This story is part of Gift Guide, our year-round collection of the best gift ideas.
Black Friday deals are in full swing. Various sales events have been rolling out all month, but as Nov. 26 gets closer, our advice is to buy early, because a lot of hot-ticket items won’t last long. Between shipping delays and chip shortages, all sorts of electronics have been in short supply. We’re just days away from Black Friday, and retailers are slashing prices on laptops, smartwatches, monitors and more. If you’re looking to upgrade your current display or add an additional monitor to your setup, now is an excellent time to snag one at a great price.
We’ve searched through the Black Friday deals on monitors and have curated this list of our top picks to make your holiday shopping a little easier. We will continue to update this page as new deals roll in, so keep checking back. All prices are accurate as of Wednesday, Nov. 24.
Not all monitor discounts are really deals; some are just cheap prices on a model you really don’t want to buy or a lower price that’s not quite low enough given the model’s specs. I follow some rules of thumb when trying to judge a monitor deal’s worth, especially when I haven’t tested the monitor myself, which may help you narrow down your selection. (You can find more guidance in our monitor buying guide and gaming monitor buying guide.) And given I’ve been tracking more than 100 potential monitor sales, narrowing down choices is quite important:
- Monitors 27 inches or smaller do not benefit from being curved and can be worse than their flat counterparts. The only exception is if you plan to set up three of them in a semicircle, in which case the curve is really handy.
- The only 24-inch monitors worth paying more than around $175 for are 360Hz gaming models or Adobe RGB (or better) color-accurate ones. You can get 27-inch models for the same money.
- You can find 32-inch monitors at Full HD (1,920×1,080-pixel) resolution on the cheap, but that’s really too low-res for looking at all day. They’re not terribly sharp, and if everything looks too small on a higher resolution display, you at least have the option of making things larger. But if everything looks too large on the FHD screen, you can’t really make them smaller.
- Unless you’re really cash-strapped, try to avoid models with a color gamut of less than 99% sRGB.
Best deals on monitors available now
Samsung
The 2020 49-inch G9 improved on its predecessor by doubling of the refresh rate to 240Hz (with 1ms MPRT), a slightly jazzier design with a deeper 1,000R curve and the addition of G-Sync compatibility to its existing FreeSync 2 support. It offers a mighty 5,120×1,440-pixel resolution and DisplayHDR 1000 certification, plus the broad color gamut typical of a QLED display. All those add up to a powerful — not to mention desk-dominating — gaming monitor.
$1,190 seems to be the previous all-time low price for this beast, making this a great deal if you’ve been eyeing it. It typically goes for $1,400, not so you’re only really saving $300 rather than $500, but that’s nothing to sneeze at, either.
Gigabyte
Since we listed it initially, the price on this 27-inch 1440p gaming monitor has been rising and falling like the tide. It was a good deal at $330, a really good deal at $310 and now a decent deal at $350. (I’m including that price history so you can judge for yourself if the price changes again.) It’s got a 165Hz refresh rate, a color gamut covering 95% P3 (that’s good for the money) and support for FreeSync/G-Sync Compatible adaptive sync technologies. The one potential drawback, though one that’s common in monitors of this price class, is DisplayPort 1.2 rather than 1.4. The FI27Q-P I recommended earlier in the sale, which supported DP 1.4, is no longer discounted. That said, you probably won’t care, since this isn’t a 4K or HDR display.
MSI
Depending upon what you count as the normal price — Newegg says $320 but Amazon says $310 — you’re either saving $30 or $40. Regardless, $280 is a great price for a 1440p 165Hz display. If you’re wondering why it’s cheaper than the Gigabyte with a similar feature set, it’s probably because it has a smaller color gamut — 100% sRGB.
