the effective active panel size to either 27 or 24 inches, in addition to the monitor’s native 32 inches.
(Credit: Joseph Maldonado)
This makes LG’s OLED extremely viable for esports players. Its notably high maximum refresh rate of 480Hz already puts it in the same field as Alienware’s 500Hz esports monitor, but the option to cut screen size while not compromising resolution will be a game-changer for some. Esports pros and amateurs alike are known to prefer smaller screens in certain games. The smaller the screen, the easier it is to keep an eye on all the action in one glance. Swapping between modes was easy enough in testing, with the monitor flashing for just a moment as the screen adjusts.Pros concerned with performance above all else should probably be satisfied at this point. But the OLED screen technology enhances the experience that much more for amateur players who like pleasing visuals, too. Even at 1080p, the OLED screen displays color that’s leaps and bounds more vibrant than what you see on ordinary VA or IPS gaming monitors.
(Credit: Joseph Maldonado)
In addition to Dual Mode, LG also employs a new sound technology. Dubbed Pixel Sound, it produces sound directly through the OLED screen rather than using downward-firing speakers placed at the back of the monitor. Coupled with DTS Virtual X, which simulates surround-sound audio, the monitor produces clean, rich output that sounds great at high volumes—and gets pretty loud, too. Testing the LG 32-Inch UltraGear OLED: A Range of OptionsOn paper, the LG 32-Inch UltraGear OLED Gaming Monitor offers the brilliance of an OLED monitor with the performance of an esports display. To figure out what LG’s gaming monitor can really can do, we stacked it up against four other excellent 32-inch 4K OLEDs: the Alienware AW3225QF 4K QD-OLED, the Asus ROG Swift OLED PG32UCDM, the MSI MPG 321URX QD-OLED, and the Odyssey OLED G8. We tested color gamut, brightness, color accuracy, and contrast ratio using Calman monitor calibration software, a Murideo Six-G signal generator, and a Klein K-10A colorimeter. We also ran the monitor through a gauntlet of games to measure input lag and judge its real-world performance. (We formally tested the UltraGear in its 4K mode only, with exceptions noted.)Moving into our first test, we measure the monitor’s brightness in its default picture mode over an SDR signal. Under these conditions, the UltraGear managed an average brightness of 243 nits (candelas per square meter), with the peak brightness setting turned on. With it off, it settled at 209 nits. For comparison, the MPG 321URX QD-OLED managed 245 nits, the AW3225QF 4K QD-OLED hit 238 nits, and the ROG Swift OLED PG32UCDM came in at 197 nits. The peak brightness setting keeps the UltraGear comparable with the competition.
Moving to sustained HDR brightness, we saw much higher numbers, with the LG settling at 658 nits of brightness. However, peak HDR brightness barely moved the needle at all, coming in at 662 nits at a 2% sample size. (We measure sustained HDR brightness at a 10% window size, but to measure peak brightness, we drop the test size down to 2%). Turning on the peak brightness mode again, we saw the HDR number jump up to 1,169 nits. The UltraGear offering a peak brightness setting is a welcome addition, and while its HDR does look good, it doesn’t stand out like the AW3225QF 4K QD-OLED does. We’ve seen brighter highlights before, but just because they’re not as bright doesn’t mean they’re not good. As we’ve said before, we’ve never met an OLED monitor we didn’t like.
(Credit: Joseph Maldonado)
The monitor’s color-gamut performance is excellent. In our tests, it spanned 133% of the sRGB color gamut, 92% of Adobe RGB, and 95% of DCI-P3. Note the greater-than-100% sRGB result means that colors can potentially be oversaturated when you’re viewing them in applications that don’t support color management. However, it’s a minor thing, and it’s actually common in OLED monitors, as they can display more vivid and saturated colors without ill effects.Color accuracy was slightly worse than we expected, with an uncalibrated Delta E measurement of 3.2. The higher the Delta E, the more colors tend to stray from their intended hue. A value under 1 is ideal, though very few gaming monitors reach it, especially out of the box. Tech-savvy users can tweak settings to improve these numbers, but even 3.2 looks good on an OLED monitor, especially one made for gaming and less so for video editing or design work.The UltraGear 32 OLED has a rated contrast ratio of 1,500,000:1, in line with the MPG 321URX QD-OLED and ROG Swift OLED PG32UCDM. The contrast ratio indicates the difference in luminance between the brightest white and darkest black that a monitor can produce, which can make a difference in picture quality. All OLED panels offer dramatically higher contrast than other screen types. In OLED screens, the individual pixels on the portions of the screen showing black truly display nothing, so you see no light leakage from the back to dilute the darkness.Media and Game PerformanceThe LG UltraGear 32 proves it can deliver a high-quality HDR picture and a wide color range, but what about its response time, an all-important metric to pro gamers? To quantify that, we use an HDFury Diva HDMI matrix to measure the monitor’s input lag and play a handful of games from our library to see if there are any noticeable blemishes, like screen tearing.First, the input lag results: We measured 1.8ms of lag—not the absolute lowest we’ve seen, but a number to be proud of. However, that does make it the “laggiest” of the bunch of OLEDs mentioned here, even if that lag is nearly imperceptible. This measurement came from the 4K/240Hz setting. While we can’t measure 480Hz response times with the HDFury Diva, we did crank up the refresh rate to play Overwatch 2 and Counter-Strike 2. I didn’t notice any difference in input lag between screen sizes, though I did perceive a difference when the refresh rate was locked at 60Hz and 120Hz.Beyond that, I also played some Returnal, Horizon: Forbidden West, and Concord (RIP) and had a blast. Additional anti-tearing measures come in the way of G-Sync Compatible and AMD FreeSync Premium Pro.Verdict: An OLED for the Gamer Who Wants It AllThe LG UltraGear 32 OLED defines itself with an interesting Dual Mode, bridging the gap between competitive players and those looking for a gorgeous PC and console gaming monitor. It doesn’t topple the Samsung Odyssey OLED G8 in our eyes. But if you’re interested some of the time in high-fps competitive play (and you’ve got the GPU and CPU to support it) on an OLED screen, and the rest of the time in playing at peak resolution, LG’s latest is sure to impress.
LG 32-Inch UltraGear OLED Gaming Monitor (32GS95UE-B)
The Bottom Line
With two refresh-rate options, the LG 32-Inch UltraGear OLED Gaming Monitor will please esports pros who need peak frame-per-second performance in some titles, as well as gamers who crave high-resolution visuals in others.
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About Zackery Cuevas
Analyst, Hardware
I’m an Analyst and ISF-certified TV calibrator focused on reviewing computer accessories, laptops, gaming monitors, and video games. I’ve been writing, playing, and complaining about games for as long as I remember, but it wasn’t until recently that I’ve been able to shout my opinions directly at a larger audience. My work has appeared on iMore, Windows Central, Android Central, and TWICE, and I have a diverse portfolio of editing work under my belt from my time spent at Scholastic and Oxford University Press. I also have a few book-author credits under my belt—I’ve contributed to the sci-fi anthology Under New Suns, and I’ve even written a Peppa Pig book.
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