This finding is becoming less important by the year. It's been quite a while since you could easily buy an HD TV - they're all 4K, even the small ones.
this post was submitted on 27 Oct 2025
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The study doesn't actually claim that. The actual title is "Study Boldly Claims 4K And 8K TVs Aren't Much Better Than HD To Your Eyes, But Is It True?" As with all articles that ask a question the answer is either NO or its complicated.
It says that we can distinguish up to 94 pixels per degree or about 1080p on a 50" screen at 10 feet away.
This means that on a 27" monitor 18" away 1080p: 29 4K: 58 8K: 116
A 40" TV 8 feet away/50" TV 10 feet away
1080p: 93
A 70" TV 8 feet away
1080p: 54 4K: 109 8K: 218
A 90" TV 10 feet away
1080p: 53 4K: 106 8K: 212
Conclusion: 1080p is good for small TVs relatively far away. 4K makes sense for reasonably large or close TV Up to 8K makes sense for monitors.
Here’s the gut-punch for the typical living room, however. If you’re sitting the average 2.5 meters away from a 44-inch set, a simple Quad HD (QHD) display already packs more detail than your eye can possibly distinguish.
That seems in line with common knowledge? Say you want to keep your viewing angle at ~40º for a home cinema, at 2.5m of distance, that means your TV needs to have an horizontal length of ~180cm, which corresponds to ~75" diagonal, give or take a few inches depending on the aspect ratio.
For a more conservative 30° viewing angle, at the same distance, you'd need a 55" TV. So, 4K is perceivable at that distance regardless, and 8K is a waste of everyone's time and money.
Please note at 18-24" with a 27" screen 4K does not max out what the eye can see according to this very study. EG all the assholes who told you that 4K monitors are a waste are confirmed blind assholes.
They are a waste of time since the things with enough fidelity to matter run like shit on them without a large investment. Its just a money sink with little reward.
Are you talking about 8K or 4K? Not only can you game in 4K with a cheap card depending on the game the desktop and everything else just looks nicer.
I think age makes a big difference, too. I'm over 50 and I've never been able to really tell between 720p and 1080i and 1080p, much less higher resolutions. And I'm nearsighted.
Do you wear glasses?
Personal anecdote, moving from 1080p to 2k for my computer monitor is very noticeable for games
Even 4K is noticeable for monitors (but probably not much beyond that), but this is referring to TVs that you're watching from across the couch.
Isn’t 2k and 1080P basically the same thing?
1920x1080 vs 2560x1440
Not crazy higher but a noticeable increase
2k is about double of 1080p and 4k is double of 2k
If 4k is 4k because the horizontal resolution is around 4000, so you'd think 1080p, with its 1920p-long lines would be 2k. It's fucked that it isn't.
Yeah. They went from counting pixels by rows to columns. A 16:9 widescreen 1080 display is 1920×1080, and most manufacturers are happy to call 1920 "2K".
Ah yes, my 1920x1080 monitor with a resolution of 2560x1440
Anecdotally at average viewing distances on my 55" TV I can't really tell a difference. If I had an enormous TV maybe I would be able to tell. 1080 > 2160 is for sure not the leap 720 > 1080, or 480 > 720 was in the average environment that's for sure.
I know I am a display tech nerd, but can people really not tell the difference? Even going from a 1440p to a 4k monitor to me was a very noticeable improvement to clarity. And there's a huge difference in the way that games look on my living room TV in 1080p compared to 4k.
ITT: people defending their 4K/8K display purchases as if this study was a personal attack on their financial decision making.
They don't need to this study does it for them. 94 pixels per degree is the top end of perceptible. On a 50" screen 10 feet away 1080p = 93. Closer than 10 feet or larger than 50 or some combination of both and its better to have a higher resolution.
For millennials home ownership has crashed but TVs are cheaper and cheaper. For the half of motherfuckers rocking their 70" tv that cost $600 in their shitty apartment where they sit 8 feet from the TV its pretty obvious 4K is better at 109 v 54
Also although the article points out that there are other features that matter as much as resolution these aren't uncorrelated factors. 1080p TVs of any size in 2025 are normally bargain basement garbage that suck on all fronts.
Resolution doesn't matter as much as pixel density.
Right? "Yeah, there is a scientific study about it, but what if I didn't read it and go by feelings? Then I will be right and don't have to reexamine shit about my life, isn't that convenient"
My 50" 4K TV was $250. That TV is now $200, nobody is flexing the resolution of their 4k TV, that's just a regular cheap-ass TV now. When I got home and started using my new TV, right next to my old 1080p TV just to compare, the difference in resolution was instantly apparent. It's not people trying to defend their purchase, it's people questioning the methodology of the study because the difference between 1080p and 4k is stark unless your TV is small or you're far away from it. If you play video games, it's especially obvious.
Old people with bad eyesight watching their 50" 12 feet away in their big ass living room vs young people with good eyesight 5 feet away from their 65-70" playing a game might have inherently differing opinions.
12' 50" FHD = 112 PPD
5' 70" FHD = 36 PPD
The study basically says that FHD is about as good as you can get 10 feet away on a 50" screen all other things being equal. That doesn't seem that unreasonable
If you’re sitting the average 2.5 meters away from a 44-inch set, a simple Quad HD (QHD) display already packs more detail than your eye can possibly distinguish. The scientists made it crystal clear: once your setup hits that threshold, any further increase in pixel count, like moving from 4K to an 8K model of the same size and distance, hits the law of diminishing returns because your eye simply can't detect the added detail.
I commend them on their study of human eye "pixels-per-degree" perception resolution limit, but there are some caveats to the article title and their findings.
First of all, nobody recommends a 44-inch TV for 2.5 metres, I watch from the same distance and I think the minimum recommended 4k TV size for that distance was 55 inches.
Second, I'm not sure many QHD TVs are being offered, market mostly offers 4k or 1080p TVs, QHDs would be a small percentage.
And QHDs are already pretty noticable quality jump over 1080p, I've noticed on my gaming rig. So basically if you do the jump from 1080p to 4K, and watch 4k quality content, from the right distance - most people are absolutely gonna notice that quality difference.
For 8Ks I don't know, you probably do get into diminishing returns there unless you have a wall-sized TV or watch it from very close.
But yeah, clickbaity titled article, mostly.
Really depends on the size of the screen, the viewing distance, and your age/eye condition. For more people 720 or 1080 is just fine. With 4k, you will get some better detail on the fabric on clothes and environments, but not a huge difference.
8k is gonna be a huge waste and will fail.
It does make a difference for reading text like subtitles or navigating game menus.
If my quick calculations are correct, the 70 inches screen at 1080p has a pixel size of about 0.7 mm give or take, where 4k would be about 0.1-0.2.
0.1mm is a smallest size of a thing a human could potentially see under very strict conditions. A pixel smaller than a millimeter will be invisible from a meter away. I really, really doubt its humanly possible to see the difference from the distances a person would be watching tv.
The thing is, the newer 4k tvs are just built better, nicer colour contrast, more uniformed lighting, clearer glass, and that might be the effect you're seeing
Basically you are in a study which calculated for you what people ought to be able to see and you insisted on redoing the calculation yourself incorrectly. The study says people factually can distinguish up to 94 pixels per degree. a 70" screen at a meter away is 24 PPD. You yourself could have easily eye balled 2 screens and come to the correct conclusion but are instead asserting nonsense.
Did you notice that FHD tvs larger than 40" literally don't exist in stores? If people literally couldn't see more than 24 PPD than at the more typical 10 feet viewing distance a 70" screen at 640x480 would be just as good as a 70" 1080p was at a meter away! For a 50" you could go down to 320x480! Still 24PPD
Uh... Hol up. So if we can maybe see down to 0.2 mm and the 1080p screen has 0.7 mm pixels... That's pretty much what I'm saying. 1080p is noticeably grainy.
The text in 4k looks crisper. I concur I can't count individual pixels, but reading game menus in 1080p feels rougher and makes me squint. Reading in 4k feels more like reading on print paper or a good e-eeader.
This and yes, the build quality of newer screens also contributes.
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I have friends and family with good eyesight and they can tell a difference. Sadly even with Recent prescription lenses I still can't see a difference. Eh, at least I can save on TV's since 1080p is cheaper.
Bullshit, actual factual 8k and 4k look miles better than 1080. It's the screen size that makes a difference. On a 15inch screen you might not see much difference but on a 75 inch screen the difference between 1080 and 4k is immediately noticeable. A much larger screen would have the same results with 8k.
I like how you’re calling bullshit on a study because you ~feel~ like you know better.
Read the report, and go check the study. They note that the biggest gains in human visibility for displays comes from contrast (largest reason), brightness, and color accuracy. All of which has drastically increased over the last 15 years. Look at a really good high end 1080p monitor and a low end 4k monitor and you will actively choose the 1080p monitor. It’s more pleasing to the eye, and you don’t notice the difference in pixel size at that scale.
Sure distance plays some level of scale, but they also noted that by performing the test at the same distance with the same size. They’re controlling for a variable you aren’t even controlling for in your own comment.
This has been my experience going from 1080 to 4K. It’s not the resolution, it’s the brighter colors that make the most difference.
It’s the screen size that makes a difference
Not by itself, the distance is extremely relevant. And at the distance a normal person sits away from a large screen, you need to get very large for 4k to matter, let alone 8k.
You should publish a study
And publish it in Nature, a leading biomedical journal, and claim boldly.
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I've been saying this for years.
8k no. 4k with a 4k Blu-ray player on actual non upscaled 4k movies is fucking amazing.
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