How to Pick the Right Projector for Your Viewing Needs | Wirecutter

While the price of big-screen TVs has dropped a lot in recent years, a front projector is still the best value for someone who wants to enjoy their favorite movies and TV shows on a really large screen. But choosing the right projector from a crowded field of models that range in price from a couple hundred bucks to thousands of dollars can be a daunting task.

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Different projectors are designed for different uses. And, even more so than for a TV, a projector’s performance is impacted by the room environment and the size and type of screen you pair with it. So before you shop, here are some key questions to ask yourself to help find the best projector for you.

What do you plan to use the projector for?

Are you looking for a projector primarily for watching movies or sports, playing games, or displaying business presentations? Many of the lowest-priced projectors are best suited for business uses such as PowerPoint or whiteboard presentations and company video chats. They can offer a decent amount of brightness and a variety of options for connecting to a computer, but their resolution may not be full HD (× pixels) or be in the correct shape (16:9) for movie and TV watching.

Most important, projectors designed for business use often have highly exaggerated colors that are meant to pop in a brightly lit conference room but don’t look natural with movies in a darker room, and they lack the video adjustments to make the image more accurate.

For movies, you should get at least a full HD projector that can reproduce all or most of the Rec 709 color gamut that’s used for HDTV and home video releases. Ideally, it includes a picture mode called Cinema, Movie, or Filmmaker that comes close to reference standards, plus the controls you need to fine-tune the image for the best performance. If you’ve invested in a 4K Blu-ray player or other 4K source, be prepared to pay more for a projector with a 4K resolution, such as the Epson LS.

For sports and gaming, ideally you should get a full-HD or 4K model that’s bright enough to watch with some ambient room lighting and has a 120 Hz refresh rate, which results in less motion blur in fast-moving images. Gamers should look for a projector that offers very low input lag, which means less time between when something happens in the game and when you see it on your screen. Many home entertainment projectors now include a game mode with lower input lag; we recommend that the lag amount be 16 milliseconds or less. Gaming projectors we like include the ViewSonic X2-4K and BenQ TH685P.

If you’re less concerned about picture quality and just want a simple option for watching the occasional YouTube video or TV show, a portable mini projector like the Xgimi MoGo 2 can serve as a replacement for a modestly sized TV. Such projectors often have features that you won’t find in a traditional projector—like built-in streaming apps, Wi-Fi, and Bluetooth—but they can’t deliver the brightness, contrast, or color accuracy of their larger siblings (more on this below). Plus, they’re small and sometimes battery-powered, so you can move them around or take them to a friend’s house.

What type of room will you use the projector in?

This question is particularly important for movie enthusiasts because it affects how much you should spend on a projector. Do you have a dedicated theater room in which you can fully block out extraneous light, or do you watch movies only at night with the lights off? Do you want to have a truly cinematic big-screen experience and see all the finest details in your favorite dark, moody thriller? If so, it may be worth paying more to get a higher-end home theater projector that can deliver an image with truly deep, dark black levels and an especially high contrast ratio that results in a richer, more engaging picture. These projectors often use higher-quality lens systems that allow for better contrast and crisper images, but they’re also bigger and heavier—so you’ll likely want to place them permanently in a projector mount attached to the wall or ceiling, as opposed to setting them on a table or shelf.

If movie night usually takes place with a few room lights on (even if they’re dimmed), or you’re looking for a projector for a living room or den that will also serve to display movies, TV shows, and sports during the day, the black-level performance becomes less critical and the projector’s brightness matters more.

You can find good living-room projectors and budget home theater projectors that may not deliver that nth degree of performance but can still produce a big, bright image with respectable color accuracy. These projectors are usually smaller and lighter than dedicated home theater projectors, so you can move them around easily, and they have built-in speakers so you don’t have to add an external sound system—though you’ll probably want to because their speakers seldom sound great.

Another thing to consider is the size of your room. Traditional projectors need a lot of space to cast a large image. Generally speaking, to cast a 100-inch image, you need at least 100 inches between the projector and screen. For a small room, you may need a projector with a short-throw lens, which allows it to cast a larger image from a shorter distance.

How big of a screen do you want?

The bigger the screen size, the more light output your projector needs to produce a well-saturated image. A projector’s brightness capability is usually listed in ANSI lumens, but keep in mind that manufacturers' stated light specs can be misleading; in real-world use, projectors usually put out a lot less light, at least in the more accurate picture modes.

We recommend at least 1,000 ANSI lumens for a 100-inch screen, which means to be safe you should look for a projector with a stated light output of around 2,000 lumens. If we’re talking about a dedicated theater room projector, you can get away with a slightly lower number because you’ll probably be keeping the room completely dark.

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When you move into the realm of portable and mini/pico projectors, you can expect a big dropoff in lumens. This type of projector isn’t designed to deliver a true big-screen movie experience, and in most cases the smaller the projector, the less light it outputs.

For our guide to the best portable mini projectors, we set a minimum requirement of 300 ANSI lumens, which allowed us to get a decently bright image at a 55-inch screen size in a room with moderate light. Even at that low number, a lot of the super-tiny pico projectors were disqualified since many of them come in under 200 lumens. (Many of them lack a full-HD resolution, too—but that matters less at smaller screen sizes.) These little things are good for casual movie and TV watching, but keep your expectations in check.

We should add that your choice of screen material (and yes, you should use a screen) also matters here. Different materials have a different screen gain, which is the amount of light that the material reflects back at you. A 1.0-gain screen reflects back the same amount of light as a standard magnesium oxide white board. Higher gains reflect more light and can help make your projector-and-screen combo seem a little brighter, while lower gains reflect less light and can help improve black-level performance.

If you plan to use a projector in a living room or den with minimal light control, consider an ambient-light-rejecting screen, which is specially designed to reject light from lamps and windows to help improve contrast in a brighter room, but keep in mind that those screens can cost a lot more.

What special features do you need?

The final question to ask yourself: Are there any special features you need that may not come standard?

Pretty much all home entertainment projectors include at least one HDMI input to connect easily to media players, cable or satellite DVRs, and gaming consoles. Make sure the projector has enough inputs to accommodate the sources you want to connect.

If you plan to stream all your content, you can connect a streaming stick from Roku or Amazon directly via HDMI and not have to deal with connecting an extra set-top box. An increasing number of projectors have the streaming platform built in or at least come with a streaming stick.

Some projectors still include an RGB computer input, but analog connectors like component and composite inputs are becoming rare—so if you wish to connect an older, analog-only source device, make sure to specifically search for a model that has them.

If you need to supply power to a connected device such as a media streaming stick or wireless HDMI receiver, many projectors now include a powered USB port for just such a purpose. And if you have a motorized screen, a 12-volt trigger allows you to automatically send raise or lower commands when the projector is turned off or on. This feature is common in higher-end projectors but less so in budget models.

As I mentioned above, dedicated home theater projectors seldom have a built-in speaker, as the expectation is that you’ll add a home-theater-worthy sound system, too. Many lower-priced projectors, including all of the recommendations in our budget home theater projector guide, have internal speakers that sound mediocre at best; you’ll probably want to incorporate some type of external speaker.

A growing number of home entertainment projectors offer built-in Bluetooth to send audio to a separate Bluetooth speaker or soundbar, although this can add lag and create lip-sync problems. Most projectors also have a 3.5 mm audio output—so you can connect a speaker via a cable, or you could buy a cheap Bluetooth transmitter to send the audio wirelessly to a better sound system.

When it comes to features, there’s no beating a portable mini projector. These models often have almost everything you need built in: streaming apps like Disney+ and Amazon Prime Video, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, speakers, and sometimes a battery for true portability. If you’re willing to sacrifice screen size to get an easy-to-use, all-in-one model, this type of projector may be the way to go.

We hope these questions and answers will assist you in narrowing down your options. If you still have questions, drop them in the comments section, and we’ll try to help.

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