ASUS ROG Strix XG27VQ vs BenQ ZOWIE XL2720

The picture quality of the ASUS XG27VQ is one of the best among all gaming monitors in this price range. This is due to its VA panel that offers high native contrast ratio, excellent peak brightness, great gamma, and fair color accuracy.

The XG27VQ does an excellent job of reproducing deep dark scenes, bright and vivid colors, and some eye-catching intermediate tones. The monitor can reproduce beautiful dark scenes thanks to its native contrast ratio of 3000:1 which allows it to display intense blacks. Colors look bright and vibrant thanks to the monitor's high peak brightness of 300 nits. Mid-tones look life-like because of the panel's nearly ideal average gamma of 2.25.

Additionally, the monitor's color inaccuracies are almost invisible to the human eye as its average color error dE is only 2.6.

FreeSync eliminates screen tearing and stutter, and reduces display lag because it allows the monitor to synchronize its refresh rate to the framerate of your Radeon GPU.

The ASUS XG27VQ supports the FreeSync in the 48-144 FPS range.

This monitor has multiple tools that enable it to display clear and blur-less motion even in the fastest FPS games, allowing this VA panel to compete against faster TN gaming monitors in this price range.

First, the artificial motion blur effect is virtually eliminated by the aid of ASUS's Extreme Low Motion Blur feature, which makes this LCD monitor behave more like CRT monitors.

Second, the monitor doesn't suffer from heavy ghosting as each pixel of the ASUS XG27VQ can change its color in 4ms.

Finally, the motion appears smooth and fluid because of the monitor's native refresh rate of 144 Hz, which enables it to display up to 144 frames each second.

The overall build quality of the ASUS XG27VQ suggests that this is a premium-class product. Each part feels rigid, as if the entire monitor was carved from a single piece of plastic.

You can adjust all the monitor's settings using your keyboard and a mouse thanks to the ASUS's desktop application.

The ASUS XG27VQ makes your overall gaming experience more immersive as its 1800R curved panel gives you the sensation of the screen surrounding you.

Additionally, the panel's curvature minimizes viewing angles on the sides of the monitor which noticeably improves the overall visual consistency of the panel.

The ASUS XG27VQ has a crosshair feature which allows you to add a crosshair to any game. It could improve your performance in games like CS: GO and Rust, where you can no-scope your opponents.

The ASUS XG27VQ offers remarkable gaming performance as it combines superb overall picture quality with excellent motion handling capabilities, well-handled input lag, and high native refresh rate.

Even though no one has tested the monitor's input lag yet, it seems to be within the four-millisecond range according to the general user reviews and the input lag tests of other ASUS ROG monitors from 2016-2017. Such input lag makes the ASUS XG27VQ one of the most responsive monitors in its price range.

The input lag of a monitor corresponds to the time delay between a GPU producing a frame and the monitor processing it. The lower the input lag, the more responsive and connected your gaming experience will be.

You can move between different display modes with a click of a button because using the configurable fast-access switch attached to the base of the monitor.

The ZOWIE XL2720 causes noticeably less eye strain than the majority of competitors in its price range because the monitor is flicker-free and has a mode that reduces the intensity of blue light.

Backlight flickering and high-intensity blue light emitted by LEDs are among the main factors related to eye fatigue that is caused by extensive use of computer monitors.

You can adjust the monitor’s tilt angle, swivel angle, and height so you won't have much trouble configuring it according to your setup.

The five capacitive OSD buttons are built very well and react quickly each time you press them.

The monitor's input lag stays at the fantastically low value of 3.2 ms making the ZOWIE XL2720 one of the most responsive gaming monitors in its price range.

A monitor’s input lag represents the delay between your GPU generating a frame and the frame starting to appear on your monitor.

The OSD is organized in a user-friendly way so all of the settings in the menu are only a couple of clicks away. Additionally, you can customize the OSD menu.

The monitor's excellent motion handling capabilities allow the BenQ ZOWIE XL2720 to display fast-paced content free from motion blur and ghosting because of its panel's high native refresh rate and fast pixel response time.

Motion blur and ghosting effects are eliminated by the panel's quick pixels that need only one millisecond to change their color because of the monitor's full pixel response time of 1 ms. Such fast color change prevents fast-moving objects from leaving artificial trails.

The monitor’s 144 Hz panel refreshes every seven milliseconds making motion appear smooth and fluid.

Regarding its picture quality, the ZOWIE XL2720 is on par with the majority of gaming monitors in this price range as it offers sufficient contrast ratio, peak brightness, color accuracy, and gamma response.

While the monitor's dark scene performance is mediocre, it can still display vivid and accurate colors and eye-catching intermediate tones. It can recreate average-looking dark scenes with blacks that are neither overly flat, nor profound as the monitor's native contrast ratio is limited to 915:1. The colors pop and appear relatively accurate since the ZOWIE XL2720 combines relatively high peak brightness of 315 nits with almost unnoticeable color accuracy error dE of 2.2. Mid-tones look good and saturated thanks to the monitor's gamma response of 2.06 which is only 6.3% away from the ideal value.

You can connect up to three peripheral USB devices to your computer using the monitor's inbuilt USB 2.0 hub. This would come in handy for those who use a laptop and have a lot of stationary USB devices.

The BenQ ZOWIE XL2720 is one of the best gaming monitors in its price range because it offers low input lag, flawlessly-handled motion, and high native refresh rate combined with decent overall picture quality.