ASUS ProArt Display PA278QV Monitor Review

The ASUS ProArt PA278QV's design is simple and a bit boxy, very similar to Dell's UltraSharp monitors, such as the Dell UltraSharp U2720Q. It has thin bezels on three sides but the bottom bezel is thicker, as it houses the monitor's controls and also has a built-in ruler. The stand has a square base that doesn't take up too much space and it has a brushed metallic finish.

Even though the stand is plastic, it supports the monitor well and there's very little wobble.

The ASUS PA278QV has superb ergonomics. It allows for all manner of adjustments, but it's the incredibly wide swivel range that really stands out.

The back of the monitor has a clean and professional look. The stand has a quick release feature if you want to wall-mount it, and there's a small cutout in the stand that serves as cable management.

The bezels are thin on three sides except for the bottom bezel, which houses the monitor's controls.

The screen itself is fairly thin, which is great if you want to VESA-mount it.

The ASUS PA278QV's build quality is good. The plastic construction feels fairly solid and there are no obvious issues. The stand supports the monitor well and it doesn't wobble much. However, the stand's finish scratches rather easily.

The ASUS ProArt Display PA278QV has a mediocre contrast ratio, typical of most IPS panel monitors. This results in blacks that look grayish, especially when viewed in a dark room.

This monitor doesn't have a local dimming feature. The video above is for reference only.

The ASUS ProArt PA278QV's SDR peak brightness is great. It's bright enough to overcome glare in any lighting conditions and is extremely consistent across different content.

The ASUS PA278QV doesn't support HDR.

Great horizontal viewing angles. Images should remain accurate when viewed from the side, making it easier to share your work with others.

Excellent vertical viewing angles. This is good if you tend to sit extremely close to the screen or have the monitor mounted above eye level.

Excellent gray uniformity. The edges of the screen appear darker, but thankfully, there's very little dirty screen effect and uniformity is even better in dark scenes.

Mediocre black uniformity. There's visible backlight bleed at the top and bottom of the screen. It shouldn't be noticeable in normal content except for very dark scenes, or in movies where there are black bars.

Out-of-the-box, the ASUS ProArt PA278QV has good color accuracy. The monitor has an sRGB mode that's factory-calibrated and comes with a calibration report in the box. It's advertised to have an accuracy that's below 2dE; however, some of our measurements exceed that. This is likely due to different methods of measuring color accuracy.

Most of the color inaccuracies are difficult to spot, but white balance is off due to the warm color temperature giving the image a reddish tint. Gamma follows the target curve reasonably well except for bright scenes, which are over-brightened.

After calibration, the color accuracy is superb. The remaining inaccuracies shouldn't be noticeable without the aid of a colorimeter. White balance is nearly perfect and the color temperature is much closer to our 6500K target. Gamma is better, but dark scenes are still brighter than they should be.

You can download our ICC profile calibration here. This is provided for reference only and should not be used, as the calibration values vary per individual unit even for the same model due to manufacturing tolerances.

The ASUS PA278QV has an excellent SDR color gamut. It has near full coverage of the widely-used sRGB color space, but its coverage of the Adobe RGB is more limited and may not be good enough for professional photo editing. If you need a monitor with wider Adobe RGB coverage, check out the Gigabyte M27Q.

Excellent color volume. It doesn't display dark colors well due to its low contrast ratio and has trouble with bright blues, which is normal for LCD screens.

The ASUS PA278QV doesn't support HDR.

This monitor doesn't support HDR.

There are no signs of temporary image retention.

Excellent gradient handling. There's a bit of banding in all colors, but it's most noticeable in greens and grays.

There are no signs of color bleed on this monitor.

The ASUS PA278QV has good reflection handling. The matte anti-reflective coating does a good job of diffusing reflected light. Direct reflections can be a bit distracting, but the monitor can get bright enough to compensate.

Text clarity is decent. It looks much sharper with ClearType enabled (top photo), especially with diagonal lines. The pixels are blurry in the photo due to the monitor's matte anti-reflective coating.

The ASUS PA278QV has great response time when running at its max refresh rate. This results in only a small blur trail behind fast-moving objects and makes this monitor a good option for gaming. The best overdive setting is '60', as it provides the best performance with minimal overshoot.

The response time at 60Hz is nearly identical to the response time at max refresh rate, but with even less overshoot. The best overdrive setting at 60Hz is '40', as the higher settings have significantly more overshoot, causing visible artifacts.

The backlight is flicker-free when the brightness is at maximum. Below maximum, the backlight's flicker frequency is so high that it shouldn't be noticeable to most people.

There's an optional Black Frame Insertion feature to help improve motion clarity. It only works at 75Hz and can't be used at the same time as variable refresh rate. Unfortunately, the strobe crosstalk is quite bad, as it causes visible image duplication. To enable the Black Frame Insertion feature, you have to be in the 'Rapid Rendering' mode.

The ASUS ProArt Display PA278QV supports Adaptive Sync to reduce screen tearing when gaming. It's also compatible with FreeSync and NVIDIA's G-SYNC; however, the latter only works over a DisplayPort connection.

The ASUS PA278QV has exceptionally low input lag. It's a little higher if you run at 60Hz or with the Black Frame Insertion feature enabled, but it shouldn't be noticeable to most people.