LG UltraWide QHD 34-Inch Curved Computer Monitor 34WQ73A-B, IPS with HDR 10 Compatibility, Built-In-KVM, and USB Type-C, Black

This is a review for the LG 34WQ73A-B, which appears to be a recent release (9/2022, review written 12/2022). TL;DR: This is an extremely good value for office use. I have more expensive monitors and I compare them in detail below.I have three other monitors to compare this against: an LG UltraFine 5K 27", an LG 4k 27" and an Alienware 34" with the same resolution (gaming, 144hz). I went with this monitor (34WQ73A-B) because it has an IPS panel and my other LG IPS 4K and 5K screens have very good color accuracy; my MacBook Pro renders text to both very well. I didn't need a high refresh for gaming, just 60Hz for office work as a software developer working in design systems. I have this placed next to my 5K UltraFine, which makes it easy to discern where it is a step down (pixel density). That said, it holds up well and is very comparable to my Alienware 34" at the same resolution. Font smoothing isn't as ideal as the 5K, but it looks good enough to not bother me at all. I use it for Zoom meetings, browser windows, and also code editing. I still prefer the 5K for previewing output (web development work on the front-end) but I'll use this when the details or colors don't matter as much.Regarding alternatives on the market, I had also considered stepping up to a 38" monitor for 2-2.5x the price but I couldn't justify the difference. It would have been the same pixel density, and only going to a 5K2K monitor at 38-40" would have been a real improvement, but those cost around 4-5x as much. Like I said, next to a 5K 27" monitor, it holds up and I'm not disappointed one bit, it does what it sets out to do very well. The value here is unmatched.I also compared its HDR performance next to my 5K and it held up really well (see the first photo with both displays). I had to turn the brightness to 100%, and made sure the HDR options were enabled. It was slightly less bright than my 5K, so I intentionally lowered the brightness on my 5K to match it better; the 5K was at 100% initially which was probably too bright for everyday use in the first place. The 5K at around 50% brightness matches the 34WQ73A-B at 100% brightness, so I feel like the 34WQ73A-B is a relatively dim monitor best suited to medium to low light settings. I don't work in a bright room, I keep my lights low and warm, so this is not an issue. In a bright space with lots of sunlight, it could be more of an issue, so keep that in mind. It probably wouldn't matter with good contrast, but darker images might not show up as well.If I could call out any other cons, it would probably be the backlight bleed. One photo shows approximately what you would see in a dark room (I turned off the lights) and the photo with a brighter backlight bleed is from the camera auto-exposing to a higher degree. It does not look like the brighter photo but it's still a good photo to show what the backlight variance is like. In everyday use, it's not a problem. I think it would handle a movie just fine even with dark scenes, it would just fall short of what an OLED TV panel could do.Again, if you research what a panel like this can do, I think this is going to deliver on what it should be capable of. At the current price point, it's one of the best values I've ever had in all my monitor purchasing. Each of my four monitors all fill a slightly different expectation and I'm pretty happy with my two setups for gaming (27" 4K + 34" 3440x1440 144Hz) and office (27" 5K + this LG 34" 3440x1440 60Hz). I think this is ideal as a value-oriented office monitor and you'd have to spend 5x as much to really have a noticeable upgrade in the ultrawide format.

I am writing this review after experiencing the monitor for couple of months to ensure that my review is well rounded and includes all the points one need to know of while making a decision to purchase this monitor.The context of my purchase:1. The pandemic has ensured that a lot of people like me are working from home. At some point we all feel two things (at least I felt):a. The laptop screens are too small for multi screen workingb. The switching between work and personal laptops becomes a spot of bother.2. Depending on our pastime hobbies, we need a monitor that can help us work on a bigger screen as well as let us do our hobby related things on the same monitor. Photography is my hobby and and I process really large photographs on a regular basis besides constantly working from home.So an ideal scenario for me was to get a monitor that supports high resolution so I can see my large photos with decent clarity and also lets me work with multiple screens side by side. I went back and forth between a lot of monitors before deciding to buy this one.One reason I went for the ultrawide is that the height of the ultrawide monitors are less than the non-ultrawide due to the 16:9 ratio. This allows me to look straight into the monitor without craning my neck.Now specifics about the monitor:1. IPS panel and hence really crisp display corner to corner, great colors and sharpness.2. Supports high resolution laptops. I have a mac mini 2020 with dedicated graphics card. I love the way this monitor displays everything on the mac mini.3. Unpacking and setting up was a breeze.4. The screen splitting software is awesome. Allows you to split the screen in 2, 3 or 4 sections. Once installed on your laptops, you select the split you want and that's it. As soon as you drag a specific application, the split window borders immediately appear and let you just drop the screen into the section you want and the application snugly fits into that section. I love this part actually.Now the difficulties I had to achieve the setup I was looking for.1. You can connect wireless keyboard and mouse straight into the monitor. Those devices get attached to the laptop you connect to the monitor without any issues.2. However, the monitor only has 1 USB-C port. So if you have two high resolution computers to attach to the monitor, you can't connect simultaneously. You have to keep taking the cable off one and put on another to get the display. This is not the solution I was looking for.3. The HDMI ports don't bring up high resolution display. My Mac Mini doesn't even show anything on the monitor when connected to the HDMI port. My work Windows laptop shows a display on HDMI port, but with resolution so low that it is not usable.4. If you use a Display cable on the Display port, then you only throw the display to the monitor but you don't get the advantage of sharing the keyboard and mouse through the monitor.So, I tried all the permutations and combinations to make it work so I can have both my work and personal computers connected to the monitor and I can switch between the two with the display select button of the monitor. Alas, didn't work out. If only LG had two USB-C ports on the monitor.So after a lot of research, I bought this KVM switch that allows me to go back and forth between my two computers with the press of a button:https://smile.amazon.com/gp/product/B08F42NXGC/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o06_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1It is a pricy solution, but it finally achieved the setup I wanted. Now my two computers are connected to the switch along with the wireless keyboard and the mouse and the switch sends the display to the monitor through a dedicated display (HDMI) cable. I switch between my two computers with the button on the switch.I know it is more than just reviewing the monitor. But I am sure a lot of you want to have a similar setup at home and I wanted to write this to ensure that you know what you are getting into. Hope this helps.