The best monitors for working from home can be an excellent investment for anyone who has a home office or studio, whatever your line of work. They can improve your day-to-day workflow and even your health since they can help avoid hunching over a tiny laptop.
But which one to buy? It depends on your work type, your workload, and your budget. That's why we've picked our favourites for specific users in mind. All of the team on Creative Bloq work from home some of the week, which means we're ideally placed to test out a range of devices in order to choose the best monitors for WFH for different needs.
We've tested the monitors below for general productivity and ergonomics but also colour coverage and accuracy for creative work plus for gaming and entertainment. Whether you need the best 4K monitor, the best monitor for photo editing or the best ultrawide monitor for your home office, you should find an option for you below.
Plenty of ports including 65W USB-C Power Delivery and a RJ45 Ethernet connection make this a great hub for a home office. We loved the 32-inch 4K IPS screen, which delivers 99% sRGB colour space coverage. A solid mid-range option from a reliable brand. Read more below
The Philips 27E1N1300AE is a very nice all-around monitor that delivers good results in almost every area, and best of all, it's super affordable too. It might not have quite enough contrast to battle the pro-level monitors, but you'll be hard-pressed to find a sharper or brighter monitor at this price. Read more below
For those looking to spend on a high-quality 4K monitor for working from home, this beautiful display has excellent colour range, fantastic connectivity and a top-notch in-built webcam for all those Zoom calls. This is our pick for the creative exec's home office. Read more below
It's one of the most expensive monitors in the known universe, but it's also one of the very best for professional creatives. Industry-leading colour coverage and onboard calibration is Calman verified, and the gorgeous OLED panel is massive and very bright too. Read more below
This is a premium ultrawide gaming monitor with fantastic colour coverage and great responsivity for creative work thanks to the brilliant OLED panel, so will easily pull double duty for creatives who like to wind down with some gaming too. Read more below
If you're into gaming outside of office time, we think this well-priced monitor is the best option for resolving both needs: work and play, with great colour and contrast an esport-level refresh rate and a range of ports. Read more below
The best monitors for working from home in full
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Need plenty of connectivity in your home office? This impressive Dell monitor for working from home could provide you with all the ports you need. It's packed with USB ports including 65W USB-C Power Delivery so that you can share your laptop's display while charging, and it even has a RJ45 wired Ethernet connection.
When we reviewed the P3222QE, we found that as well as all its handy ports, it also packed decent image quality. Its 32-inch 4K screen delivers 99% sRGB colour space coverage (although it's not so hot at Adobe RGB), and its IPS screen technology means you'll get accurate colours regardless of your viewing angle. Want to know more? See our full Dell P322QE USB-C Hub Monitor review for complete details, including the results of our lab testing.
Connectivity: HDMI 1.4 x 1, USB-C x 1 (DisplayPort Alt mode, data and Power Delivery)
Reasons to buy
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Crisp images
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Smooth motion
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USB-C connectivity
Reasons to avoid
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Only Full HD resolution
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Not great contrast
The Philips 27E1N1300AE is a fantastic all-around monitor that delivers good results in almost every area. The IPS display makes viewing possible from virtually any angle in case you're strapped for space in your home office.
The display also gives you a crisp image when viewing pretty much any medium, and 1ms (MPRT) for response times removes any annoying lag. Of course it won't bother the top-spec OLED monitors for contrast, but the brightness is plentiful, and gives a lovely, flat picture that is easy on the eyes. The USB-C connection also includes power delivery for charging connected devices, which is great news if you don't have the budget or the space for an external dock to hook all your peripherals up to port-deficient laptops.
Overly expensive if you don't need the webcam and 4K resolution
The Dell UltraSharp U3223QZ addresses a vital need amongst work-from-home professionals – having a reliable, high-resolution webcam for their business calls and team meetings. This isn't Dell's first monitor with a built-in camera, but it's certainly the best, which is why it'll also set you back a hefty price.
In our full Dell UltraSharp U3223QZ review, we note that the webcam performs exceptionally well, with FHD resolution and facial tracking that allows the wide-angle lens to lock on precisely to your image. There's also a privacy shutter for peace of mind. As for other areas, our tests found colour coverage and accuracy to be perfectly decent for use as a monitor for home working for most creative workflows, although the 60Hz refresh rate and max HDR at 400 nits, will rule it out for some video and game development pros.
The ASUS ProArt PA32DC is big, clunky and old-fashioned. It's also one of the brightest, sharpest, most professional-ready 4K monitors on the market, whether you work in video, photography, graphic design or animation. Sure, the refresh rate tops out at 60Hz and it costs more than most people's entire monthly salary, but with all those preset profiles, the built-in colorimeter and that OLED panel, it might just be worth it. It's Calman-verified to meet the criteria for video post-production editing and reviewing, with a solid Delta E colour accuracy score of -2.
On top of that, it should meet all the connectivity requirements of the home-working creative with USB-C delivering 96W of power, which should be enough to charge and run a laptop, along with three HDMI ports and four USB-A connectors to turn it into the most expensive USB hub you've ever had in your house. DisplayPort daisy-chain support is the icing on the cake. Despite the dizzying price tag, we can't think of a better 4K monitor right now for ambitious creative professionals.
Connectivity: 2x HDMI 2.0, 1x DisplayPort 1.4, 1x USB-C (supports power delivery), 1x USB-B 3.2 upstream, 4x USB-A downstream (1 for fast charge B.C 1.2)
Reasons to buy
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Brilliant curved OLED panel
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Minimal stretching or distortion
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Impressive colour gamut
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Refined design
Reasons to avoid
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Pro-level price
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No colour-temperature adjustment
The Philips Evnia 34M2C8600 is a premium ultrawide gaming monitor with fantastic colour coverage and great responsivity thanks to the brilliant OLED panel. With a relatively gentle 1800R curvature, the level of outer-edge distortion becomes negligible for creative tasks such as video/photo-editing or graphic design, while retaining that immersive, enveloping sensation when watching films or playing games on the monitor.
That combination makes it an ideal display for a creative person and gaming fan who wants to hit two birds with one stone and maximise their desk space at home. It's not the cheapest monitor you'll find, but honestly, you'll be hard-pressed to find a better one for under a grand...
The AOC AGON AG275QZ doesn't come cheap, but its price tag is justified when you take into account its superfast response times, excellent colour range, great contrast, super fast 270Hz refresh rate and range of ports. This monitor is designed for gaming, but that means it works a treat with creative apps, too. We absolutely loved this monitor when we reviewed the AGON AG275QZ and think its ideal for those who want to game by night and work on creative projects by day, or the other way round, of course.
If you're an Apple fan and you use lots of other Apple devices, then you've probably already chosen the best monitor for working from home for you. As we noted when we wrote our initial Apple Studio Display review, this monitor is very competitive for what it delivers, which is 5K resolution plus a built-in webcam for all your work-from-home calls and online meetings.
With only a 60hz refresh rate, no HDR, and no stand included (you have to buy that separately!), it lacks in some areas, but the monitor pairs perfectly with a Mac mini or MacBook Pro and the 5K screen offers great clarity, and we found colour and brightness are consistent.
Even if you're working from home, you might need to work in other places at times, or even just in other rooms. A portable monitor like this can make working outside the office more pleasant, extending the screen on your laptop, and it doesn't take up much space. Asus is the the king of portable monitors, and the Asus ZenScreen Go MB16AWP shows how seriously it's taking the format.
When testing this 15.6-inch display, we were impressed by built-in battery and speakers, the variety of useful inputs and the quality of the image. The drawback is that this is quite a bit more expensive than more generic portable screens of the same size, so you have to want the wireless connection and battery to opt for this.
While the monitors above get our ultimate nod of approval as fantastic monitors for working from home, there are more monitors worthy of your consideration. If none of the above quite tickle your fancy, we've also tested all of the below monitors and will happily recommend them as great home-working displays, whether you're looking for a pro, hobby or entry-level model.
Acer Predator X27U Providing strong crossover appeal for the creative+gaming crowd, this Predator OLED is certainly not the cheapest (£800-plus, thankyouverymuch), but masterful gaming performance is almost a bonus for the colour reproduction here. Read our full 4-star review.
Xiaomi G27i
Not just content with offering phones that far outperform their price point, Xiaomi is now taking on the world of display. Billed as a gaming monitor, this is an excellent all-around screen for WFH, and at a bargain price too. Read our 4.5-star review.
BenQ EW3280U An excellent 4K, 32-inch display still doesn't come cheap these days, but the BenQ EW3280U is a great deal. This media-focused monitor sits right in the mid-range, which is surprising considering that it's packed with features. Read our 4-star review.
Philips 329P1H Another large-screen 4K offering on this list is the Philips 329P1H, a great MacBook Pro-friendly display that boasts bright, sharp, and vibrant picture quality and comes with useful features such as a USB hub. It's a great choice for work-from-home professionals who just need enough space to spread out and multitask. Read our 4-star review.
How to choose the best monitor for working from home
The best work-from-home monitor for you depends on your daily tasks and demands. While any basic monitor would do for everyday office and admin work, if you're in a creative job then you need something that packs a little more in the visual department.
In our guide above, we've picked the best monitors for home offices for various professionals, from regular office workers to programmers and creative pros. We've included budget options that still provide more screen space and better ergonomics than a laptop screen but also options with built-in webcams – ideal if your home working involves a lot of video calls – and options that offer the kind of visual quality and colour reproduction necessary for doing things like photo and video editing at home. Also see our pick of the best monitors for graphics artists if you have more specific needs.
How we tested the best monitors for working from home
We conduct regular reviews of a wide range of tech devices, including monitors. When we review monitors, we conduct lab tests on brightness, contrast, colour coverage and accuracy and we also use them in practical situations for different types of work, including design work and photo and video editing.
In most cases, our reviewers conduct reviews of tech gear in their own homes over several weeks to get a thorough idea of how well the equipment performs. We also compare specs with other products and take feedback from other contributors and customer reviews.
To choose the best monitors for working for home for this guide, we considered different working needs, including general productivity for those whose work involves use of general office apps, but we have also picked some monitors that can serve for creatives working from home and even for those who want to get in some gaming after work.
FAQs
Is it better to use a dedicated monitor for home working?
Ideally, yes. While many people will find it possible to work from home from a laptop alone, laptop screens have two major disadvantages. One is there small size, which is great for portability but less great for viewing your work, especially if you work across several different programs or windows at once.
The second problem is their position. If you put a laptop on your desk the screen will almost certainly be below your natural sightline meaning that you have to look down at it. Over days, months and years spending so much time in that position can be bad for your posture. Using a laptop shelf isn't always an ideal solution either since it often means your keyboard will be too high to type on comfortably.
Using one of the best monitors for working from home helps resolve this by allowing you to keep your laptop on your desk but position an external monitor level with your eyes. For other options to improve your posture when working from home, see our guides to the best office chairs for back pain and the best standing desks.
Erlingur is the Tech Reviews Editor on Creative Bloq. Having worked on magazines devoted to Photoshop, films, history, and science for over 15 years, as well as working on Digital Camera World and Top Ten Reviews in more recent times, Erlingur has developed a passion for finding tech that helps people do their job, whatever it may be. He loves putting things to the test and seeing if they're all hyped up to be, to make sure people are getting what they're promised. Still can't get his wifi-only printer to connect to his computer.
