HP OMEN 27c  Monitor Review

The HP 27c looks almost like a curved version of the HP OMEN 27i. It has an all-black design with a simple look, and it doesn't have any RGB bias lighting. While meant for gaming, it won't stand out much in an office environment.

The metal square-based stand is very solid, and it supports the monitor well as there's no noticeable wobble. The stand doesn't take up a lot of space, and you can place stuff on top.

The HP OMEN 27c has disappointing ergonomics. It offers a good range of height and tilt adjustments, but you can't swivel the screen.

The back of the HP OMEN 27c has a simple design. It's made of matte plastic, except for the reflective OMEN branding. The inputs are at an angle, making them easier to access than down-facing inputs. The hole in the stand is meant for cable management. There's also a headphone holder on top. Because the VESA mounting slots are rotated at a 45-degree angle, you need to make sure you get a mounting arm that rotates at least 45 degrees.

Despite its aggressive curve, the HP 27c isn't as thick as the Samsung Odyssey G7 C32G75T, so it doesn't take up as much space.

The HP OMEN 27c has excellent build quality. The entire monitor is well-put-together, and there aren't any issues. The metal stand is solid, and the plastic on the back doesn't flex at all.

The HP OMEN 27c has a decent contrast ratio, but it's considered low for a VA panel. It's lower than the advertised 3000:1 contrast, but this can vary between units. These results are from measuring the contrast ratio after calibration in the 'Standard' Picture Mode, but we also measured it before calibration in the 'HP Enhance +' Picture Mode, and we got a contrast of 2,957:1. This mode is the most accurate before calibration, so if you're not going to calibrate the monitor, you can use it to achieve a higher contrast. We also measured a contrast of 2,541:1 in the 'Standard' mode before calibration. If you're looking for a VA panel with a better contrast ratio, look into the Samsung Odyssey G6 S32BG65.

The native contrast ratio is good, but it's worse with the local dimming feature enabled. Local dimming automatically turns on in HDR, and there's no way to disable it, and the contrast is so low because all the zones are on. We measured the contrast using the white level of a zone that's turned on and the black level of a zone that's off, and we got 12,569:1. However, this isn't representative of most content because the local dimming turns on all zones with most content.

The HP 27c has an edge-lit local dimming feature, and it's terrible. It's only available with HDR signals as it automatically turns on, and there's no setting to disable it. There are approximately eight zones, and because they're so large, a small highlight lights up an entire zone, which is distracting. The algorithm is sensitive, meaning that most of the time, all the zones are on together, and the local dimming isn't doing anything.

The HP OMEN 27c has decent SDR peak brightness. It's much lower than the advertised 400 nits brightness with HDR off, and while it's bright enough to fight glare from some light sources, it's not good enough to place opposite a bright window. Luckily, the brightness doesn't vary at all between different content.

We measured the SDR brightness after calibration in the 'Standard' Picture Mode with the Brightness at '100'. Like with the contrast ratio, we checked the brightness before calibration, and we measured a real scene brightness of 300 nits in the 'HP Enhance +' mode. While this makes the screen brighter, it's not a significant improvement, and you lose image accuracy.

The HP 27c has okay HDR brightness. Its real scene brightness is enough to meet the brightness requirement of the DisplayHDR 400 certification. However, it's still not bright enough to make highlights pop in HDR the way the creator intended. When you play HDR content, all settings are disabled, as it enables local dimming and sets the backlight to its max.

As it has a VA panel, the HP OMEN 27c has narrow horizontal viewing angles. The image looks inaccurate when viewing from the sides, so it's not ideal for co-op gaming. The curved screen helps bring the edges within your field of vision, which helps improve the viewing angles if you're sitting directly in front of it, but our testing measures from the center of the screen, so it doesn't take the curvature into account.

Once again, the vertical viewing angles are disappointing on the HP OMEN 27c. You'll notice that the image looks inaccurate if you choose to mount it above eye level.

The HP 27c has excellent gray uniformity. The entire screen is very uniform, and even though there are a few darker patches towards the edges, they're minor. There's also almost no sign of dirty screen effect in the center. Uniformity is even better in near-dark scenes. Uniformity can vary between units, but it's not a common issue on monitors.

The HP OMEN 27c has disappointing black uniformity, but this may vary between units. You can see that the uniformity is worse with local dimming because it causes blooming around the center across. Even without local dimming, there's noticeable backlight bleed along the edges.

The HP OMEN 27c has very good accuracy before calibration. Most colors and the white balance are only slightly inaccurate, but some primary colors are over-saturated, and there's no sRGB mode to limit them to the sRGB color space. The color temperature is on the cold side, giving the image a blue tint. Gamma is good overall, but it seems to follow a flat 2.2 target instead of the sRGB curve, so some scenes are too dark.

The HP OMEN 27c's accuracy after calibration is exceptional. There aren't any visible inaccuracies to colors and the white balance, and the color temperature is nearly spot-on with our 6500K target. Gamma tracks the target curve a bit better, but some really dark and really bright scenes are slightly too bright now.

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

The HP OMEN 27c has an excellent SDR color gamut. It has near-full coverage of the sRGB color space used in most went content, but its coverage of the Adobe RGB color space is too limited for professional photo editors.

The HP OMEN 27c has fantastic color volume. Thanks to its good native contrast ratio and decent peak brightness, it displays colors at a wide range of luminance levels. However, it still struggles with really bright and really dark colors.

The HP OMEN 27c's HDR color gamut is good. It has amazing coverage of the DCI P3 color space, which is used in most HDR content, and even the wider Rec. 2020 color space has good coverage.

The HP OMEN 27c has good HDR color volume. It displays most colors well in the DCI P3 color volume, but it's more limited in Rec. 2020.

There are some very minor signs of temporary image retention on our unit of the HP OMEN 27c after displaying a high-contrast static image for 10 minutes. However, it's hard to see, and it disappears quickly. Temporary image retention may vary between units, and it's rarely a big problem.

The HP OMEN 27c has fantastic gradient handling. It accepts a 10-bit signal, and there are no signs of banding in most colors.

The HP OMEN 27c doesn't have any visible signs of color bleed. It may vary between units, but it's rarely an issue.

The HP OMEN 27c has good reflection handling. It handles moderate amounts of light well, but it struggles with strong light sources, so we don't suggest placing it opposite a bright window.

The HP OMEN 27c has good text clarity. Enabling Windows ClearType (top photo) improves the appearance of diagonal lines. The text clarity is in line with most other 27 inch, 1440p monitors, but it's not as good as the Samsung Odyssey G7 C32G75T because the matte coating introduces some haze.

The HP OMEN 27c has a great response time at its max refresh rate of 240Hz, but it's still slower than the Samsung Odyssey G7 C32G75T. The response time is quick with most transitions, but it's slower in dark transitions, which is typical of VA panels, and it results in some black smearing. We recommend using the 'Level 3' Response Time setting because it's quicker than 'Level 1' and 'Level 2 (Fast)', and it doesn't have any overshoot like with 'Level 4' and 'Level 5'. However, if you don't mind introducing some overshoot for a quicker response time, you can use 'Level 4'.

The response time at 60Hz is good. Like at its max refresh rate, you may notice some black smearing due to the slow response time in dark transitions. This time, we recommend using the 'Level 2 (Fast)' Response Time setting because you already notice inverse ghosting caused by overshoot at 'Level 3', so you may have to change the setting if the frame rate of your game drops.

The HP OMEN 27c has a flicker-free backlight in any mode and backlight setting. However, like with the Samsung Odyssey G7 C32G75T, we noticed that it flickers with VRR enabled and with low-frame-rate content in dark areas. You can see an example of this in the Adobe Premiere menu here. We don't know if this is a common issue, so let us know if you experience the same thing.

The HP OMEN 27c has an optional backlight strobing feature, commonly known as black frame insertion, to try to reduce persistence blur. It flickers at a fairly wide range, but it introduces some image duplication, and you can't use it at the same time as VRR. We took photos with the BFI set to 120Hz and at 240Hz using the different Response Time settings, so you can see how it performs below. The photo above was taken with the Response Time setting at 'Level 4'.

Keep in mind that the BFI score is based on the flicker range, and not the actual performance.

The HP OMEN 27c has a native 240Hz refresh rate that you can achieve over a DisplayPort connection, and you can reach a max of 144Hz over HDMI. It has native FreeSync support to reduce screen tearing, which works over both HDMI and DisplayPort, and we confirmed that the G-SYNC compatible mode works over DP.

The VRR feature works without any issues over its entire range, but if you set the refresh rate from your source to 60Hz, and you're using a DisplayPort connection, the VRR feature stops working. You can still enable VRR, but there's constant tearing. You need to make sure you set the refresh rate of your source is above 60Hz.

The HP OMEN 27c has low input lag for a responsive gaming experience. We couldn't measure the 60Hz VRR input lag because of the issue explained in the Refresh Rate section. We couldn't measure the 10-bit HDR input lag either because you can only achieve the max refresh rate with 10-bit signals with DisplayPort connections, and we don't have the tools to measure HDR input lag over DisplayPort. However, we don't expect HDR to impact the input lag.

The USB-C port is upstream only, so you can use the included USB-C to USB-A cable to connect it to your PC, and you can connect your peripherals to the monitor.

The HP OMEN 27c has a few gamer-oriented features, including:

• Crosshair: Adds a virtual crosshair that your system won't detect.
• Edge Precision: Sharpens the image.
• Frame Rate Counter: Displays the current frame rate of your game.
• Multi-Monitor Alignment: Displays a grid so that you can align it in a multi-monitor setup.
• Shadow Vision: Raises the gamma so you can see opponents in games easier.
• Timer: Displays a timer.

There's a single joystick on the back right side to control the on-screen menu, and there's also a power button.

• Power cable
• Power supply
• DisplayPort cable
• USB-A to USB-C cable
• User guides
• Allen key