ASUS ROG Swift OLED PG32UCDM 32” 4K HDR 240 Hz Gaming Monitor

I’ve been trying to purchase this monitor for months. After finally being able to purchase it for a reasonable price, the unit I received is defective and won’t turn on. I tried multiple outlets and checked the voltages coming from the power supply and they were all normal.

The 3rd gen Samsung QD-OLED panel used in this Asus PG32UCDM monitor looks absolutely stunning and performs well for nearly any task, yet it is quite expensive and not without issues.

Having upgraded from a 1440p 144hz IPS LCD (the LG 27GL850 in particular), the improvements were immediately apparent as soon as I turned on the new monitor: No more IPS glow or backlight bleed, amazing contrast-ratio, perfect viewing angles, clear glossy panel coating, resolution and refresh rate upgrades etc.
I can turn of all lighting in my room and the display looks perfect while the LCD was near unusable due to IPS glow and poor contrast-ratio.

Some notes on my experience regarding potential issues you may have read about:

1) Text fringing: it is barely noticeable when staring closely at the screen. At normal viewing distances it’s a non-issue I would say. Text looks sharp and clear on the default 150% scaling set by Windows.

2) Raised blacks on bright room lighting: this one can be noticed if you look for it (especially compared to the black side-bezels), but it is very subtle and nowhere near as bad as shown on pictures / camera footage. The blacks are still very deep that I don’t consider this a deal-breaker. I will say however, that the only way I could get perfect pitch blacks is by completely turning off all room lighting, as even dim lighting can raise blacks a tiny, barely noticeable amount.

3) VRR flicker: varies on a game by game basis and also on your hardware (especially CPU performance). If the game is well-optimized and giving consistent frametimes without sudden abrupt dips/variations, there won’t be any flicker, and vise versa. This is all depending on frametime consistency and not average frame rates. It can be mitigated by better hardware, adjusting in-game graphic settings, and capping the frame rate at a level where it stays consistent without major dips. The flicker is commonly noticed during loading screens as frame rates tend to heavily fluctuate there.
For normal gradual frame rate variations, the VRR function works as intended and there isn’t any flicker. It only occurs in sudden fluctuations (the ones that also result in hitching/stutter).

Other notes:

– Factory calibration is on point. You can pick you desired color space, gamma, and color temperature. By default they’re set to wide gamut, 2.2, and 6500K respectively.

– SDR max brightness measured 245 nits out of the box. Increases to 260 nits when setting the color temperature to user mode, which exposes the RGB controls. you can further increase SDR brightness when viewing anything less than 100% pure white window by using the ABL function (you have to turn off the “uniform brightness” setting in the OSD). Personally I found the brightness to be more than enough for my use and I don’t even keep it on max.

– I can’t comment on HDR performance as I don’t have much experience with it at the moment. This is my first true HDR display (aside from OLED smartphones).

– Pixel response times are better than a fast LCD, but are not a night and day difference subjectively when compared at the same refresh rates. Another difference is that LCD pixels tend to suffer from overshoot due to overdrive (especially at low refresh rates), while OLED does not have this issue.

– The glossy coating reflection-handling is excellent. Reflections appear suppressed/darkened (if that makes sense), without getting diffused all over the screen like what matte coatings do.

Item arrived damaged, ended up messing up as soon I started using it , flickering , shutting off on and off , not clear image quality, unstable.

Expensive To much

PROS: Stunning Colors and Contrast, Color Calibration, HDR, 240hz, G-Sync/Free Sync, OSD options, QD-OLED

CONS: Price, DP 1.4, Clunky OSD, *potential VRR Flickering*

Monitor setup was incredibly ez, 2 basic steps and its attached to the stand ready to go.

First impressions after turning it on, the screen looks AMAZING! It has great colors, both “sRBG” and “Wide Gamut” image modes seem well calibrated. It has an array of settings you can mess with on the monitor to tune it to your liking. HDR works and looks good, though I haven’t used HDR much yet. I have played both a single player game and an FPS on it and their isn’t another monitor that even comes CLOSE! The glossy panel finish is definitely worth it if you can control the brightness in your room. All in all, this is definitely a luxury item for those that want to get the most out of a high end gaming PC and experience exceptional display quality!

I’ve used the monitor on both HDMI 2.1 and DP 1.4 and haven’t had issues with either. Some people report VRR Flickering in darker scenes but I haven’t had any problems as of yet. Navigating the settings on the monitor is a little clunky, I find that I sometimes accidently turn things on, but its not a deal breaker. The price point may be a point of contention for some but this monitor offers virtually all the bells and whistles (Except for DP 2.1) and at a price that matches that. There are cheaper options on the market that still give you amazing quality but at cheaper price and without some of the “premium” features that you may not use anyway. It does have RGB that shines down from the stand that is completely unnecessary and annoying but that can be turned off in the monitor settings.

*NOTE: The one I ordered was SOLD and SHIPPED by Amazon not a 3rd Party*

The monitor, like all the QD-OLED monitors, has a truly awe-inspiring picture, from inky blacks to extremely bright whites, and truly rich colors – so rich I had to turn the saturation down. Unlike its main competitor, Alienware (Dell), it has a built-in KVM switch and the usual passel of gamer-centric features. (Though most of those are only really useful for first person shooter and Battle Royale games). It provides a full set of cables in their own pouch: A Displayport cable, an HDMI cable, and two USB cables. It has built in safety measures to prevent the evergreen OLED problem, burn-in. It also comes with software that can replicate most of its hardware menu items, but easier and quicker. It even has Picture-in-Picture, so those using this behemoth for work can monitor work and home computers simultaneously. It’s a gorgeous piece of hardware and unlike some previous reviewers mine came and worked perfectly, so maybe ASUS got their stuff together.

But there are downsides. Some are big ones:

— The KVM switch is awkward to use to say the least. You have to press a button, select using the tiny monitor joystick, and then it switches. And it used to be worse – you had to switch keyboard, mouse, and video source *separately.* That’s been fixed with firmware, thank goodness.
— HDR (High Dynamic Range) can be very problematic with the monitor, as using it as an HDR monitor removes almost all ability to control the picture. There are far better HDR monitors out there.
— Some overly adolescent features (such as a bottom-facing projector; they even provide a set of lenses for it, including blanks and of course the ROG logo).
— Only one Displayport input. The others are two HDMI ports, a USB-B port, three USB-A ports and a Thunderbolt/USB-C port, either for using the monitor as a hub or for KVM.
— Documentation, including the official manual, is *abysmal.* That’s not just an ASUS problem, that’s an industry problem. But expect zero help in, for example, setting up the downward projector – it isn’t mentioned in the manual at all. Nor are explanations for a lot of the built in menu options. I had to use Reddit to get most of my info.
— Giant power brick. It’s 600W and almost as big as my computer’s power supply!
— Availability is also abysmal. This is an *extremely* popular monitor and expect the price to keep going up (July 2024), because it is in such hot demand. Shades of the Great Graphics Card Shortage of 2020-2023.

In summary: A great monitor that falls short of being the ultimate.

First I’ll say the Monitor is gorgeous. Colors are super vibrant and darks are jet black. Build quality is solid and the monitor feels and looks expensive in its own right. Lots of features in the settings and easy to setup and use. I’m coming from an Acer Predator 4k 165hz monitor. Immediately you will notice the difference in contrast, saturation and especially the glossy screen itself. I Have only used this for gaming and browsing the web with Non-HDR content. So I can’t speak to its functionality with HDR which has been reported by others to be sub par. The only issue I have is there is VRR flicker which is a shame. Fortunately mine isn’t too bad and it’s basically only noticeable during loading screens. Normal gameplay with a stable frame rate it’s barely noticeable at all. However just a warning yours will most likely have some VRR flicker with VRR enabled and may be worse. This goes away if VRR is turned off but at this price point that ridiculous to even think about buying this and turning VRR off. Also I have experienced some issues with older games crashing because they can’t support a 240hz refresh rate. This only happened in a couple of games I tested like Company of Heroes 2. This is resolved by changing the frame rate value for the game in Steam to 60,120,144 etc. You will also be notified a lot about pixel cleaning which is annoying but I guess it’s better than forgetting and getting burn in. I typically play games like Elden Ring, RDR2, Witcher 3, BG3, Xcom and so on. I’m running a RTX 4090 Gaming Trio X, i9 13900k, 64GB ram and 4TB SSD. I’ve yet to be able to push any of those game near 240hz at max settings but they still run great and look amazing regardless. Overall I’d give this and 8/10. If you can get your hands on the MSI 4k 240hz QD-OLED id say just get that as reviews seem better overall and not many report VRR flicker. Hope any of this helps. Game on!
***Just fyi I was lucky enough to get this from a seller for $1349.99. I would NOT buy this from the resellers marking this up to 2k+ it’s definitely not worth it and just terrible these people are charging that much it’s ridiculous.
Like I mentioned at the end of the review the MSI is considerably cheaper and reviews are solid so if you can snag one of them I recommend doing so.

I bought two units for my main setup, both worked fine. Bought directly from Amazon, DO NOT buy from these third party sellers who are overpricing it over MSRP. Normal price should be close to $1400. Personally I’m not a fan of LEDs in the back and the stand, feel it’s unnecessary features, would much rather prefer a cleaner design. My setup faces the wall so I’ll never see the back side. But even if I had my setup facing an open room where the back is visible, I still wouldn’t want the backside RGB. But ROG is about being extra… personally I wish it cost less while doing away with these extra features.

For quite some time, I was looking for a reasonably sized 4K (3840×2160) OLED monitor to be used for both gaming and productivity. When ASUS announced the 32” ROG PG32UCDM Gaming Monitor, I immediately signed up to be notified when it became available in stock. Unfortunately, as soon as I got an e-mail notification and went to their site, it was already out of stock again. I decided to visit my favorite online retailer, Amazon.com, to see if they were available. They were, but with a caveat.

Initially, and for the longest time, the monitors were only available from third parties. I’ve had lots of good luck with third-party purchases through Amazon, but apparently the first reviewers of the PG32UCDM did not fare as well. Virtually all low-star reviews were due to DOAs or other quality issues, perhaps caused by early or returned inventory. I decided to hold tight and wait for a monitor sold and shipped by Amazon. That day arrived last week and I’m now typing this review using the brand new, gorgeous OLED monitor.

I can confidently state without hyperbole that this is the best monitor I’ve ever used in my lifetime. The blacks are zero-nit infinite blacks, the highlights are brilliant and crisp, the connectivity and feature set are absolutely top notch, and the heft and build quality are really second to none. Used for both FPS and MMORPG, as well as business applications (e-mail, web-based work, MS Office apps, etc.), I’ve never used a monitor with text and graphics that were easier to read with zero eyestrain. I was a bit concerned about the gloss finish of the monitor, having a window right behind me, but even with a black screen I can barely see any reflections from light behind me. It’s witchcraft, I swear!

I could gush on for a while, but I’ll wrap up with a pleasant HDR Windows 11 surprise. Anyone who has enabled HDR on a Windows 10/11 PC has immediately noticed all contrast and colors become muted and dull. Firing up an UHD HDR video on YouTube in full screen looked fantastic, but “regular” Windows was bleached out and mostly unusable. Well, ASUS has a solution for that called “DisplayHDR 400 True Black”. When enabled for HDR, almost all the contrast lost by enabling HDR in Windows is restored. Plus, you still get that jaw-dropping stunning “infinite depth” from 4k HDR videos. It’s truly the best of both worlds.

The ASUS PG32UCDM 32” 4K OLED Gaming Monitor gets my highest recommendations! Buy one now!

Definitely worth the wait and price! When you have the chance to buy one of these take it! I used an app called HotStock to be able to buy one. Colors , features, and sleekness are all amazing. I waited over a month for it to ship but it was worth the time waiting. You want find another monitor like this!