HP bills its U28 4K HDR Monitor ($449.99) as a consumer display for content creators. This bright, handsomely designed panel does a great job in both color-gamut coverage and color accuracy for the sRGB space, making it highly suitable for working with art destined for the web. This high-resolution monitor also does a decent job in handling the DCI-P3 space, with nearly 90% coverage in our testing. The U28 can display HDR video content, although the effect is relatively subtle. It’s a fine general-use panel that’s also fit for light content-creation work, though the competition in its market segment is stiff.
A Panel That Packs in the Pixels
The monitor’s 28-inch in-plane switching (IPS) panel offers 4K or UHD (3,840-by-2,160-pixel) resolution at a 16:9 widescreen aspect ratio. This resolution and screen size yield a very high pixel density—compared with either lower-resolution 27- or 28-inch screens or larger 4K displays—of 157 pixels per inch (ppi), which is more than enough for working with photos and other art. All else being equal, the higher the pixel density (how closely pixels are packed together), the sharper the image.
Like other IPS screens, the U28 has wide viewing angles, rated at up to 178 degrees for both vertical and horizontal, meaning that colors should remain reasonably true—free of shifting or posterization—even if you view the screen at extreme angles from the side or above.
The screen is surrounded by black bezels that are very thin on the top and sides and thicker on the bottom. The back of the cabinet, the stand, and the base are silver-colored. The stand supports a full range of ergonomic adjustments, with height, tilt (up to 5 degrees toward and up to 23 degrees away from you), swivel (up to 35 degrees in either direction) and pivot (between landscape and portrait) control. If you would prefer to wall-mount the U28 or secure it to a movable arm, a square array of holes spaced 100mm apart on the back will fit a VESA mounting bracket.
Ports include one HDMI 2.0 port, a DisplayPort 1.2 connector, a USB Type-C port that supports DisplayPort over USB Alternate Mode and USB power delivery (PD) of up to 65 watts, and a hub of three USB 3.1 Type-A ports. There’s also a 3.5mm jack for headphones or powered external speakers—the monitor has no built-in speakers. The USB hub is a nice feature with some useful ports, although it is a more modest set than either the Philips Brilliance 279P1 or the HP Z27k G3 4K USB-C Display, which are so connectivity-centered that they earn the moniker “docking-station monitor.”
All the U28’s ports are in back, facing outward and stacked in a vertical column. They’re much easier to access than the downward-facing ports of most displays.
Also in back but easily in reach of one’s right hand is a mini joystick controller for navigating the U28’s onscreen display (OSD). It’s more convenient and easier to use than the row of tiny control buttons found on many monitors’ bottom bezels.
HP backs the U28 with a three-year standard warranty, which is typical of higher-end productivity monitors.
Testing the U28: Bright, With Stellar sRGB Coverage and Accuracy
I tested the U28’s brightness, contrast ratio, and color accuracy using our standard test equipment: a Klein K-10A colorimeter, a Murideo SIX-G signal generator, and Portrait Displays’ CalMAN 5 calibration software.
HP rates the display at 400 nits (candelas per square meter) of luminance, and it topped that—410 nits—in my testing. It did better than its rated 1,000:1 contrast ratio, tallying a 1,333:1 score. (See how we test monitors.)
The U28 did great in our sRGB color-gamut testing, covering 99.8% of sRGB. (See the chromaticity or color coverage chart above.) sRGB is the color space used for online art and numerous other applications.
HP claims a Delta E of less than 2, representing good color accuracy, for the sRGB color space. Delta E (dE for short) is the difference between the hue of a displayed color and the color input that the monitor received. The dE figure that appears in monitor specs is the average of a large number of individual color readings from across the spectrum; the lower the value, the more accurate the color. Many professional monitors tout a dE of less than 2 in various color spaces. The U28 easily hit that mark for sRGB, with an average dE of 1.4. (See the ColorChecker chart below.)
The U28 also covered 89.6% of DCI-P3, a color space geared to digital video production, a little short of HP’s claimed 93% rating (see the chart below). The company does not make any claims regarding the panel’s Adobe RGB coverage; I tested it at 84%.
In addition to formal testing, I did our usual ad-hoc testing, viewing photos from our test suite as well as a selection of video clips. Photos were bright and colors looked vivid and true. Video was bright and the colors were well saturated. The monitor did well in retaining detail in both bright and dark areas.
The U28 is a VESA-certified DisplayHDR 400 monitor. Unlike many HDR monitors, the U28 does not have special HDR settings. Instead, like many TVs, when it receives an HDR video signal, it will automatically play it as such. In testing, I viewed some familiar clips from the YouTube HDR Channel. They showed good contrast, and were reasonably bright, though the HDR effect was relatively subtle compared with other HDR monitors I’ve tested.
A High-Resolution Panel With Crisp sRGB Coverage
The HP U28 4K HDR Monitor is a whiz at handling the sRGB color space, between its color accuracy and coverage, high pixel density, and high resolution. It also does a fair job of rendering HDR content.
The HP, though, is one of a glut of 4K monitors with similar screen size and color coverage. The Editors’ Choice award-winning (and less expensive) Philips Brilliance 279P1 mentioned earlier, for instance, has almost identical color gamut coverage (99.6% of sRGB, 88.9% of DCI-P3, and 85% of Adobe RGB). It also goes beyond the U28’s ample port selection by adding Ethernet and built-in speakers. Still, the U28 is a highly capable display that is well worth considering as a general-purpose monitor with some creative chops.
