LG 42 C2 OLED Monitor Review

The LG C2 42 is a simple-looking TV that's a bit different than the larger sizes. As opposed to a center-mounted stand, its stand consists of two feet, and the back is a bit thicker too. Besides that, it looks like any premium TV with thin bezels all around. While this TV has a flat screen, the LG 42 OLED Flex is a similar display whose panel can curve up to 900R.

The LG C2 42 has fantastic build quality. It's solid throughout, with a metal bezel around the frame and textured plastic on the back that's sturdy. The stand supports the display well, and there aren't any obvious issues.

As the LG 42C2 is a TV, it doesn't offer any ergonomic adjustments. You can use the feet to route the cables through for cable management. The inputs are side-facing, which are easy to access, especially if you have the TV on a desk.

Instead of having a center-mounted stand like on larger C2 models, the LG C2 42 has two wide-set plastic feet. This is better for monitor use because you can route your keyboard and mouse cables or place stuff between the feet. They also support the display well.

You need to change all of the LG OLED42C2's settings with the included remote, and there's a button underneath the center of the screen to turn it On/Off, change inputs, adjust the volume, or switch channels.

• Remote (with 2x AA batteries)
• IR Blaster
• 2x cable management clips
• 2x double sided tape for IR blaster
• User manuals and documentation

The LG C2 42 has an OLED panel with a near-infinite contrast ratio, meaning blacks are deep and inky in dark rooms.

The LG C2 42 doesn't have a backlight, so it doesn't require a local dimming feature. However, with a near-infinite contrast ratio, there isn't any blooming around bright objects, and it's the equivalent of a perfect local dimming feature. We still film these videos on the monitor so you can see how the screen performs and compare it with a monitor that has local dimming.

The LG C2 42 has disappointing peak brightness in PC Mode, and it's not as bright as the Sony 42 A90K OLED. If you're looking for a brighter display, check out the LG 42 C4 OLED. These results are from after calibration in the 'Game Optimizer' Picture Mode with Game Optimizer enabled and the input set to 'PC', which lets you achieve low input lag and proper text clarity when using it as a PC monitor. However, 'Game Optimizer' locks you out of many settings in SDR, including Peak Brightness, which is why the screen is dim, and it's not enough to fight glare in a well-lit room. It's beneficial when using it as a PC monitor because there's no Automatic Brightness Limiter that makes full-screen documents and webpages dimmer. It also helps reduce the risk of permanent burn-in.

Below are the results for the brightness tested with Game Optimizer setting disabled in PC Mode with the Picture Mode still on 'Game Optimizer'. It makes the screen brighter, but the ABL is a bit more aggressive with larger areas of bright colors. Disabling Game Optimizer increases the input lag, but it's still fine for desktop use if you want the brighter image.

• Peak 2% Window: 227 cd/m²
• Peak 10% Window: 232 cd/m²
• Peak 25% Window: 233 cd/m²
• Peak 50% Window: 234 cd/m²
• Peak 100% Window: 147 cd/m²
• Sustained 2% Window: 196 cd/m²
• Sustained 10% Window: 223 cd/m²
• Sustained 25% Window: 224 cd/m²
• Sustained 50% Window: 226 cd/m²
• Sustained 100% Window: 133 cd/m²

You can also see the results in the 'Expert (Dark Room)' Picture Mode with the Peak Brightness setting on 'High' below. The TV gets brighter when you're streaming regular content out of Game Mode, but like with any OLED, larger areas of bright colors are dimmer, so it isn't ideal to use with regular desktop use, as full-size windows are noticeably dimmer.

• Real Scene: 351 cd/m²
• Peak 2% Window: 341 cd/m²
• Peak 10% Window: 343 cd/m²
• Peak 25% Window: 324 cd/m²
• Peak 50% Window: 318 cd/m²
• Peak 100% Window: 177 cd/m²
• Sustained 2% Window: 317 cd/m²
• Sustained 10% Window: 325 cd/m²
• Sustained 25% Window: 307 cd/m²
• Sustained 50% Window: 301 cd/m²
• Sustained 100% Window: 168 cd/m²

The LG C2 42 has decent HDR peak brightness. It gets bright enough to make small highlights pop, and the overall scene is good enough for a satisfying HDR experience. The EOTF follows the target perfectly until there's a sharp roll-off at the peak brightness, causing a loss of fine details in bright scenes. If you want something that gets brighter, then check out the Samsung 43 QN90B QLED.

These results are from the 'Game Optimizer' HDR Picture Mode with the input label set to 'PC", OLED Pixel Brightness at its max, and Peak Brightness on 'High'.

The LG C2 42 has an excellent horizontal viewing angle. The image remains consistent from the sides, but the colors shift, so it isn't ideal if you're using it for photo editing and need to see accurate colors from the side.

The LG C2 42 has an amazing vertical viewing angle. The image looks the same if you're standing above it or have it mounted above eye-level, but like with the horizontal viewing angle, the colors aren't as accurate.

The LG C2 42 has excellent gray uniformity. Solid colors throughout the screen look uniform, and there's hardly any dirty screen effect in the center, which is ideal when you have full web pages open. It doesn't have the pink tint on the sides like on the 65-inch C2, likely because it uses a slightly different panel technology. Also, all OLEDs have faint vertical lines with near-dark images, which you'll notice if you sit close.

The LG C2 42 has perfect black uniformity because there isn't any blooming around bright objects.

The LG C2 42 has great out-of-the-box accuracy in SDR. Setting Color Gamut to 'Auto' clamps the colors to the sRGB color space, and unlike many monitors, you still have access to all picture settings. Sadly, the white balance is a bit off, and the color temperature is on the warm side, giving the image a slightly red tint. Gamma doesn't follow the target sRGB well, so dark scenes are too dark while brighter scenes are over-brightened.

The LG C2 42 has fantastic accuracy after calibration. It's not as good as most other monitors because we only calibrate monitors with a 2-point calibration, but you can use the full 10 and 22-point calibration settings to get more accurate colors. Although some colors, the white balance, and gamma aren't perfect, the image still looks accurate, and you won't notice any big issues.

You can also read more about the TV's settings here.

The LG C2 42 has an incredible SDR color gamut. It has almost full coverage of the commonly-used sRGB color space used in most web content. It also has great coverage of the Adobe RGB color space used in photo editing, but it doesn't display all the necessary greens properly.

The LG C2 42 has a remarkable SDR color volume. It displays colors as bright as pure white and displays dark colors perfectly, thanks to its near-infinite contrast.

The LG C2 42 has an amazing HDR color gamut. It covers nearly all of the commonly-used DCI-P3 color space with good tone mapping, but it doesn't display saturated greens properly. Sadly, it's not future-proof because it has limited Rec. 2020 coverage and the tone mapping is off, and more content will start to use that color space.

The LG C2 42 has a decent HDR color volume. It displays dark and bright colors well, but it's limited by its incomplete color gamut. Unfortunately, its color volume isn't as good as the Dell Alienware AW3423DW because that monitor uses QD-OLED technology, allowing it to get brighter and display a wider range of colors, so colors look more vivid.

The LG C2 42 has fantastic reflection handling. Unlike the Sony 42 A90K OLED, it has a glossy finish that cuts down reflections well, and even though the TV doesn't get the brightest in Game Mode, you shouldn't have issues using it in rooms with a few lights around. Unlike the Dell Alienware AW3423DW, the black levels aren't noticeably worse when there's ambient light on the screen.

The LG C2 42 has decent text clarity. As it's about the same pixel density as a 27-inch, 1440p monitor, text is legible, but you'll notice some blurriness if you sit close. Windows default to a 300% scaling, which is too big, and changing it to 100% is good enough to read the text, as you can see in the photos above. The OLED screen's RWBG (also known as WBGR) layout isn't ideal as programs don't support it, so text clarity is worse with some programs. Also, some color fringing is noticeable with certain content, like when displaying yellow on a green background, but it's not a big issue with most content. Due to the smaller screen size, the LG C2 42 also has slightly better text clarity than the LG 48 C1 OLED, but it's not enough to make a significant difference.

Below you can see text clarity photos at different scaling options.

As this uses a RWBG subpixel layout, all four pixels are never on at the same time, but you can see different pixel combinations below:

• Blue only
• Green only
• Green and blue
• Red only
• Red and blue
• Red and green
• Red, green, and white

The LG C2 42 has fantastic gradient handling. There's some banding in darker shades, but other than that, banding is minimal. There's a Smooth Gradation setting that reduces banding, but also causes a loss of fine details with high-quality content, and you can only use it with certain picture modes.

The LG C2 42 has a high refresh rate that you can achieve over its HDMI 2.1 ports, but unlike most monitors, it doesn't have a DisplayPort input. If DisplayPort connectivity is important to you, OLED monitors like the LG 48GQ900-B are a better choice.

The LG C2 42 supports all common variable refresh rate formats, including HDMI Forum VRR, to reduce screen tearing. You need to ensure your graphics card supports HDMI 2.1 for the full VRR range in 4k; otherwise, you'll be limited to a max refresh rate of 60Hz in 4k. If you want an OLED monitor with a higher 165Hz refresh rate for PC gaming, consider the Dell Alienware AW3423DWF or the Samsung Odyssey OLED G8/G85SB S34BG85.

The LG C2 42 has a near-instantaneous response time, resulting in remarkable motion handling. There's almost no motion blur behind fast-moving objects, but due to OLED's sample and hold method, there's still a bit of persistence blur. It also has some overshoot when transitioning from pure black to any shade, which is common among OLEDs, and while it can cause inverse ghosting, it's not noticeable. Unlike most monitors, there's no option to adjust the pixel overdrive, but you won't need it anyways.

The max refresh rate of the LG C2 42 is 120Hz, so the results are the same as at the max refresh rate.

The response time on the LG C2 42 remains quick with 60Hz content. There's a bit more overshoot with dark transitions, leading to some inverse ghosting dark scenes, but it's not noticeable. However, because the response time is so quick, there's stutter with lower-frame-rate content as each frame is held on longer. The LG C2 42 has a motion interpolation feature to try to reduce stutter, though.

The LG C2 42 has an optional black frame insertion feature to reduce persistence blur. Unlike the LG 48 C1 OLED, it only flickers at 60Hz, and you can't use it at all with 120 fps content. For it to work, you need to enable OLED Motion, and you also need to make sure you disable VRR and have Prevent Input Delay set to 'Standard', which significantly increases the input lag.

The LG C2 42 doesn't use pulse width modulation to dim the backlight, but it's technically not flicker-free either. The slight dip in brightness coincides with the 120Hz refresh rate, which isn't visible because it's not a full-screen on and off flicker like on LED-backlit displays.

The LG C2 42 has low input lag for a responsive desktop experience, as long as you're in the 'Game Optimizer' Picture Mode with the input set to 'PC' and Prevent Input Delay set to 'Boost'. Setting Prevent Input Delay to 'Standard' instead of 'Boost' increases the input lag, but it's still useable for gaming. The BFI input lag is at 60Hz with Prevent Input Delay set to 'Standard', which is why it's much higher than with BFI disabled.

You can also see the input lag results from other settings with 4k @ 120Hz:

• Prevent Input Delay on Standard: 13.6 ms
• VRR disabled: 5.2 ms
• Game Optimizer disabled: 13.7 ms
• Outside Game Mode but in PC Mode: 13.6 ms
• Outside Game Mode and PC Mode: 47.8 ms

The LG C2 42 has about the same pixel density as a 27-inch, 1440p monitor, so if you care about the best pixel density, it's better to go for a smaller 4k display.

The LG C2 42 works perfectly with the PS5 thanks to its HDMI 2.1 bandwidth.

The LG C2 42 is compatible with the Xbox Series X, but forcing 1440p @ 60Hz signals disables the VRR, ALLM, and HDR, which is a limitation of the Xbox. However, those features are enabled with 1440p @ 120Hz, so keep the TV at 120Hz if you're playing 1440p games.

The 42 and 48-inch models of the LG C2 42 have an audio output, making it easy to connect desktop speakers or headphones, but the larger sizes don't have this port.

Unlike other monitors, you can't use the USB ports to connect your peripherals to work with your computer, but you can use them to play media from USB sticks.

The LG C2 42 works well with recent macOS devices. HDR looks great, and everything works as intended, but you're limited to a 60Hz refresh rate, and VRR doesn't work. When the MacBook goes to sleep or you close the lid, the TV goes into screensaver mode, and waking the computer takes some time for the TV to display an image again.

As this is a TV, it has a bunch of features most monitors don't have, like image processing and smart features, which you can read about in the TV review. While it has a multi-input display feature, you can only view an image from one HDMI source and one native app, and not two HDMI sources at the same time. There are a few similar monitors that feature a fully-featured smart interface, like the Samsung Smart Monitor M7 S43BM70, but they don't perform as well.

The LG C2 42 also has a few settings to help reduce the risk of permanent burn-in associated with OLEDs like Pixel Cleaning and Screen Move. Even though it's likely less prone to burn-in than older OLED panels, there's still a risk. OLED panel technology has significantly advanced since our real-world burn-in test, which used 2017 models, so we don't know just how likely it is that these TVs will experience burn-in. We'll be starting a new burn-in test shortly to determine how effective each of these new panel technologies are at reducing the risk of burn-in.

See the settings page for the TV here.