whatsmyaspectratio.com

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AlistairPerson

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Hi,

I created What Is My Aspect Ratio? (whatismyaspectratio.com). It tells you the aspect ratio of your display. Should work with any TV, projector, computer or phone display (provided there is a browser to access the site with).

It’s targeted at people who don’t know much about aspect ratios and don’t know their own aspect ratio (or resolution). Could be useful if you want to know this yourself or want to know this of a non-tech savvy friend or family member.

Hope you find it useful.

Feedback welcome.
 
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Pretty cool. But it's a shame to see all the people that are using 16:9. It's not a ratio that is meant for computers... Also, please remove your statement that "widescreen is preferred for almost all purposes"... Because 4:3 is a great ratio!
 
Blue_Scholar said:
Who are you to say what platform a particular aspect ratio is meant for? :rolleyes:
Click to expand...

Considering most information is stacked vertically and not horizontally, he's right. You don't usually scroll left to right on websites, you scroll up and down, then you have your tabs and menus taking up valuable vertical space with all this unused horizontal space just going to waste (just an example). I'd be up for a 4:3 comeback.
 
Aspect ratio doesn't really matter very much when you have very high resolutions, unless your display is pretty small.

I can display as much on my 32" 2160p monitor as you can display on 3.6 1920x1200 or 4 1920x1080 monitors. Yes, it's true, on a hypothetical 16:10 (3840x2400) 32" monitor I could display EVEN MORE, but such a display does not exist, and why would I want 16:10 at the cost of a huge amount of screen real estate by dropping down to a low resolution?

Basically 16:9 is the literally the only option if you want a good display, so it's not surprising that's what people are buying...
 
I was quite impressed that it correctly found the aspect ratio of both my monitors (one 16:9 and on 9:16), although I had to refresh it after moving the browser to the second monitor - it would be nice if it detected moving between monitors automatically.

rabidz7 said:
Pretty cool. But it's a shame to see all the people that are using 16:9. It's not a ratio that is meant for computers... Also, please remove your statement that "widescreen is preferred for almost all purposes"... Because 4:3 is a great ratio!
Click to expand...
I used to think that, but I have changed my mind after using widescreen monitors more. With a widescreen monitor, I can have one window open on one side (Win+left/Win+right are useful here), and some other windows open on the other side. Also, various controls (Windows taskbar, browser tabs) work better when positioned vertically on the side, which isn't pratical on a 4:3 monitor where horizontal space is scarce. I do prefer 16:10 though, which is an unfortunately rare aspect ratio.
 
rabidz7 said:
Pretty cool. But it's a shame to see all the people that are using 16:9. It's not a ratio that is meant for computers... Also, please remove your statement that "widescreen is preferred for almost all purposes"... Because 4:3 is a great ratio!
Click to expand...

If actually prefer 5:4, it's closer to the optimal 1:1. Seriously, these short-screen monitors are silly. Saying that I have 16:9 monitors because the lack of options. They have to be bigger to compensate, which is annoying. The idea that they're more "cinematic" (which is a bad thing by the way) just because aspect ratios that were wider than tall were chosen for cinemas due to technical limitations.

P.S. anyone who can't do the incredibly simple math to figure out their aspect ratio is an idiot.
 
Thanks for comments. Fair point on 4:3. I'll update the text maybe say 'widescreen is preferred for most purposes'. My point of view is that if you aren't sacrificing height widescreen is just a bonus, although this isn't necessarily true for tablets I guess.

Interesting point about moving between monitors i'll look into it.
 
rabidz7 said:
Pretty cool. But it's a shame to see all the people that are using 16:9. It's not a ratio that is meant for computers... Also, please remove your statement that "widescreen is preferred for almost all purposes"... Because 4:3 is a great ratio!
Click to expand...

Absolutely, it shoul read "widescreen is prefered for ALL purposes" :D:D
 
Should not it be 7:3? Not 21:9.

Hasn't anyone taken basic math?

My check made 21:9 4% :)
 
rabidz7 said:
Pretty cool. But it's a shame to see all the people that are using 16:9. It's not a ratio that is meant for computers... Also, please remove your statement that "widescreen is preferred for almost all purposes"... Because 4:3 is a great ratio!
Click to expand...

4K 16:9 makes it irrelevant as long as you can sit close enough to the screen, it is a video wall.
You can play back any aspect ratio media and view many websites on the same screen at the same time.
Just move your seat to the area you want to view.
 
rabidz7 said:
Pretty cool. But it's a shame to see all the people that are using 16:9. It's not a ratio that is meant for computers... Also, please remove your statement that "widescreen is preferred for almost all purposes"... Because 4:3 is a great ratio!
Click to expand...

16:10 (or 8:5 for you pedants) is better than both 16:9 and 4:3 IMHO. You get the benefit of a higher picture along with a wider one.
 
Agreed, 16:10 is the sweet spot for me too.

16:9 eating too much into my precious vertical real estate.
 
I once wrote a simple calculator for people replacing their monitors, where they could enter their current screen's diagonal size and aspect ratio and it told them what screen sizes they'd need in other aspect ratios to achieve the same physical screen height.

For example, if you had a 24" 16:10 screen it would calculate that you need to buy at least a 26" 16:9 screen in order to not reduce your screen height.

I originally had the idea when I was upgrading from a 19" 4:3 CRT to my first LCD.

Perhaps you might like to incorporate something like that in your site?
 
AlistairPerson said:
Hi,

I created http://whatsmyaspectratio.com. It tells you the aspect ratio of your display. Should work with any TV, projector, computer or phone display (provided there is a browser to access the site with).

It’s targeted at people who don’t know much about aspect ratios and don’t know their own aspect ratio (or resolution). Could be useful if you want to know this yourself or want to know this of a non-tech savvy friend or family member.

Hope you find it useful.

Feedback welcome.
Click to expand...

Clever Boy.
 
Sancus said:
Aspect ratio doesn't really matter very much when you have very high resolutions, unless your display is pretty small.
Click to expand...
Aspect ration is still important regardless of resolution. For example, if you have a 24inch 1080p monitor and you upgrade to a 24inch 4K monitor you're not going to be able to view any extra information on the 4K monitor even though you have double the vertical resolution. If you displayed double the number of lines of text on the 4K display it would make the text too small to be readable.

Rather than increasing the amount that can be displayed, increasing the resolution improves the clarity of what can be displayed. If you want to increase the amount of vertical information that can be displayed you need a different aspect ratio, which is where 16:10 comes in.

For computer use 16:10 is simply a better resolution. All widescreen monitors used to be 16:10 and the reason they switched to 16:9 was purely cost saving. I remember reading an article about it on Digitimes before they switch happened. The article said they could make twelve 16:10 monitors from a sheet of substrate, but they could make fourteen 16:9 monitors. Hence they got an extra two monitors with the same amount of material. They didn't switch to making 16:9 monitors because they were better, but because they could be made more cheaply.

Not only is 16:10 better for computers, it's also just a nicer ratio as it meets the 1.6 Golden Ratio:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Golden_ratio

I actually wish widescreen video content was made in 16:10 as it works better for our eyes.
 
Yeah 16:10 has always been a better ratio for tons of uses. But it's too late now it will never come back as the standard.
 
munkle said:
Considering most information is stacked vertically and not horizontally, he's right. You don't usually scroll left to right on websites, you scroll up and down, then you have your tabs and menus taking up valuable vertical space with all this unused horizontal space just going to waste (just an example). I'd be up for a 4:3 comeback.
Click to expand...
Or you could just turn your 16:9 monitor 90 degrees for more vertical space. I do this when I'm programming, and I'm sure many others do the same.
 
I don't code in portrait but I game a lot (vertical shmups) and a rotated 16:9 is much less convenient than a 16:10, because it puts the centered pic too high on the desk fo me (maybe tall people don't have that problem but I do since I'm only average size).
Very few games and hardwares have the ability to shift the picture towards the sides to place it at a better height.

Okay I'm the minority, but I remember my co-workers from the dev team never bothered rotating their displays, they only demanded bigger size and resolution.
Rotating a display on a busy desk requires a proper stand and free space around, even more so if it's a large 16:9 !
 
Richard Jones said:
I don't code in portrait but I game a lot (vertical shmups) and a rotated 16:9 is much less convenient than a 16:10, because it puts the centered pic too high on the desk fo me (maybe tall people don't have that problem but I do since I'm only average size).
Very few games and hardwares have the ability to shift the picture towards the sides to place it at a better height.

Okay I'm the minority, but I remember my co-workers from the dev team never bothered rotating their displays, they only demanded bigger size and resolution.
Rotating a display on a busy desk requires a proper stand and free space around, even more so if it's a large 16:9 !
Click to expand...

Even 16:10 feels a bit tall/narrow when rotated (I have two 1200x1600 that surround a 2560x1600). I suspect high res rotated 5:4 or 4:3 would feel better for programming.
 
With 40" UHD being a commodity there is no need to rotate anything. It is wider than actually needed -- true -- but one can just work in the central 4:3 area and have nice background on the sides for bias lighting. Having said that, I agree with your main assertion that 16:9 sucks. 21:9 sucks big time. We made a compromise with widescreen propellerheads, but those extremists are still not satisfied. I hope VR sets would kill those silly "My [wide] AR is better than yours" arguments once and for all.
 
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I'm personally frustrated at the popularity of 16:9. I'm forced to get an apple laptop as it is one of the very few that are 16:10. More vertical real estate is so much better on a wide screen monitor.
 
Mr Milquetoast said:
Aspect ration is still important regardless of resolution. For example, if you have a 24inch 1080p monitor and you upgrade to a 24inch 4K monitor you're not going to be able to view any extra information on the 4K monitor even though you have double the vertical resolution. If you displayed double the number of lines of text on the 4K display it would make the text too small to be readable.
Click to expand...

This is simply not true. Text on a 24" 1080P monitor with no adjustment made is quite overly large, A standard 27" 2560x1440 monitor has 20% smaller text, and that's no problem. Someone with normal vision is capable of taking advantage of MUCH more real estate than 1080p @ the 24" size.

I don't even have normal vision(20/30, uncorrectable) and I'm perfectly comfortable with no dpi adjustment on a 32" 4K monitor, which has 33% smaller text than a 24" 1080p monitor.

So yes, it's true, aspect ratio matters far less with higher resolution monitors because we do not need to make text as big as low resolution monitors to read it, because we are not blind.
 
Sancus said:
This is simply not true. Text on a 24" 1080P monitor with no adjustment made is quite overly large, A standard 27" 2560x1440 monitor has 20% smaller text, and that's no problem. Someone with normal vision is capable of taking advantage of MUCH more real estate than 1080p @ the 24" size.

I don't even have normal vision(20/30, uncorrectable) and I'm perfectly comfortable with no dpi adjustment on a 32" 4K monitor, which has 33% smaller text than a 24" 1080p monitor.

So yes, it's true, aspect ratio matters far less with higher resolution monitors because we do not need to make text as big as low resolution monitors to read it, because we are not blind.
Click to expand...
You're comparing 24, 27 and 32inch monitors. You've thrown a third factor into the debate, which is size. To say that a 27inch monitor gives more real estate than a 24inch monitor is a statement of the bleedin' obvious, and entirely misses the point.

Firstly, buying a much larger monitor, with yet more useless horizontal real estate, just to get some extra vertical real estate is a ridiculous solution. The problem is far better solved by a 16:10 monitor.

Secondly, the reason I would want a 4K monitor is not to allow for larger monitors, but to increase the definition of the text and images. If you use the additional resolution to make monitors larger you gain little to nothing in terms of definition.

So, by using a 16:9 ratio you end up with a overly large monitor with poor definition. Meanwhile, with 16:10 you don't need to make the monitor physically larger because it already delivers sufficient vertical real estate. As such you can use additional resolution to improve the definition of the monitor.

So yes, aspect ratio is still very important and 16:10 is a superior ratio. What I consistently notice is that people who rail against 16:10 have never used one for an extensive period of time. People who have actually used 16:10 always prefer it, simply because it's better.
 
Mr Milquetoast said:
You're comparing 24, 27 and 32inch monitors. You've thrown a third factor into the debate, which is size. To say that a 27inch monitor gives more real estate than a 24inch monitor is a statement of the bleedin' obvious, and entirely misses the point.

Firstly, buying a much larger monitor, with yet more useless horizontal real estate, just to get some extra vertical real estate is a ridiculous solution. The problem is far better solved by a 16:10 monitor.

Secondly, the reason I would want a 4K monitor is not to allow for larger monitors, but to increase the definition of the text and images. If you use the additional resolution to make monitors larger you gain little to nothing in terms of definition.

So, by using a 16:9 ratio you end up with a overly large monitor with poor definition. Meanwhile, with 16:10 you don't need to make the monitor physically larger because it already delivers sufficient vertical real estate. As such you can use additional resolution to improve the definition of the monitor.

So yes, aspect ratio is still very important and 16:10 is a superior ratio. What I consistently notice is that people who rail against 16:10 have never used one for an extensive period of time. People who have actually used 16:10 always prefer it, simply because it's better.
Click to expand...
I agree with Sancus that aspect ratio becomes less important as monitor size and resolution increase. For instance, here is a screenshot of how I typically work on a 16:9 3840x2160 monitor (scaled down to 1080p so mortals with tiny monitors can see it):
4k-windows.jpg

There is enough space to fit two whole pages side-by-side, plus toolbars etc. and none of the horizontal space is wasted. Whereas 16:9 1080p is much less practical than 16:10 1200p, going from 2160p to 2400p isn't necessary, as 2160p will already fit the equivalent of a whole A4 page in height.

At 32", the monitor I took that screenshot on has both more useable area and substantially higher definition than a 24" 1080p monitor.
 
What is your definition of big monitor? I sit 20-24" from 40" UHD and the sides are at 45 degree angle. It is possible to read stuff there, but feels unnatural to do so. Besides, for VA panel the image is little bit washed out at such an angle. As a result I work in the center 4:3 area. I even open Eclipse in window mode. The other factor is that I like corner desks. Therefore, the monitor becomes width constrained. 40" barely fits for me, but there is still space at the top.

To summarize, this thread demonstrates manufacturers arrogance and complete disregard for customers. As Tom's review of the first ultrashort monitors put it: "Who have ordered that?"
 
Mr Evil said:
snip
Click to expand...

Resolution should not effect how much you can fit on screen. Resolution should effect sharpness. The effect of resolution changes on the scale of the OS is a leftover from simpler days of computing. Today, in any modern OS, text size and GUI scaling can be manually changed however you want. You can change the OS's scale on a 1920x1080 monitor to give as much space as a 4K with stock scaling. You can also scale 4K to 1920x1080 space. Resolution increases should be done to increase sharpness and clarity, not to get more windows on the screen. If I want a 21" 4:3 monitor, I'd need a 24" 16:10 monitor to match its height. A 16:9 monitor would need to be even bigger. Want more windows and space on the screen? Then either buy a bigger screen and keep the scale the same or shrink the GUI a bit on the current monitor.
 
rabidz7 said:
...You can change the OS's scale on a 1920x1080 monitor to give as much space as a 4K with stock scaling...
Click to expand...
Not even close. Try reading the text in the screenshot in my last post - even ignoring the compression artefacts, 1920 is simply too few pixels to represent that many characters on one line.
 
For people who had multi-monitor setup transition to single 21:9 screen seems natural. However, let's recall how those 3x monitor setups appeared in the first place. Back in CRT days the biggest monitors around were 21" -- bulky and costly proposition. There was simply no way to have to have decent screen area with single monitor. There, something like 3x17" made sense.

Somehow, this idea proceeded unchallenged to LCD world, so most common multi-monitor setup today is 3x1080p. However, 40" UHD is commodity today, so that you can have gigantic screen at your desk, far superior to any multi-monitor or shortscreen setup. Let this silly 21:9 FUD die.
 
tegirinenashi said:
For people who had multi-monitor setup transition to single 21:9 screen seems natural. However, let's recall how those 3x monitor setups appeared in the first place. Back in CRT days the biggest monitors around were 21" -- bulky and costly proposition. There was simply no way to have to have decent screen area with single monitor. There, something like 3x17" made sense.

Somehow, this idea proceeded unchallenged to LCD world, so most common multi-monitor setup today is 3x1080p. However, 40" UHD is commodity today, so that you can have gigantic screen at your desk, far superior to any multi-monitor or shortscreen setup. Let this silly 21:9 FUD die.
Click to expand...

Except 21:9 isn't fud. You choose what you like and i will continue using my Dell U3415W.
 
21:9 kind-of makes sense when LCDs have poor black levels if you spend most of your time watching movies I guess.
Otherwise I'm not really seeing the benefit of 21:9 over a 4K monitor.

ultrawide9kubt.png
 
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