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Unless one has an unlimited budget for buying a PC monitor, there will always be some sort of compromise. Monitors like the Asus TUF Gaming VG289Q offer great bang for the buck at under $400 (as of this writing), but something has to give. The user must then decide what he or she can live without.
An Ultra HD monitor for under $400 is clearly aimed at those who place pixel density at the top of their priority list. But unlike the preceding Asus PB287Q of nearly six years ago, the VG289Q is a true gaming monitor that will appeal to many.
Consulting the gaming monitor checklist, we can mark off high resolution, Adaptive-Sync, HDR and extended color. The VG289Q delivered those things as well as any premium-priced screen in our testing. But although it even delivers unofficial G-Sync support, as an edge-lit IPS monitor, contrast is just 1,000:1 and you don’t get much of an upgrade from SDR to HDR.
While lower than some rivals, gamut coverage is a respectable 80% of DCI-P3. Some monitors offer more color, but the VG289Q’s palette is large enough to make a visible improvement over an sRGB display. Our only nitpick is that there’s no true sRGB mode available.
A nice surprise is the ASCR dynamic contrast option. It made a subtle improvement to SDR content without clipping detail, and we recommend it for all SDR applications. We must also give kudos for color accuracy. In the default Racing mode, we recorded error levels lower than what many monitors produce after calibration.
This screen delivers everything you need for satisfying gameplay in a 28-inch IPS panel for less than $400. A 27-inch 1440p monitor with a higher refresh rate sells for nearly twice as much. So, if you’re looking for the best value in 4K gaming right now, the Asus TUF Gaming VG289Q is it.
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