ASUS ROG Strix OLED XG27AQDMG review
It has premium specs at a competitive price, but is the world’s first glossy WOLED monitor worth a buy?
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The ASUS ROG Strix OLED XG27AQDMG is the latest in the line of gaming monitors released by the company in their Republic Of Gamers line. The 26.5-inch monitor comes with some impressive specs at a pretty reasonable price, and is the first to feature a new panel type: a 3rd generation MLA WOLED from LG, with the glossy element native to the panel itself, and not a layer added by ASUS at a later time. Up until now all we’ve seen are matte or semi-matte WOLED screens, so lets see how this glossy customer held up in our tests.
- Refresh rate: 240Hz
- Response time (claimed): 0.03ms (gray-to-gray)
- Screen size: 26.5″
- Resolution: 2560 x 1440
- Panel technology: MLA WOLED (3rd Gen)
- Adaptive Sync: FreeSync Premium & G-SYNC Compatible
- Weight: 6.7kg / 14.77lbs
- Ergonomics: Tilt (+20° ~ -5°), Swivel (+45° ~ -45°), Pivot (+90° ~ -90°)
- Connectivity: 1x DisplayPort 1.4, 2x HDMI 2.0, 2x USB 3.2 Gen 1 Type-A, 3.5mm headphone jack
One of the best monitors we’ve seen released in 2024, this is a fantastic buy for those looking for an OLED gaming monitor around the 27” mark. It’s bright, responsive, and available at a great price (at least if you’re in the US).
- Fantastic value
- High peak brightness
- Great WOLED panel with perfect blacks & contrast
- 240Hz refresh rate & excellent response times
- High color accuracy on sRGB Cal preset
- not quite 99% DCI-P3
- text clarity still not as good as an IPS monitor
- HDMI 2.0 only may put some niche customers off
Pricing & availability
One of the most enticing things about the XG27AQDMG is the price. Coming with a standard MSRP in the US of $749, there is also a special launch price of $699 if you pick it up in the initial launch from one of the following retailers: Newegg, MicroCenter, and the ASUS eShop, though it’s stated that the latter eShop will only have a limited amount of stock.
The initial launch will be limited to these few retailers on the 30th of May, with the wider launch at the standard price to follow at an undetermined time after. As of yet we do not know when other global markets will be able to buy this monitor.
Even at the standard pricing this is very good value for what you get, as we’ve seen monitors with similar specs go for up to $250 more. That being said, it remains to be seen how non-US pricing will compare as ASUS products tend to be more expensive in Europe and elsewhere.
At the time of writing there have been various QD-OLED supply issues that have affected availability of certain displays, however it’s unclear as of yet whether there will be sufficient supply of the glossy WOLED panels that this model uses.
Design & specifications
At first glance the ASUS ROG Strix OLED XG27AQDMG looks very similar to the other ROG gaming monitors released in 2024: it has the same stand with a broad, square-looking (actually hexagonal) base in a dark gray color, although compared to the IPS panel monitors the bottom bezel is notably smaller. Much of the screen is also substantially thinner than the IPS ROG line, although about half of the rear is taken up by the thicker section that houses the connection ports and affixes the screen to the stand. Overall, it’s a pretty nice looking monitor, with the thinner edges and bezels being particularly pleasing.
In terms of build quality the XG27AQDMG also impressed: the stand is sturdy and stable and we experienced minimal screen wobble, and transitioning between the different ergonomic positions felt smooth. We noticed no obvious points of weakness on the display itself. It’s not a particularly light monitor to move about, but that’s a worthwhile trade-off for such a solid stand.
In terms of ergonomics you get a fairly standard amount of tilt (+20° ~ -5°), as well as a decent amount of swivel (45°) and pivot adjustment (90°). The top of the stand has a 1/4″ tripod screw socket you can use to attach a camera and the base also has a phone-holder slot that you can use to prop up your phone underneath the display, which is a simple but welcome addition.
The monitor also has VESA mount support and comes with the mounting kit included in the box.
Refresh rate
240Hz
Response time (claimed)
0.03ms (gray-to-gray)
Screen size
26.5″
Resolution
2560 x 1440
Panel technology
MLA WOLED (3rd Gen)
Adaptive Sync
FreeSync Premium & G-SYNC Compatible
Weight
6.7kg / 14.77lbs
Ergonomics
Tilt (+20° ~ -5°), Swivel (+45° ~ -45°), Pivot (+90° ~ -90°)
Connectivity
1x DisplayPort 1.4, 2x HDMI 2.0, 2x USB 3.2 Gen 1 Type-A, 3.5mm headphone jack
In terms of connectivity all the ports and sockets are round the back of the monitor, facing downwards, which makes it look cleaner but is often a pain when you’re trying to plug things in.
You get a single DisplayPort 1.4 socket which is fine, and two HDMI ports but they’re only 2.0, which will annoy some people, though in practical terms for most users it shouldn’t make a difference: Variable Refresh Rate and Auto-Low Latency Mode are both still supported at the native 1440p resolution, if this was a 4K monitor then it would be more of an issue. The only real downside is that you will not be able to avoid Display Stream Compression when set to 10bit color, but at 8bit color you will, and this isn’t an issue that most consumers would care about anyway.
We would have liked to have seen a USB-C port, but the given the two USB 3.2 Gen 1 Type-A and 3.5mm headphone jack are pretty standard for this price point.
OSD, features & settings
As with most ROG monitors you get quite an impressive amount of tweakable features within in the menu: including a good number of visual presets, fully adjustable color temperature, contrast, and brightness, and various different OLED-specific and gaming features.
The monitor fully supports both G-Sync and FreeSync Premium to help minimise screen tearing. It comes with the latest ASUS OLED Care anti-burn in tech which is very important in an OLED gaming monitor, as well as a custom passive heatsink to reduce thermals. There is a pixel refresh setting that enables about 5 mins after you put the monitor to sleep or set it on standby.
OLED displays aren’t traditionally the best at displaying text, but the XG27AQDMG comes with features like META and Clear Pixel Edge to ‘provide brighter full-white windows, clearer text, and improved motion clarity’: more on our experience of these below.
The display comes with a Extreme Low Motion Blur (ELMB) setting you can switch on, which is a form of Black Frame Insertion (BFI) for those that don’t know: helping to remove both screen flickering and motion blur by simulating CRT flicker. ELMB can’t be used in conjunction with VRR (G-Sync or FreeSync) and is capped at 120Hz, so will primarily be of interest to console users or for those who aren’t concerned about pushing their refresh rate to the max: true competitive players might prefer to run at 240Hz instead.
The XG27AQDMG does have firmware updating for any future tweaks and improvements that ASUS come out with, and crucially, does have a 3 year warranty that covers panel burn-in, although the company has come under fire in recent years for its shoddy RMA and customer support practises, so just bear this in mind and check the small print.
Screen testing & performance
Subjectively the screen of the monitor looks great (more on this below), but how did it measure up in our testing? Read on for the results.
Color gamut, accuracy & picture quality
We tested the XG27AQDMG at various presets (though more are available in the monitor’s settings), using the i1DisplayPlus colorimeter and DisplayCAL software. Below you can see the results, with the ideal values listed at the top for reference.
The standard User mode settings (the values of which can be changed by the user) is what we recommend for general use and gaming, and you can manually increase the brightness levels on this preset to get it closer to FPS mode should you wish. Cinema mode was noticeably cooler thanks to its higher color temperature. sRGB Cal mode was nearly perfect for color-accurate work in the sRGB gamut (120 cd/m2 being the brightness value that most closely resembles ‘natural light’), however the color temperature was a bit on the warm side.
When calibrating the display, this resulted in a significantly worse average deltaE*00 in exchange for a better white point when compared to the sRGB Cal mode preset. Your own calibration may achieve better results than this, but otherwise we recommend just sticking with this preset for any color-accurate work.
In terms of gamut coverage the DCI-P3 results were slightly worse than the 99% that ASUS claimed, but probably still good enough for non-professionals. The 99.8% effectively amounts to 100%, so, based on this, professional color work could be conducted in the sRGB space.
Brightness
For every monitor we review we record the peak brightness, minimum brightness, and what number on the brightness settings equates closest to 120cd/m², which, as mentioned, is the approximate value for natural light.
100 brightness 434 cd/㎡
0 brightness 35 cd/m²
20 Brightness 123 cd/m²
ASUS claims a peak brightness of 450cd/㎡, and though our results fell just slightly short of this, it’s not by enough that you’d likely notice much difference. 434cd/㎡ is a very nice high peak brightness and sufficient to overcome any glare the glossy screen may experience in indoor scenarios.
Panel uniformity
Panel uniformity measures how consistent the luminance and colors are across the whole screen. The display is divided into a 5×5 grid, with the central square used as the reference point from which every other square is tested for variance.
Variance below 1.00 shows up as green, and this is the ideal result, with the variance being imperceptible to the naked eye. Yellow represents a greater degree of variation between 1.00 – 3.00, though at the lower end this is still unlikely to be discernible to the untrained eye/general user, and doesn’t necessarily preclude the display from color accurate work. Greater variance is more of a problem, and shows up as red.
As we can see in the image above, there was a nearly 50/50 split on the sectors between green and orange. For gaming this is a perfectly fine result, and is even acceptable for amateur color work, although professional color graders may want to look elsewhere. Panel uniformity can differ between monitors of the same model, so please do also bear this in mind.
Viewing angles
As with virtually all OLED screens, the ROG Strix OLED XG27AQDMG has excellent viewing angles: there’s limited color shift when you view the on-screen image from the side, indeed color is still pretty visible even as you approach the 180° mark.
Gaming performance
We tested the XG27AQDMG across a range of different titles, from CyberPunk 2077 to CS2, and were very impressed with its performance. The picture was crisp, colors popped, and the contrast looked great as you’d expect from an OLED screen. Loss of color was minimal in both very dark and very bright scenes. The whole experience was immersive as can be on a 27-inch screen, helped by the minimal bezels around the edges.
When gaming the screen felt very responsive and fast. With VRR on we didn’t notice any screen tearing whatsoever. At 240Hz on fast-paced games like CS2 motion blur and ghosting was almost entirely imperceptible, and most users will likely never notice it. At 120Hz with ELMB switched on, even our most keen-eyed monitor specialists couldn’t spot any whatsoever, and the same was true when we conducted the Alien UFO test: a practically perfect result.
General performance & productivity
When watching YouTube and movies the display performed admirably, as you’d expect from an OLED panel. The high peak brightness of the screen combined with the glossy panel also really helped produce a great looking image.
For general usage, the XG27AQDMG was okay, but text clarity still lagged behind that of an IPS monitor, even with META and Clear Pixel Edge enabled in the settings. It still performed above average in this area compared to other OLED panels however, and ultimately this is just the trade-off you make when opting for an OLED monitor; some people aren’t bothered by it at all.
ASUS ROG Strix OLED XG27AQDMG gaming monitor (240Hz QHD)
