Asus ROG Swift OLED PG32UCDM review: the best gaming monitor we've tested

Wake up, nerds – new gaming monitors are here. Five years after the advent of 27-inch Fast IPS 1440p 144Hz monitors, which earned hearty DF recommendations for hitting the sweet spot for gaming and content creation alike, we have a new wave of ultra high-end models that offer a similar leap in fidelity and motion.

These are 32-inch 4K 240Hz monitors, based around a third-generation QD-OLED panel from Samsung and offered by Asus, MSI and Dell. These screens tick a lot of boxes, with a 4K resolution that suits gaming on PC and console, a 240Hz refresh rate ideal for esports-grade PC gaming, the phenomenal HDR performance provided by OLED and improvements to the underlying panel tech that shore up some of its weaknesses for PC use, especially with regards to content creation and consumption.

Today we’re looking at perhaps the most exciting of the options available, the Asus ROG Swift PG32UCDM. Asus did well to differentiate their previous generation OLED gaming monitors with better cooling – and therefore slightly brighter displays – than their competitors. They also offered comprehensive burn-in measures, plenty of gaming-specific OSD settings and of course the RGB styling the company is known for, which helped ameliorate their higher prices. It looks like a similar situation this time around, with the PG32UCDM commanding a $1300/£1350 price point that comes in above Dell and MSI’s alternatives in some regions.

In this review we’ll see what you get for that premium, as we compare the PG32UCDM to the $1200/£990 Dell Alienware AW3225QF and $950/£1299 MSI MPG 321URX – as we see which is the best 4K 240Hz QD-OLED gaming monitor on the market.

Asus ROG Swift PG32UCDM hands-on impressions

I’ve worked and gamed on 27-inch 4K 144Hz IPS screens for the past five years – starting with an Acer Nitro XV273K that required two DisplayPort cables to hit a full 4K 144Hz! – so moving to a 32-inch 240Hz QD-OLED like the PG32UCDM immediately felt like a huge step forward. Despite offering the same resolution – and therefore requiring the same level of GPU performance – you’re getting a significantly larger image that’s still quite sharp at 140PPI, with dramatically better contrast, motion clarity and HDR performance than even modern Fast IPS alternatives.