Why Many PC Gamers Still Prefer HD Monitors Over 4K

Although 4K gaming monitors have been on the market for what feels like an eternity, 1080p  — also known as HD  — remains stubbornly common. In the June 2025 Steam Hardware Survey, which tracks the components and peripherals used by PCs with the Steam app installed, over half of all users were running a 1080p display. Even considering that laptops are counted in those results, that's a surprising result. Do gamers really prefer HD to 4K, or is something else afoot?

Although monitor manufacturers tend to bring up resolution quite a bit in their marketing and packaging, it's only one consideration among many taken into account by savvy shoppers when choosing a display. Optimizing your gaming monitor for the best frame rate is often far more important than resolution, especially with entry level or mid-tier graphics cards. The same goes for panel technology, responsiveness, and many other specs that will have a much greater impact than resolution on the way a game looks and feels. Moreover, 1080p displays tend to be a lot cheaper than 4K displays, all else being equal. So, let's break down why so many PC gamers are still choosing HD monitors in 2025, and who should upgrade to a higher resolution.

There's a crucial bit of data we haven't mentioned yet. The most popular GPUs on the Steam Hardware Survey referenced above are on the low-end, with eight of the top 10 spots occupied by versions of the Nvidia GeForce RTX 3050, 3060, 4050, and 4060. The GTX 1060, released back in 2019, still holds fourth place. Pairing a 4K monitor with those GPUs would be like driving a Formula One race car in rush hour traffic. In other words, gamers are choosing monitors that make sense with their computers and their budgets. If you handed out blank checks and told them to build their ideal gaming PC, a large portion of them would choose a ludicrously expensive, high-end GPU and a 4K monitor to go along with it.

Free computers are exceedingly rare in the real world, so gamers have to make choices that balance budgets with spec sheets. And for most gamers, 1080p gaming is the clear choice. Unless you have a beefier GPU than the majority of gamers, you'll have to choose between playing games at 1080p with boosted settings and frame rates, or running them at 4K with choppy frames and lower settings. And other specs matter when buying a monitor, including response times, color accuracy, contrast, brightness and whether or not it has G-Sync or FreeSync to reduce screen tearing. 

Additionally, premium panel technologies like OLED are more expensive than LCD. If you have a certain budget for your monitor, it's better to opt for a 1080p panel with great specs than a 4K display that sucks. But that doesn't mean all gamers should stick to HD monitors. So let's talk about who should make the jump to 2K or 4K.

Although 1080p can be preferable for many gaming setups, there are still plenty of PC gamers who can benefit from a 2K or even 4K resolution display. If you're able to run demanding games, for example, "Cyberpunk 2077" or "Black Myth: Wukong," at 1080p with blistering frame rates and every graphics setting cranked up to the maximum, you probably have some performance headroom left over to push more pixels.

Unless you have a relatively high-end graphics card  — think Nvidia GeForce RTX 4080, 4090, 5080, or 5090, or an AMD Radeon RX 9070 XT — you probably won't want to scale all the way up to 4K unless you can find a great sale price on a well-reviewed monitor. Instead, you'll probably be best suited by a 1440p 2K panel. As noted above, consider specs aside from the raw resolution of a monitor when shopping, as they will have much more of an impact on how games actually look and feel. Since 2K panels tend to be more affordable than 4K, you'll find it easier to get a great monitor without breaking the bank.

If a 4K monitor is the right choice for you, you probably already know it  — and can afford it. You've already invested several thousands of dollars in your gaming PC, choosing the most powerful GPU, a blazing fast processor, and more. You won't be satisfied until you've completed that setup with one of the best 4K gaming monitors. More power to those gamers, but it's clear that 1080p is still a great option for many others.