The 4 Best Cheap Projectors - Summer 2024 Reviews

The best cheap projector is the Epson Home Cinema 1080, which delivers decent performance for the price. It projects a sharp 1080p image and is very bright, so it can easily handle moderately lit rooms. Unfortunately, its contrast is inadequate overall, so blacks are raised in dark rooms; if you're exclusively looking for a dark room projector, consider the ViewSonic PX701-4K below, which has much better contrast. Thankfully, the Epson's color gamut is alright; it's good enough to project pleasant colors, although nothing that will blow your socks off. You also can't improve the unit's color accuracy with calibration, but that's fine, as it's already great out of the box. It doesn't support HDR, but HDR support on projectors tends to be sub-par anyway, so it isn't a great loss, especially at this price point.

While it isn't truly a portable projector due to its size and lack of an integrated battery, it's only 5.9 pounds, so it's easy to carry around if needed. It has automatic vertical keystone correction, which further facilitates its portability, and its optical zoom lets you adjust the projected image's size without further moving the unit. The projector has two HDMI 2.0 ports and a USB-B port, allowing you to control the projector through a computer. Unfortunately, the unit doesn't come with a smart OS. Still, it does have Wi-Fi 5 and Miracast for screen mirroring, so all it is missing for full streaming functionality is an external streaming dongle, which you can power through the unit's USB-A port. Overall, it's the best budget projector available for most people.

If you're shopping for a dark room projector or if you're specifically looking for a gaming unit, the ViewSonic PX701-4K is one of the best budget projectors we've tested. It is decently bright, certainly bright enough to look vibrant in a dark room, and its contrast is quite good, making it the best option here to watch movies with the lights off. It's not a true 4k projector, but it uses pixel shifting to achieve a higher resolution image, giving it the sharpest image of any projector on this list. Unfortunately, this unit has one big flaw regarding image quality: its color accuracy is very poor out of the box, and you can barely improve it through calibration. This model does offer a ton of performance for the price, but it's not for color purists. And for the gamers out there, this model has two HDMI ports capable of gaming at 4k @ 60Hz or 1080p @ 240Hz.

Like many other projectors, it's not exactly portable, but it's also light at 6.2 pounds, so you can move it easily if needed. It even has automatic vertical keystone correction, so it can fix any geometry errors automatically on the vertical axis. While it supports HDR10 and HLG, its color gamut and output brightness aren't good enough to project a pleasant HDR experience, so stick to SDR content where possible. It also lacks any smart OS or wireless features, so connecting an external streaming dongle is necessary if you want any streaming features. Overall, it's a bit expensive to qualify as a cheap product, but it's a bit more versatile than the Epson Home Cinema 1080 and is a good choice for anyone willing to overlook its poor accuracy.

If you're looking for a model you can easily carry without plugging it into an outlet, the best cheap portable projector we've tested is the XGIMI Halo+. It's a very small unit and weighs only 3.7 pounds, so you can easily throw it into a backpack. Plus, it has an integrated battery promising up to 2.5 hours of uninterrupted playback, which is long enough to watch most movies. It has many image correction features: full auto keystone, autofocus, intelligent screen alignment, and obstacle avoidance. This is truly a projector you can take on the go, as it automatically sets itself up correctly no matter where you install it. To round up the package, it comes with the Android TV smart interface, Chromecast and AirScreen support, and Wi-Fi 5 and Bluetooth 5.0 capabilities.

Like most portable models, it's slightly dim but significantly brighter than most competitors. It'll project a pleasant image as long as all the lights are off or the moonlight isn't too strong. Fortunately, it does have great contrast, emphasizing its dark room capabilities. It also has a very wide color gamut and HDR support, but it's not bright enough to take advantage of them. Its color accuracy is quite poor, and while you can improve it somewhat through calibration, this isn't really a product for color purists, but then again, color accuracy doesn't matter too much when projecting a movie on the side of a barn or van. It has one HDMI port, which also doubles as an eARC port, and a USB port through which you can play video files directly to the projector.

If you're looking for the absolute best value, look at the Epson EpiqVision Flex CO-W01. While it doesn't have any HDR support, it projects an extremely bright 1280 x 800 resolution image that is perfect for bright offices, but the projector's also no slouch for watching movies; its bright image makes content pop, and this model looks great when watching content in a moderately lit room. Unfortunately, the contrast is inadequate; blacks are raised and look gray. This means it'll look its best when a few lights are on. Its out-of-the-box color accuracy is decent, which is certainly good enough for most people, but color purists can greatly improve it through the projector's 2-point white balance calibration.

Like the Epson Home Cinema 1080, this model is pretty light at 5.4 pounds, so you can carry it around if you need to. Unfortunately, unlike the Home Cinema 1080, it lacks any auto keystone correction and autofocusing, so you must manually adjust the image if you wish to fix any geometry issues. It also lacks any smart OS and doesn't even have Wi-Fi, so an external streaming dongle is necessary. It does have a USB-B port to let you projector some audio and video files directly from a PC through Epson's USB Display software, and you can project a few file formats through the unit's USB-A port, but overall, it's rather barebones when it comes to ports, especially as it has only one HDMI port.