Enable or disable HDR?

[CrisR82]

I've been curious about something lately - is it worth it to enable (or disable) HDR on a sub-400 nits monitor/TV?

 

Currently I have a LG UltraGear 24GN60R (https://www.lg.com/us/monitors/lg-24gn60r-b-gaming-monitor) on my PC, and a Philips 55PUS7303 TV (https://www.philips.co.uk/c-p/55PUS7303_12/7300-series-4k-uhd-android-tv-with-ambilight-3-sided-with-ambilight-3-sided), neither of which (as far as I'm aware) reach 400 nits brightness but support HDR10.

At some point in the past, I was advised that disabling HDR would be better as the content would look much better in SDR in comparison to having bad HDR, so I have kept them with HDR turned off...but I never really messed around with it to test it properly, just took the advice at face value and went with it.

 

A game I'm very interested in (The Legend of Heroes: Trails in the Sky 1st) is coming out soon and I noticed it does support HDR, which it got me extra curious on the topic, so I thought I'd ask people with more legit knowledge on the matter before spending a whole bunch of my already limited free time messing around with it.

 

 

P.S. probably because I have never owned/used expensive/high-tier displays, both the TV and the monitor have been great for me, not really thinking of replacing them, just thought that I should make sure I'm getting the most out of them.

[TudorFinalBosz]

I have a more expensive LG 4K monitor and I still could never understand what do ppl see so great in HDR. It all looks overexposed, too bright and too high contrast to me. It's like the whole image was roasted.

So I disabled it both on desktop and mobile. Seems a gimmick to me.

[podkall]

Some monitors "support" HDR, but that doesn't mean it's always good, usually it has to be expensive monitor/TV to have good HDR, or have it specifically designed with "good HDR support".

 

I'm not much of an expert, though it's worth simply turning it on and trying it - and if you don't like it, you can just turn it off.

[ChrisLoudon]

8 minutes ago, CrisR82 said:

I've been curious about something lately - is it worth it to enable (or disable) HDR on a sub-400 nits monitor/TV?

 

It all comes down to how it looks to YOU!

 

Watch a movie or play a game and have HDR off then on. If one looks better that than other to your eyes, then go with that.

[ChrisLoudon]

1 minute ago, podkall said:

Some monitors "support" HDR, but that doesn't mean it's always good

Agreed.

 

I have a 4K Philips Momentum Screen that boast over 1000 Nits but at a smidge under 500 quid I kinda expected sub par HDR but truth be told, Its appalling. 

[johnt]

Proper HDR only looks good on OLED panels in my opinion. It looks absolutely gorgeous and lively. It adds a ton of texture to surfaces and really makes the eyes happy. But only on OLED panels.

[Pyrren]

Me personally, I am not a too big on the whole HDR thing. Makes things looked too bright on my monitor and I like it when my monitor or, in this instance, game to have a nice balance between dark and bright.

[TudorFinalBosz]

HDR seems to me the visual equivalent of those audio systems that are bass-boosted.

[CrisR82]

Interesting info here.

Well, I actually found a test video file (like, one that can actually be downloaded, YouTube is horrible for this apparently) - couldn't really notice any meaningful difference, however I DID notice an issue - the shadow/border effect around windows in Windows 11 looked significantly worse (like, it had a gradient lines across it? Not sure how to put it into words) so I guess HDR off it is for me.

[Pyrren]

55 minutes ago, CrisR82 said:

Interesting info here.

Well, I actually found a test video file (like, one that can actually be downloaded, YouTube is horrible for this apparently) - couldn't really notice any meaningful difference, however I DID notice an issue - the shadow/border effect around windows in Windows 11 looked significantly worse (like, it had a gradient lines across it? Not sure how to put it into words) so I guess HDR off it is for me.

It really depends on the monitor.

[chaotic kronos]

59 minutes ago, CrisR82 said:

Interesting info here.

Well, I actually found a test video file (like, one that can actually be downloaded, YouTube is horrible for this apparently) - couldn't really notice any meaningful difference, however I DID notice an issue - the shadow/border effect around windows in Windows 11 looked significantly worse (like, it had a gradient lines across it? Not sure how to put it into words) so I guess HDR off it is for me.

Did u turn hdr I. System and monitor cuz if u didn’t u won’t find a difference 

 

 TLDR in short 

hdr is at best on oled 

 however it’s great on high  end monitor which are not just adding labels to its display 

Basically all hdr 400 r trash , 600 most bad but u might find a good one , hdr 1000 , hdr 2000 

 mostly are good but u might find bad ones. 
Mostly in the low number of dimming zones , the higher the amount the better it is 

[Doobeedoo]

No. You need a more premium display. Like OLED for example. 

Those saying HDR bad never saw good proper HDR content. 

[Omon_Ra]

On 9/6/2025 at 4:26 AM, Doobeedoo said:

No. You need a more premium display. Like OLED for example. 

Those saying HDR bad never saw good proper HDR content. 

Second this. OLED is the obvious winner when it comes to HDR, but the higher end LED and 'QLED' displays are pretty damn good. Especially when in a bright environment (living room with lots of windows in the daytime). The other piece to HDR is having actual HDR content. In particular, files and/or physical media, games with HDR, and not necessarily streaming services (though Netflix, Amazon Prime, etc seem to be okay-ish; but bitrate can be limiting for sure).

I was a skeptic of HDR for a long time; I mostly thought of the crappy HDR photography style which most of the time makes images look extremely fake and terrible. But once I saw actual video HDR, I realized how much it can add. But you need content that is created for HDR displays. There's no sense of having HDR on when watching something that isn't encoded/developed for HDR. You obviously can, but the SDR to HDR conversion just looks weird to me.

[xg32]

On 9/5/2025 at 8:11 AM, CrisR82 said:

.

for the 2 displays you mentioned i'd recommend turning hdr off.

 

The best hdr displays right now depending on budget is probably the xiaomi gpro 27i (one of the cheapest monitors with true hdr), m27p6, and XG32UCWMG (glossy 4k woled), these displays will likely look good even with auto hdr for content that's not optimized. For something with anime style like trails in the sky or cell-shaded like borderlands 4, i'd probably recommend a mini-led over a woled for the color volume, though the glossy woled is better for dark scenes, motion clarity (fps) and streaming content overall.

 

It's mostly personal preference, i know people that prefer sdr over hdr even on oled, but having the option for true hdr doesn't hurt.

[Omon_Ra]

23 hours ago, xg32 said:

For something with anime style like trails in the sky or cell-shaded like borderlands 4, i'd probably recommend a mini-led over a woled for the color volume, though the glossy woled is better for dark scenes, motion clarity (fps) and streaming content overall.

 

It's mostly personal preference, i know people that prefer sdr over hdr even on oled, but having the option for true hdr doesn't hurt.

I should add that 90% of the time I'm in SDR. But when I do watch a newer TV show or movie that is 4K HDR...totally worth it. Gaming has been a mixed bag. For the most part it does look better than SDR. Also has way less impact on performance than ray tracing. To me, wider dynamic range is more appealing to me than ray tracing. BUT, the implementation in games is definitely wonky at times. Going from dark to light environments, being in wooded areas going in and out of shadows, and other times where the lighting isn't super consistent, I've seen some odd 'flickering' where the game doesn't really know what to do. I've noticed this quite a bit in FF7: Rebirth in the Gongaga region. Could just be the game, as other games with HDR it hasn't been as apparent. But the other games I've played a lot of in HDR are Baldurs Gate 3 and Elden Ring. Both of those I had started on a 1080p VA panel, and when I went to my 4K OLED and turned HDR on...sploosh.

[starsmine]

with a sub 400 nit LCD/LED nah. 
MiniLED and oled sure. 

HDR 400 is HDRisnt. It should not exist as a standard. Its only communicating that the monitor can accept an HDR signal, not that it can display it in any real way. It can make the colors look worse as HDR messes with black levels the screen can not produce. It also has created perception about HDR that isn't true as shown by @TudorFinalBosz statement in this thread. That monitor does not even have HDR 400 rating. 

HDR trueblack 400 or HDR 600 and up are the minimums to actually turn on HDR and get something out of it. Note that HDR 600 is the low end of HDR quality though. (true black 400 is amazing though)

HDR does a far greater improvement on visual quality then 4k ever wishes it could. 

[TudorFinalBosz]

52 minutes ago, starsmine said:

with a sub 400 nit LCD/LED nah. 
MiniLED and oled sure. 

HDR 400 is HDRisnt. It should not exist as a standard. Its only communicating that the monitor can accept an HDR signal, not that it can display it in any real way. It can make the colors look worse as HDR messes with black levels the screen can not produce. It also has created perception about HDR that isn't true as shown by @TudorFinalBosz statement in this thread. That monitor does not even have HDR 400 rating. 

HDR trueblack 400 or HDR 600 and up are the minimums to actually turn on HDR and get something out of it. Note that HDR 600 is the low end of HDR quality though. (true black 400 is amazing though)

HDR does a far greater improvement on visual quality then 4k ever wishes it could. 

Not my fault monitor (and phone) makers include this feature even when it's half-baked and basically useless.

It's misleading and they're selling buzzwords.

[starsmine]

14 minutes ago, TudorFinalBosz said:

Not my fault monitor (and phone) makers include this feature even when it's half-baked and basically useless.

It's misleading and they're selling buzzwords.

usually phones with their amoleds have decent implantation. 

[TudorFinalBosz]

20 minutes ago, starsmine said:

usually phones with their amoleds have decent implantation. 

I don't buy flagships anymore, my A55 only has HDR10+, so I suppose that's not a good demo of what HDR can do.

It seems proper implementations are only on highend TVs, monitors and phones. For the rest, it seems a marketing gimmick