The most notable selling point for the Philips 221V8LN ($69.99), a 22-inch computer monitor, is its affordability. While other budget monitors may occasionally dip to or below the $70 mark while on sale, the 221V8LN is one of the very few that consistently sells at such a modest price. Like many of its cut-rate brethren, it has a small screen, a modest resolution, limited ergonomic adjustments, and a meager port selection. But its image quality is better than many somewhat-higher-priced monitors we have seen. It therefore earns our Editors' Choice award as an excellent budget general-purpose monitor.

A Budget Monitor for All Seasons

The 221V8LN is equally useful for home-office and entertainment purposes. Its color coverage and pixel density make it suitable for light photo editing, as well as working with line art and diagrams, and it does well in rendering movies. The vertical alignment (VA) panel with a 75Hz refresh rate and AMD FreeSync compatibility puts it in good stead for casual gaming, too.

Lightweight and compact, the 221V8LN can fit in tight spaces, like a desk in a dormitory room. When mounted on its stand, the all-black 221V8LN measures 14.5 by 19.4 by 8.7 inches (HWD) and weighs 5.9 pounds. The full HD (1,920-by-1,080-pixel, or 1080p) screen spans 21.5 inches, measured diagonally. A screen with those specifications has a 102 pixel-per-inch (ppi) pixel density, ensuring a reasonably sharp image by the standards of a non-professional monitor. The VA panel helps keep the monitor's price down and provides higher contrast than in-plane switching (IPS) screens are capable of.

The base and stand are plastic. Assembly is tool-free; the shaft snaps into place in back of the chassis, and the base rotates into the bottom of the shaft until it catches. These components can be removed from each other by depressing a pair of latches. Although they don't feel particularly strong, the base and shaft hold the panel reasonably steady. Not unusual on a budget monitor, the 221V8LN's stand is ergonomically limited, providing only tilt adjustment, up to 5 degrees toward or 20 degrees away from the user. I would have liked for the screen's cabinet to be be mounted a little bit higher on the stand. The 221V8LN has a square array of holes, placed 100mm apart, to fit the bracket for a VESA mount for arm or wall mounting.

The Philips 221V8LN has a basic port selection, one that is typical of budget monitors, with one HDMI and one VGA port. This ensures compatibility with the vast majority of desktop and laptop computers in use today. (Exceptions? Laptops that are limited to USB-C connectivity, though you still may be able to connect them using an adapter.) There is also a jack for headphones or powered speaker(s), to output audio that is received from the computer over an HDMI connection. The ports all face downward in back, but because the 221V8LN is a small and light display, they are easy enough to reach by tilting the panel or setting it screen-side-down on the desk.

Philips offers one of the best monitor warranties in the business—four years—and to the company's credit, its coverage generosity extends even to budget monitors, including the 221V8LN.

Testing the Philips 221V8LN: Solid Brightness, Great Color Coverage

I did our luminance, contrast, and color testing using a Klein K-80 colorimeter and Portrait Displays Calman 5 software. Philips rates the 221V8LN's maximum brightness at 250 nits (candelas per meter squared). In our testing, it fell a bit short of that, coming in at 224 nits, which is still a solid brightness measure for a budget monitor.

In our color testing, the 221V8LN covered 98.9% of the sRGB color space (see the chromaticity chart below), an excellent figure for a monitor of its price.

We were not able to test the 221V8LN's contrast; it has a rated contrast ratio at a healthy 3,000:1, typical of a VA panel and significantly better than the 1,000:1 contrast ratio at which most in-plane switching (IPS) displays are rated. In viewing our usual suite of test photos and selection of video clips, colors seemed true and reasonably well saturated. The 221V8LN showed a wide dynamic range for a budget monitor, doing well in rendering detail in both bright and dark areas.

Verdict: A Bit of Budget-Panel Magic

In most ways, the Philips 221V8LN hews to the budget monitor credo: a small screen, 1080p resolution, basic ergonomics, and a limited port selection. The 221V8LN's VA technology helps keep its price down, while the 75Hz refresh rate and AMD FreeSync make it a good choice for low-impact gaming. It won't win any brightness awards, but otherwise does well in image quality, with stellar sRGB color coverage and good retention of both bright and dark detail, putting it in good stead for video watching and light photo editing.

To be sure, some budget monitors are more feature-rich than the 221V8LN is. The Editors' Choice-winning HP 24mh, for instance, adds DisplayPort connectivity, height and pivot adjustment, and twin 2-watt speakers. But the Philips 221V8LN comes in at less than half the HP's price, and it includes a four-year warranty. The 221V8LN therefore earns its own Editors' Choice award as a budget general-purpose monitor. So long as you're okay with the relatively small screen size, it's a solid budget buy.