BenQ MOBIUZ EX321UX review

The high-end PC monitor market has been focused exclusively on OLED displays for about 18 months. It was one gigantic OLED after another. But this BenQ MOBIUZ EX321UX has just landed to remind us that yes, there is indeed an alternative. It is a conventional 32-inch LCD panel with 4K resolution, but with a mini-LED backlight for an OLED-like HDR visual effect.

This is a full array solution with 1152 zones. On paper, it supports HDR1000, which means a peak brightness of 1,000 nits. This panel will also be able to produce a full-screen image with a brightness of 700 nits, something that no existing OLED monitor can achieve. Even the latest generation of large-screen OLED technologies achieves a maximum brightness of around 250 nits on a full screen.

Indeed, with a typical price tag of around $1,200, this BenQ really needs to do something special to justify its existence. Currently, 32-inch 4K OLED panels can be purchased for around $800. An LCD panel for 50% more cash is a grave ask.

Either way, with all the attention on OLEDs lately, it’s worth briefly summarizing what this full-size mini-LED shizzle is all about. The idea is to operate busy backlighting to compensate for the fact that LCD panels allow featherlight to pass through even when a given pixel is supposed to be turned off or very shadowy.

To remedy this, at least theoretically, the backlight is divided into zones. This allows you to change the intensity of the backlight on the panel depending on the displayed image. In the case of brighter areas of the image, they should be increased, in the case of darker areas – the opposite.

If this sounds like a neat trick and a good idea, it has its drawbacks. We’ll dive into the details in a moment, but the basics are quirks resulting from the zone control algorithms and the resolution of the backlight itself. 1152 zones may seem like a vast number, but it actually means that each zone illuminates 7200 pixels. This isn’t exactly precise.

Full backlight aside, the BenQ MOBIUZ EX321UX has a lot more to offer. For starters, it’s a 4K panel with a frequency of 144 Hz. In the era of 480 Hz plus panels, this is a relatively modest refresh. But it actually makes sense for native 4K resolution. Realistically, even with upscaling, you won’t be able to play the latest games at 4K resolution and frequencies above 200Hz, especially if you don’t have an RTX 4090 card.

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Supports 4K60 resolution over both HDMI and DisplayPort. Oh, it will also do so via USB-C, which provides 65W of power. This is not enough to support a proper gaming laptop. But this makes this monitor perfect for sharing between a desktop PC and a gaming laptop or, whisper it, a console. When it comes to connecting multiple computers, full KVM switch support is also available. Incidentally, HDMI interfaces support eARC 7.1 and have a built-in audio DAC.

If the feature set is quite robust, BenQ has also leaned a bit into aesthetics. The base and back of the screen are made of white plastic, providing an overall look similar to Samsung’s high-end Odyssey gaming monitors and helping to at least partially justify the higher price. So it’s a pretty good looking monitor, it’s just not something really special.

Of course, image quality is where the BenQ MOBIUZ EX321UX really needs to stand out, and first impressions are good. It’s a very radiant, immaculate and crisp IPS panel. It’s worth noting that BenQ has opted for a matte rather than glossy anti-reflective coating, with the latter being de rigueur in OLED monitors these days.

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Matte or shiny is quite a subjective matter. But one thing is certain: this panel is radiant enough to offset any perceived dullness that may accompany matte anti-reflective coatings. It looks good at any of those 1,000 nits in HDR mode, and SDR content can be set to an almost uncomfortable brightness.

As for SDR and HDR, SDR content looks absolutely attractive in HDR mode, with excellent color calibration. So this is largely a display that you can set to HDR and just leave it on, regardless of the type of content.

Another drawback related to brightness is that this display allows you to adjust the overall brightness level in HDR mode. This is unusual and somewhat counterintuitive, considering brightness data is inherent to the HDR signal. But it’s actually a welcome feature and one we wish more monitors included.

Either way, the HDR experience is mostly impressive. It’s a truly lively and striking display. It is also more prone to brightening the backlight zone of a petite image element than many full-screen LCD monitors.

The advantage is that you don’t lose fine details on a shadowy background. What is less desirable is the more noticeable flashing in and out of highlighted zones as a petite, radiant object moves against a shadowy background, which inevitably results in a radiant halo.

Ultimately, with such low backlight resolution, inevitable compromises must be made. That is, as low as the resolution of the panel itself. So also very low compared to the ideal illumination per pixel of an OLED panel, which actually has eight million zones up to 7200 in this panel. That said, this thing still looks pretty damn gorgeous in, say, Cyberpunk 2077 with all the bells and whistles of HDR.

Probably the other main argument in comparing LCD to OLED is the assumption that the latter is much faster in terms of pixel response. And so it is. But it’s also debatable how much it matters.

For IPS panels, the BenQ MOBIUZ EX321UX is really very brisk. There is very little blurring or smearing and, just as importantly, no obvious overshoots or reverse ghosting. For most players, response and clarity will be fine in most cases. But an OLED panel is definitely a little better, and an OLED with a much higher refresh rate is even better.

If this monitor were much cheaper than the OLED alternative, it would be simple to rationalize the response deficit. You can acknowledge the advantage of OLED, note how much it costs, and say that this monitor still looks pretty good for the money.

But for $1,200 it’s much more tough. Aside from relatively clunky HDR rendering, this panel is noticeably slower and a bit fuzzier than an OLED monitor. And yet it’s priced at the most steep OLED options. In return, you get excellent full-screen brightness. But that’s really it.

Ultimately, the BenQ MOBIUZ EX321UX is a very good example of its breed. Since LCD gaming monitors with mini-LED and full backlighting go hand in hand, we really like it. It has one of the better backlight algorithms we’ve seen. But at this price point it’s just difficult to recommend. These types of mini-LED panels would be much more attractive as a budget alternative to OLED, costing slightly more than a conventional LCD monitor.

At, say, $600 to $700 and about $100 to $200 more than a basic 32-inch 144Hz 4K monitor, while undercutting all the OLED options, this monitor would be intriguing. But basically, at twice the price, it really doesn’t make much sense.