LCD, IPS, OLED, and Quantum Dots: All the Confusing Display Terms, Explained

The type of display technology you get can have a huge impact on the quality of your display.

There are a lot of confusing terms that get thrown around when discussing display technology.

With all that, we can start talking about the different types of displays you’ll see when shopping for a new monitor.

Vertical alignment (or VA ) panels are similar to IPS panels, except that their crystals are arranged in a vertical orientation.

VA panels can achieve greater contrast by blocking more of the backlight.

Since there are no backlights involved, OLED panels are incredibly good at producing high-contrast images.

Since each pixel can emit its own light, there’s no extra light bleed in dark parts of the image.

This is used in high-end models from LG like the new C4 ( 9/10 , WIRED Recommends) to achieve peak brightness well over 1000 nits. Since QD-OLED and WOLED panels are relatively new, displays using them are likely to be on the more expensive side for now, but you’ll likely be hard-pressed to find better image quality on monitors without them..