HyperX Omen OLED 27q review: A budget OLED monitor champ

HP came to CES 2026 with a major announcement about its approach to PC gaming hardware. Going forward, the company’s PC gaming hardware—including monitors and even laptops—will be sold under the HyperX brand name, not HP. The HyperX Omen OLED 27q is the first such monitor PC World has tested, and it’s a simple, budget-friendly OLED display.

Read on to learn more, then see our roundup of the best monitors for comparison.

The HyperX Omen OLED 27q’s basic specifications could hardly be more typical for a 27-inch OLED monitor. It’s a 27-inch 16:9 monitor with a Samsung QD-OLED panel and a resolution of 2560×1440—just like dozens of competitors.

This is normally the part of the review where I’d highlight a few extra features that make a monitor stand out, but the HyperX Omen OLED 27q really does stick to the basics. It has no USB connectivity, no speakers, no headphone stand, no tripod mount. It’s just a monitor that does monitor things.

At least that helps HyperX keep the price low, as the monitor has a retail MSRP of $499.99. You can find a few discounted OLED monitors for less, but the HyperX’s MSRP is about as low as it goes, and I expect it will see discounts after a few months on the market.

The HyperX Omen OLED 27q pares its basic specifications with a basic design. Nearly all of the monitor is coated in a matte black finish so deep it seems to absorb any light that falls on it. Like most OLED displays, the panel is slim at the edges but thicker in the middle to accommodate the internals and the inputs.

While the monitor’s design is basic, it doesn’t skimp on quality. The materials feel rigid and the stand is heavy. It’s not amazing, but you could spend a lot more on a monitor and end up with roughly the same build quality.

The monitor ships with an ergonomic stand that provides 100mm of height adjustment, 25 degrees of tilt, 45 degrees of swivel, and 90 degrees of pivot for rotation into portrait mode. I can nitpick this by pointing out that similar monitors often provide 110mm of height adjustment, but I doubt most people will miss the extra 10 millimeters. A 100x100mm VESA mount is included for use with third-party monitor arms and stands.

HyperX once again sticks to the basics when it comes to connectivity. The Omen OLED 27q has two HDMI 2.1 ports, one DisplayPort 1.4, and a 3.5mm audio jack.

That’s it. The monitor doesn’t have USB-C input and lacks downstream USB-A ports for even basic USB hub functionality. That also means the monitor can’t be used as a KVM switch, which is a common feature found on many monitors that have downstream USB ports.

Many similar monitors also lack USB. The popular MSI MAG 274QP X24 is one example. On the other hand, it’s common for older OLED monitors to be discounted to a price similar to the HyperX Omen OLED 27q’s MSRP. For example, the LG 27GS93QE-B is currently $499.99, and it does provide two USB-A downstream ports.

You’ll access the HyperX Omen OLED 27q’s on-screen menu with a D-pad style control on the monitor’s rear right flank. This is somewhat unusual, as most competitors have a joystick-style menu control. HP’s D-Pad works fine, however. Some might even prefer it, as the buttons used to navigate the menus have a nice tactile feel.

The on-screen menu has limited image quality options. It includes a number of color modes, including those which target color spaces like Display P3. You’ll find warm and cool color temperature presets, and an RGB gain adjustment mode. It lacks precise gamma presets entirely, however, and also lacks more advanced six-axis color calibration, instead sticking to RGB. That’s not a problem for an affordable gaming OLED, but it’s something to keep in mind if you’ll also use the monitor for creative work.

Gaming features are fairly limited, too. The monitor has an on-screen frame rate indicator, crosshair, and timer, a dark stabilizer mode, console mode, and alignment features for multi-monitor setups.

You can also access monitor features through HP’s Omen Gaming Hub. It’s a reasonably attractive piece of software and provides access to most monitor features. However, because the monitor’s feature set is so limited, you won’t find much to adjust.

The HyperX Omen OLED 27q doesn’t have speakers. While I always prefer to see speakers in a monitor, many gaming monitors leave them out not only to save cost but also because they assume owners will prefer to bring their own audio. In any case, you will need external speakers or headphones.

Like most OLED monitors, the HyperX Omen OLED 27q has a Samsung QD-OLED panel. HP’s marketing doesn’t list specifics about the generation of OLED panel used. Still, it’s a great display panel by most measures.

First up is brightness, which turns out to be among the monitor’s weakest points. I measured a maximum sustained SDR brightness of 197 nits, which is low even for OLED, which tends to already be dimmer than an LCD backlit monitor.

A brightness of 197 nits is still fine for most situations, and I mostly used the monitor at a little more than half its maximum brightness. However, you may have trouble if your office or gaming den has bright, sunlit windows. The monitor has a glossy finish, too, which doesn’t help.

Contrast is always great for OLED monitors. The HyperX Omen OLED 27q has an effectively infinite contrast ratio, as it can achieve a perfect minimum luminance of zero nits. That results in a deep, immersive image. That’s good, though it’s also true of every QD-OLED and WOLED monitor on the market.

Color gamut is also a perk for QD-OLED monitors, including the HyperX Omen OLED 27q. It can display 100 percent of sRGB, 98 percent of DCI-P3, and 95 percent of AdobeRGB. Those are incredible results for a display that carries a $499.99 MSRP, and they result in a vivid, saturated color presentation. As with contrast, however, this perk is slightly diminished by the fact that other QD-OLED monitors deliver similar results.

I was a bit surprised, though, to see the HyperX Omen OLED 27q deliver a stellar color accuracy result. In fact, its out-of-box color accuracy is among the best I’ve ever seen. HP’s marketing advertises that monitor’s factory color calibration, and in this case it seems to have done its job. Colors look vivid but realistic and true to the creator’s intent.

I also measured an on-target gamma curve of 2.2. This is notable because most QD-OLED monitors slightly miss and instead hit a gamma curve of 2.3. The on-target gamma means content will look about as bright as the creator intended. It’s a good thing that the out-of-box gamma is spot-on, because the monitor lacks controls to customize or calibrate it.

Color temperature, though, was a miss with a default color temperature of 6100K. That’s warmer than the target of 6500K. As a result, you’ll notice that white has a warm, reddish hue. I don’t mind this, personally, but your mileage may vary.

Sharpness is a downside depending on your needs. The monitor’s native resolution of 2560×1440 works out to a pixel density of about 110 pixels per inch, which isn’t impressive for a modern computer display. For comparison, a 27-inch 4K monitor packs about 163 pixels per inch. The monitor is reasonably crisp in movies and games, but small fonts can show pixelation. Compared to a 4K display, you’ll also notice more “shimmer” along small high-contrast details in games, like powerlines and fences.

The HyperX Omen OLED 27q is a bit cagey about its HDR support. There’s not much mention of HDR in the company’s marketing materials. It’s not listed on the official spec sheet, either, though it did get a mention in an image that HP’s marketing sent me over email.

I found the Omen OLED 27q could sustain no more than 407 nits in a 3 percent window, and that it was generally dimmer when larger portions of the display were lit. I also noticed the monitor lacked any sort of control over the HDR mode or brightness. HDR was either on, or off—that’s it.

Modest HDR support might be expected given the Omen OLED 27q’s pricing. However, some competitors—most notably the Alienware AW2725D—offer much better HDR brightness at a similar price point (the AW2725D has a $549.99 MSRP, currently discounted to $499.99).

That’s not to say the monitor’s HDR is hopeless. It can still look punchy when displaying HDR highlights. Still, you should skip this monitor if HDR performance is high on your list of priorities.

OLED monitors have solid motion clarity as a rule, and the HyperX Omen OLED 27q is no exception. It provides a refresh rate up to 240Hz and pixel response times down to 0.03 milliseconds. These factors combine to provide crisp, clear visuals both in games and on the Windows desktop. Enemies are easier to see in the distance and scrolling text is easier to read.

Of course, it’s possible to find even better motion clarity. Cutting-edge OLED displays like the Asus ROG Swift PG27AQWP-W can exceed 500Hz at 1440p resolution. The improvement is as obvious as the leap from 60Hz to 240Hz, but so is the leap in price, as most OLED monitors with superior motion clarity sell for around $1,000 or more.

The HyperX Omen OLED 27q supports Adaptive Sync for smooth, fluid frame pacing. While the monitor’s marketing lists Nvidia G-Sync support, the on-screen menu lists AMD FreeSync support, which is a bit confusing. Still, the monitor worked with both in my testing.

The HyperX Omen OLED 27q is a run-of-the-mill budget OLED monitor. That’s a compliment. OLED monitors are very, very good even when they lack a wide range of extra features, and HyperX’s just-the-basics approach is successful in providing a low MSRP of $499.99. While I’d definitely recommend a 4K OLED monitor (such as the MSI MPG 272URX) if you can afford it, the HyperX Omen OLED 27q delivers similar color and motion performance at a much lower price.