It’s been conventional wisdom that, in order to properly compete in esports titles, a 1080p monitor was necessary to achieve super high frame rates. Nvidia thinks that wisdom is in the past and wants to upgrade to 1440p resolution, now with refresh rates up to 360Hz.
Of course, the company has already enlisted the help of several monitor OEMs to make this upgrade possible, including Asus, MSI, and more.
Esports games such as Counterstrike: Global Offensive (CS:GO) and Overwatch demand quick reactions and pinpoint accuracy. Many amateur and professional competitive players will play on 1080p monitors (and often at lower graphics settings) in order to maximize performance. Even mid-tier graphics cards from two generations ago, such as the GeForce GTX 1060, can push CS:GO to over 200 frames per second at 1080p. Nvidia believes that modern graphics cards (and theirs in particular) have become powerful enough to leapfrog esports gaming to another resolution tier.
According to Nvidia’s Research team, “1440p 27-inch displays can improve aiming by up to 3 percent over traditional 1080 24-inch displays when aiming at small targets.” Of course, that three-percent difference could make a marked difference over the course of a fast-paced, competitive FPS like CS:GO or Valorant.
This makes sense because the higher pixel count of the 1440p display makes it much easier to spot opponents, especially at range. Additionally, the RTX 3080 and 3090 easily push CS:GO past the 300 fps mark while even the RTX 2060 can run CS:GO at 200 fps at 1440p, so one could see Nvidia’s point in wanting to push the esports community to a higher fidelity of resolution.
Nvidia announced four new 1440p monitors that are capable of up to 300Hz or higher refresh rates. The Asus ROG Swift 360Hz PG27AQN features a 360Hz refresh rate. Meanwhile, the AOC AG274QGM, AGON PRO Mini LED, MSI MEG 271Q Mini LED, and ViewSonic XG272G-2K Mini LED all feature mini-LED with a 300Hz refresh rate. All monitors also come with Nvidia Esports Vibrance, Dual-Format, and Reflex Analyzer features.
We don’t currently have pricing and availability for these monitors but expect these to release sometime this year. Unfortunately, even if you’re able to get your hands on one of these new esports-focused monitors, trying to buy a graphics card is still a headache. Fortunately, there are plenty of gaming laptops coming out that could still offer high-performance esports gaming. Dell updated its Alienware lineup with Intel Alder-Lake CPUs and even included a model with all-AMD hardware inside, a rarity in today’s gaming laptop market.