The HP OMEN 34c is a budget-friendly ultrawide gaming monitor. It has a 34-inch screen with a 1500R curve and a 3440x1440 resolution, and it competes with other similar monitors like the Dell S3422DWG and the Gigabyte G34WQC. It's focused on gaming with a 165Hz refresh rate and supports FreeSync variable refresh rate (VRR) technology to reduce screen tearing. It supports OMEN Gaming Hub so you can customize settings and take advantage of some extra features to improve your gaming experience. It's barebones besides that and only comes with two HDMI 2.0 ports and one DisplayPort 1.4 input, as it lacks a USB hub.
Our Verdict
The HP OMEN 34c is good for most uses. It's very good for gaming as it has a 165Hz refresh rate, VRR support, and low input lag, but there's smearing with fast-moving objects, and it lacks HDMI 2.1 bandwidth. It's also good for office work and content creation as its 34-inch ultrawide screen is ideal for multitasking, but it takes time to get used to its curvature, and it has narrow viewing angles that make the image appear washed out from the sides. Lastly, it's good if you want to sit back and watch content thanks to its high contrast ratio, but it lacks a local dimming feature, and it fails to make highlights pop in HDR.
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34-inch ultrawide screen.
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Great peak brightness.
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Good reflection handling.
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High contrast ratio.
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Excellent accuracy before calibration.
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Narrow viewing angles.
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Limited ergonomics.
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Curved screen may take time to get used to.
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Motion is blurry.
The HP OMEN 34c is good for office use. Its ultrawide 34-inch screen offers plenty of space to multitask and has good text clarity. It also gets bright enough to fight glare if you want to use it in a well-lit room and has good reflection handling. Unfortunately, it's a bad choice if you need to share your screen with someone else as it has limited ergonomics and narrow viewing angles, so the image looks washed out from the sides. Its curved screen makes it more difficult to view when sharing your screen with someone else, as it's meant to sit directly in front of.
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34-inch ultrawide screen.
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Great peak brightness.
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Good reflection handling.
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Good text clarity.
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Narrow viewing angles.
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Limited ergonomics.
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Curved screen may take time to get used to.
The HP OMEN 34c is very good for gaming. It has a 165Hz refresh rate with FreeSync VRR and G-SYNC compatibility to reduce screen tearing. Its input lag is very low for a responsive feel, and it also has a decent response time, but there's smearing and blur with fast-moving objects. Luckily, it's good if you want to use it in a dark room as it displays deep blacks. Unfortunately, it has limited compatibility with gaming consoles and modern graphics cards as it lacks HDMI 2.1 bandwidth.
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34-inch ultrawide screen.
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165Hz refresh rate.
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FreeSync VRR and G-SYNC compatibility.
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Low input lag.
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Motion is blurry.
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Lack of HDMI 2.1 bandwidth.
The HP OMEN 34c is good for media consumption. It has a high contrast ratio that displays deep blacks, and the black uniformity is decent, but it lacks a local dimming feature to improve either of those. Its ultrawide format is ideal for watching widescreen movies, but not with someone next to you, as it has narrow viewing angles, and the stand offers limited ergonomics.
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34-inch ultrawide screen.
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Great peak brightness.
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High contrast ratio.
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Decent black uniformity.
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Narrow viewing angles.
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Limited ergonomics.
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No local dimming feature.
The HP OMEN 34c is good for media creation. Its ultrawide format helps you see more of your video timeline at once or multitask more, and it has good text clarity. It also has excellent accuracy, so you won't need to get it calibrated unless you need perfectly accurate colors. It has a few downsides, though, as its curved screen makes straight lines appear curved. It also has narrow viewing angles and limited ergonomics, making it difficult to share the screen with a coworker or client.
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34-inch ultrawide screen.
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Great peak brightness.
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Good reflection handling.
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Excellent accuracy before calibration.
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Narrow viewing angles.
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Limited ergonomics.
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Curved screen may take time to get used to.
The HP OMEN 34c is decent for HDR. It has a great native contrast ratio that makes blacks look deep next to bright highlights, and it has decent black uniformity. However, without a local dimming feature, neither of those are improved, and small highlights don't pop against the rest of the image. It displays a wide range of colors in HDR, but it doesn't get bright enough to make all colors look vivid and saturated.
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34-inch ultrawide screen.
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High contrast ratio.
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No local dimming feature.
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Not bright enough for highlights to pop.
- 7.6 Mixed Usage
- 7.5 Office
- 7.8 Gaming
- 7.8 Media Consumption
- 7.8 Media Creation
- 7.1 HDR
- Updated Oct 04, 2023: Review published.
- Updated Sep 29, 2023: Early access published.
- Updated Sep 22, 2023: Our testers have started testing this product.
- Updated Aug 28, 2023: The product has arrived in our lab, and our testers will start evaluating it soon.
- Updated Aug 15, 2023: We've purchased the product and are waiting for it to arrive in our lab.
Differences Between Sizes And Variants
We tested the 34-inch HP OMEN 34c, which is the only size available for this monitor.
| Model | Size | Panel Type | Resolution | Max Refresh Rate | Curve |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 34c | 34" | VA | 3440x1440 | 165Hz | 1500R |
Our unit was manufactured in June 2023; you can see the label here. We tested this monitor with firmware 1.50.4.0.
Compared To Other Monitors
The HP OMEN 34c is a good budget-friendly ultrawide gaming monitor that has things you'd expect to find in a gaming monitor, like VRR support and low input lag. However, it doesn't excel at anything, and its smearing and motion blur are disappointing if you play fast-paced games with a lot of moving objects. While it's a slight upgrade to other budget options like the Gigabyte G34WQC, it still isn't as well-rounded as the Dell S3422DWG, which gets brighter in HDR and has better console compatibility.
See our recommendations for the best 34-49 inch monitors, the best curved gaming monitors, and the best ultrawide gaming monitors.
The Dell S3422DWG and the HP OMEN 34c are similar ultrawide gaming monitors, but there are a few differences. While the HP has a slightly higher 165Hz refresh rate, the Dell has a quicker response time, leading to less motion blur, but each monitor has smearing with fast-moving objects. The Dell is also better to use with gaming consoles as it can downscale a 4k image, which the HP can't do. Lastly, the Dell has a few extra features, like a USB hub, making it the better choice if you need more USB ports to plug in your devices.
The Samsung Odyssey G5 C34G55T and the HP OMEN 34 are both good ultrawide gaming monitors. They share many similarities, but there are a few differences too. The HP gets brighter, so it's better to use in a well-lit space, and it has better ergonomics that make it easier to adjust. The HP also has better motion handling, but each monitor has smearing with fast-moving objects. One plus that the Samsung has is that it downscales 4k signals, which the HP can't do, making it a better choice for console gaming.
The Gigabyte G34WQC and the HP OMEN 34c are similar monitors in specs and performance, but there are a few differences. The HP delivers slightly better image quality thanks to its improved image accuracy and wider range of colors in HDR. The HP also has a bit better motion handling, but each monitor has issues with that anyway. However, the Gigabyte is more versatile if you want to use it for console gaming as it downscales 4k signals, which the HP can't do.
Test Results
The HP OMEN 34C has a rather simplistic design with an all-black plastic body. It features some of OMEN's branding throughout, but otherwise, it's plain, with matte plastic on the back panel.
The build quality is great. The plastic materials feel solid and don't flex easily. While the screen wobbles a bit on the stand, which is expected for a display of this size, it quickly stabilizes. Otherwise, the stand is solid and robust, and you won't accidentally move it on your desk either.
The ergonomics are mediocre, as it offers minimal adjustments. It's fine if you need to adjust it in front of you, but you'll have to turn the entire monitor to share your screen with someone next to you. Because its VESA mounting holes are in a diamond shape, you'll need to use a wall adapter that can rotate.
The square-based stand is solid and supports the screen well, but it doesn't take up a ton of space either. The thickness measurement is from the side of the screen to the back of the stand, but the thickness from the center of the screen to the back is 6.7" (17.0 cm).
The thickness measurement is from the side of the screen to the back, but the thickness from the center of the screen to the back is 2.2" (5.5 cm).
There's a directional pad to navigate the on-screen menu and a power button to turn the display On/Off.
The HP OMEN 34c has a high native contrast ratio to display deep blacks next to bright highlights. However, it lacks a local dimming feature to further improve it.
This monitor doesn't have a local dimming feature. We still film these videos on the monitor so that you can compare the backlight performance with a monitor that has local dimming.
The SDR brightness is great. It gets bright enough to fight glare, and its brightness is consistent across different content. The minimum brightness is a bit high, which is disappointing if you want to use the monitor in a dark room and are sensitive to bright lights. These results are from after calibration in the 'Gaming' Color Mode with the Brightness setting at its max.
The HP OMEN 34c has decent HDR brightness. While it gets bright, small highlights don't pop against the rest of the image due to the lack of a local dimming feature. Also, it doesn't follow the target PQ EOTF properly, as most dark scenes are too dark, but because it has a sharp cut-off at its peak brightness, it lets highlights get the brightest they can. There aren't any settings available in HDR, except for Sharpness, and there aren't any picture modes.
The horizontal viewing angle is disappointing. The image washes out from the sides, which isn't ideal if you need to share your screen with someone next to you.
The HP OMEN 34c has a poor vertical viewing angle. The image looks washed out if you're standing up and looking down at the screen.
The gray uniformity is great. While the sides are a bit darker than the rest, and there's some minor backlight bleed towards the center, there's minimal dirty screen effect.
The black uniformity is decent. Although there's minimal blooming around objects, there's still some backlight bleed, and it lacks a local dimming feature to reduce it.
The HP OMEN 34c has excellent accuracy before calibration. While it doesn't have a dedicated sRGB mode, many of the Color Modes include an sRGB clamp. It locks colors well to the sRGB color space, and the white balance and gamma are both good but imperfect. That said, the color temperature is on the cold side, giving the image a blue tint. Only the 'Gaming' and 'Native' modes don't use the sRGB clamp, and 'Native' gets much brighter than most of the other modes but has a very cold temperature. The 'Gaming' mode still has decent brightness and color temperature, but colors are oversaturated, as you can see here. The modes that include the sRGB clamp are:
- HP Enhance +
- Standard
- Warm
- Cool
- Cinema
- Night
The accuracy after calibration is excellent. Although it's already accurate in one of the sRGB modes, calibrating it lets it get brighter while maintaining an accurate image.
The SDR color gamut is fantastic. It has perfect coverage of the common sRGB color space, and while it has great coverage of the Adobe RGB color space used in photo editing, it oversaturates reds and magentas and undersaturates greens and cyans.
This monitor has an incredible HDR color volume. It displays most bright colors well but struggles with dark colors due to its low contrast.
The HDR color gamut is good. It has good coverage of the DCI-P3 color space, but it can't display saturated greens well, and it has a more limited coverage of the wider Rec. 2020 color space.
The HP OMEN 34c has a great HDR color gamut. While it displays some bright colors well, it's mainly limited by its incomplete color gamut.
The reflection handling is good. Although it struggles if you place it opposite a window with direct sunlight, it's still good if you want to use it in a room with a few lights around, as it also gets bright.
The text clarity is good, and enabling Windows ClearType (top photo) helps improve clarity on diagonal and curved lines. These photos are in Windows 10, and you can see it in Windows 11 with ClearType on and with ClearType off.
Although not directly related to text clarity, the monitor has some pixel inversion and flicker issues, depending on the content. You can see this if you have multiple windows open or if you move windows across a dark background, as you can see here. It only happens with certain content, as we noticed it with test patterns and with Tomb Raider on macOS, but it's still something to be aware of.
The gradient handling is remarkable. You won't see banding with most content.
Due to bandwidth limitations, the refresh rate is limited over HDMI, so you can only reach this monitor's max refresh rate with 8-bit signals over DisplayPort.
The HP OMEN 34c works well with FreeSync VRR and G-SYNC compatibility, but G-SYNC only works over a DisplayPort connection. The monitor supports Low Framerate Compensation (LFC) for the VRR to continue working over a wide refresh rate range.
| Overdrive Setting | Response Time Chart | Response Time Tables | Motion Blur Photo |
| Level 1 | Chart | Table | Photo |
| Level 2 | Chart | Table | Photo |
| Level 3 | Chart | Table | Photo |
| Level 4 | Chart | Table | Photo |
| Level 5 | Chart | Table | Photo |
The response time at the max refresh rate is decent, but there's some blur and smearing with most fast-moving objects. The 'Level 4' Response Time setting has better motion handling than the first three settings and less overshoot than 'Level 5'.
| Overdrive Setting | Response Time Chart | Response Time Tables | Motion Blur Photo |
| Level 1 | Chart | Table | Photo |
| Level 2 | Chart | Table | Photo |
| Level 3 | Chart | Table | Photo |
| Level 4 | Chart | Table | Photo |
| Level 5 | Chart | Table | Photo |
The HP OMEN 34c has a good response time at 120Hz. It's similar to its max refresh rate, with slightly less blur while using the 'Level 4' overdrive setting. It's the recommended setting because it has the fastest total response time and a lot less overshoot than 'Level 5'.
| Overdrive Setting | Response Time Chart | Response Time Tables | Motion Blur Photo |
| Level 1 | Chart | Table | Photo |
| Level 2 | Chart | Table | Photo |
| Level 3 | Chart | Table | Photo |
| Level 4 | Chart | Table | Photo |
| Level 5 | Chart | Table | Photo |
The response time at 60Hz is okay, as there's blur and smearing with fast-moving objects. Unlike with higher refresh rates, the recommended Response Time setting is 'Level 2' because it has a faster total response time and less overshoot than levels 3 through 5. That said, the monitor's LFC feature kicks in at 60Hz, doubling the refresh rate to 120Hz when you have VRR enabled. This means you only get a true 60Hz refresh rate with fixed signals.
| MPRT Setting | 165Hz | 144Hz | 120Hz |
| 1 |  |  |  |
| 2 |  |  |  |
| 3 |  |  |  |
| 4 |  |  |  |
| 5 |  |  |  |
The HP OMEN 34c has an optional backlight strobing feature, commonly known as black frame insertion. You need to disable VRR to use the MPRT setting, which has five options to choose the intensity of it. However, none of the settings are effective at improving the appearance of motion, and there's image duplication as well.
The backlight remains flicker-free at all brightness levels, which helps reduce eye strain if you're sensitive to flicker.
This monitor has low input lag for a responsive feel while gaming; you won't notice any delay.
This monitor has limited compatibility with the PS5 because it can't downscale 4k signals and doesn't support VRR either. Also, the console doesn't support ultrawide gaming, so you'll see black bars on the sides.
This monitor has limited compatibility with the Xbox Series X|S because it can't downscale 4k signals. This means it doesn't support HDR, as the Xbox only supports HDR in 4k. Despite enabling VRR in the Xbox's settings, it didn't actually work in games, as the refresh rate would remain at 60Hz. Also, the console doesn't support ultrawide gaming, so you'll see black bars on the sides.
The HP OMEN 34c works well with macOS while using a DisplayPort to USB-C cable. VRR and HDR work simultaneously, and there aren't any issues. However, there are some flicker and pixel inversion issues that you can see in games, as you can read more about in Text Clarity. If you're using a MacBook, windows return to their original position when waking the laptop up from sleep, but not when you close the lid and reopen it.
The HP OMEN 34c has a few extra features, including some of these:
- Crosshair: You can choose different virtual crosshairs available, giving you a competitive advantage as your game's anti-cheat tool won't detect it.
- Diagnostic Patterns: Displays full-screen images of different colors so you can see any uniformity issues or dead pixels more easily.
- Frame Rate: Displays the current frame rate from your source.
- Multi-Monitor Align: Makes it easier to align the monitor next to another by displaying an overlay.
- OMEN Gaming Hub: This monitor works with HP's proprietary app to change certain settings, even if it doesn't have a USB hub to connect your PC to.
