Acer Predator X27U X1 monitor review: The OLED price war heats up

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The OLED price wars are here.

Acer’s Predator X27U X1 is a new monitor with a 27-inch 1440p QD-OLED display. Yet it carries an MSRP of $600, which is hundreds of dollars less than the MSRP similar monitors had in 2023 and 2024. Acer is forced to make a few compromises to hit a low price but, when it comes to image quality, the X27U X1 is a match for its peers.

Read on to learn more, then see our roundup of the best gaming monitors for comparison.

Acer Predator X27U X1 (X1bmiiphx) specs and features

The Acer Predator X27U X1’s specifications are typical for a 27-inch QD-OLED monitor. It has a 26.5-inch QD-OLED panel with 2560×1440 resolution and a refresh rate up to 240Hz. Adaptive sync is supported, though only AMD FreeSync Premium Pro is officially listed.

• Display size: 26.5-inch 16:9 widescreen
• Native resolution: 2560×1440
• Panel type: 10-bit OLED
• Refresh rate: 240Hz
• Adaptive sync: AMD FreeSync Premium Pro
• HDR: HDR10, VESA DisplayHDR 400 certified
• Ports: 2x HDMI 2.1, 1x DisplayPort 1.4
• Audio: 2x 5-watt speakers
• Warranty: 3 years
• Price: $599.99 MSRP, as low as $449.99 retail (U.S.)

Pricing is where the Predator X27U X1 stands out, as it lists an MSRP just one cent shy of $600. Most similar monitors list an MSRP of $799.99 or more. Newegg already lists this monitor at $450.

Shoppers should be careful to write down the X27U X1’s full model name, which is X1bmiiphx (yes, really). Acer sells several monitors that are similar in name, design, and specifications. It’s confusing enough that, as of March 2025, Newegg has the wrong photos on its listing for this monitor. 

Acer Predator X27U X1 design

The Acer Predator X27U X1 is obviously designed, built, and priced with affordability in mind. That leads to fewer compromises than I expected, but its design reflects the price. Though it does have a tiny Predator badge on the bottom bezel, the monitor is otherwise incredibly generic. It’s built from sturdy but unremarkable black plastics and lacks flourishes like customizable RGB-LED accent lighting.

I’m not a fan of the stand, either. While the monitor itself is generic, the stand feels a bit cheap. This is mostly due to the coarse texture of the materials used. The tiny plastic clip used for cable management, which feels like it’s sure to break after a couple of years, doesn’t help matters. I don’t like the design of the stand base, either. It’s wider than most yet doesn’t keep the monitor any more stable than its competition.

Matthew Smith / Foundry

With that said, though, Acer’s budget stand keeps most of the functionality you’d expect from a more expensive OLED monitor. It adjusts for height, tilt, and swivel, though it doesn’t pivot into portrait orientation. A 75x75mm VESA mount is available for use with third-party monitor stands and arms.

Acer Predator X27U X1 connectivity

Acer keeps the Predator X27U X1’s connectivity as simple as its design. The monitor has two HDMI 2.1 ports and one DisplayPort 1.4. All video ports can handle the monitor’s full resolution and refresh rate. The monitor also has a 3.5mm audio-out.

But that’s it for connectivity. It has no USB-A or USB-C ports, which also means it lacks a KVM switch function (an increasingly common feature on OLED monitors).

The lack of USB is certainly a downside and makes the Predator X27U X1 less versatile than more expensive alternatives. Alternatives like the MSI MPG 272URX offer multiple USB ports and USB-C with Power Delivery. That monitor has an MSRP of $1099.99, however.

Acer Predator X27U X1 menu and features

The affordable Acer Predator X27U X1 makes cuts to design and connectivity, but that’s where the sacrifices end.

Contrary to what the price suggests, the X27U X1 has an effective on-screen menu with many options. While I do take issue with the font size, which is a bit small and low contrast for my tastes, I was surprised by the plethora of options. In particular, the monitor has easy-to-find settings for color temperature, gamma, and six-axis color calibration.

Matthew Smith / Foundry

The monitor also includes gaming features, like a dark equalizer (which can elevate shadowy areas of a scene to make foes visible) and a frame rate counter. The monitor includes several screen space modes, too. For example, you can restrict the visible area to 24 or 22 inches if desired.

Acer packs the display with a pair of 5-watt speakers (most OLED monitors have no speakers or stick to dinky 2-watt speakers). The speakers aren’t going to knock your socks off, but they’re loud and clear. I didn’t mind relying on them for watching YouTube or playing games that don’t focus on bombastic audio design (like Civilization), and they’re indisputably an upgrade over most competitive monitors.

Acer Predator X27U X1 SDR image quality

The Acer Predator X27U X1’s affordability isn’t obvious from its image quality. It has a 26.5-inch QD-OLED panel with a native resolution of 2560×1440. It has all the benefits common to OLED panels and doesn’t suffer any significant flaw.

Matthew Smith / Foundry

Let’s get the bad news out of the way. The Acer Predator X27U X1, like other OLED monitors, has a relatively tame maximum SDR brightness of 263 nits. That’s typical for an OLED monitor but a long way from the brightest LCD-IPS monitors, which can exceed 400 nits.

This won’t matter in most situations, as a brightness of 200 nits or more is adequate for a typical home office or gaming den. If you plan to use the monitor in a brightly lit room where you can’t turn off or block nearby light sources, however, you might find the brightness unimpressive.

Matthew Smith / Foundry

Contrast, as typical for OLED, is excellent. The QD-OLED panel can achieve a minimum brightness of zero nits, which lets the monitor deliver a convincing sense of depth and dimensionality. Brighter scenes will seem to have depth within the scene, while darker scenes will show shadow details and a true, deep black level that backlit LCD displays can’t provide.

Matthew Smith / Foundry

Color gamut is a strength of all OLED monitors, but the Acer Predator X27U X1 knocks it out of the park. It showed up to 100 percent of sRGB, 98 percent of DCI-P3, and 95 percent of AdobeRGB. That’s the widest color gamut of all the OLED monitors I’ve tested so far in 2025, though only by a hair.

A wide color gamut translates to a vivid, saturated image that looks punchy straight out of the box. It’s also good news for creatives who want to work with photos, videos, or digital art that targets a specific color gamut. Despite its price, the X27U X1’s color gamut is on par with many displays pitched at creative professionals.

Matthew Smith / Foundry

The Acer Predator X27U X1 scores well in color accuracy, too. It’s not the best, but not the worst, and the level of color accuracy provided here is enough that even the most critical viewers should be happy with the results. Content looks realistic and true to its original creative intent.

The monitor scored slightly off-target in gamma and color temperature. It hit a gamma curve of 2.3 (off a target of 2.2) and a color temperature of 6400K (off a target of 6500). I found the difference in gamma noticeable, as content often looked a little darker than ideal, but I struggled to notice the difference in color temperature. Also, most QD-OLED monitors have a similar gamma curve. In both cases the differences are minor.

Sharpness is the Predator X27U X1’s only real image-quality flaw. A resolution of 2560×1440 is not that sharp in 2025, and it’s made worse by the sub-pixel issues QD-OLED displays can suffer. You may notice strong pixelation or color artifacts around small fonts and high-contrast edges. This isn’t often noticeable in games, but it’s easy to spot in Excel spreadsheets or an IDE like VSCode. Put simply, I wouldn’t recommend the X27U X1 if you often view small text on your monitor—a 4K OLED, or an IPS-LCD display, will be better for that task.

The Acer Predator X27U X1’s SDR image quality is excellent and exactly in line with most OLED monitors, including many that are more expensive. It scores especially well in contrast, color gamut, and color accuracy, where the X27U X1 delivers results on par with the most expensive OLED displays available today. It’s incredible to see this level of color performance from a monitor sold online for as little as $449.99.

Acer Predator X27U X1 HDR image quality

Okay, so the affordable Acer Predator X27U X1 delivers SDR image quality on par with other 1440p QD-OLED monitors, no matter their price. So, surely, it must give up some HDR performance—right?

Matthew Smith / Foundry

Nope. It’s a solid HDR monitor.

Yes, the Predator X27U X1 turned in results that are technically a bit dimmer than some other OLED monitors I’ve recently tested.

But these are rather slim differences and, as I test more and more OLED monitors, I’ve become convinced that the kind of differences shown in the graph don’t translate to a meaningful real-world advantage. That’s not to say HDR brightness doesn’t matter, but I don’t think the benefit of a slightly brighter HDR monitor, like the Alienware AW2725Q, is easy to see.

The test clips that I normally view, which include the “Into the Storm” scene from Mad Max Fury Road and the “Gargantua” scene from Interstellar, showed good luminance detail and impactful HDR highlights. HDR games like Forza Horizon 5 looked great, too, providing a vivid and punchy presentation. 

Acer Predator X27U X1 motion performance

You won’t see any compromise in the monitor’s motion clarity, either.

The Acer Predator X27U X1, like most 1440p OLED monitors, has a maximum refresh rate of 240Hz and quotes gray-to-gray pixel response times as low as 0.03 milliseconds. This makes for excellent motion clarity with minimal ghosting.

Test images from League of Legends, for example, showed that character names and hitpoint bars were usually easy to read while scrolling across the map, though low-contrast font can still be hard to make out. A quick camera pan in a 3D game, like Valorant, will show good detail even in small objects. The motion clarity is helpful in Word and in web browsers, too, as fonts are easier to read when scrolling down a page or document.

Of course, the same is true of other OLED monitors with a 240Hz refresh rate. But it’s good to see the X27U X1’s lower price doesn’t compromise motion clarity.

Adaptive sync is supported, but Acer only lists official support for AMD FreeSync Premium Pro. The monitor will generally work with G-Sync and other video sources that support adaptive sync, but it’s not guaranteed. This is one small compromise in the name of affordability, as more expensive monitors often list themselves as compatible with both FreeSync and G-Sync.

Should you buy the Acer Predator X27U X1?

The Acer Predator X27U X1 is proof that 2025 is the year OLED becomes affordable. At $600 MSRP, which is already discounted to as little as $450 online, the X27U X1’s pricing severely undercuts what was typical for OLED monitors in 2024. It also starts to compete with high-end IPS-LCD monitors which, though they still have a few perks (like sharpness), generally can’t compete with OLED on image quality.

I expect that Acer’s competitors won’t hesitate to match the X27U X1 with their own price cuts. But, for now, the X27U X1 is a good choice if you want to enjoy OLED for less.