The allure of glasses-free 3D has captivated us for decades, but it's only in the last few years that we’ve seen that technology finally catch up with the lofty ambitions of mixed reality. The Sony ELF-SR2 Spatial Reality Display ($4,750) is the latest step in glasses-free 3D's evolution, offering real and natural 3D spatial images for a wide variety of applications on its 27-inch 4K screen. While it’s not aimed at a more general audience in the way the Acer SpatialLabs View ASV15-1B is, the Sony ELF does deliver an immersive and intuitive experience, specifically tailored for those in professional fields like medicine, architecture, and game development. It's not a computer monitor we can recommend to the average office worker or gamer, but if you work in a field that falls within this monitor's use case, you'll find an incredible 3D experience and a glimpse of tech to come.

Design: The Sony ELF Works Its Magic

This ELF doesn’t have pointed ears, but you'll still find a lot of magic tucked away in this unorthodox display. Slanted at a steep 45-degree angle, the 27-incher stands on two 90-degree brackets that serve as the monitor’s stands. A thick black bezel wraps the 27-inch display on all sides, with enough room to fit the monitor’s high-speed vision sensor. At the top of the monitor, you’ll find buttons instead of your typical OSD control stick. Two additional magnetic brackets stick to the left and right, acting as blinders for the display’s 3D effect.

(Credit: Joseph Maldonado)

Along the ridged backside of the monitor, you’ll find its port hub, which includes an HDMI 2.0 port, a DisplayPort, a USB-A port, a USB-C port, and an audio jack. A 1-watt speaker is also included, providing decent but not-so-loud sound. This is not a normal productivity or gaming monitor, so it has no need for high-speed HDMI 2.1 ports or multiple high-speed USB ports, but it does need both an HDMI and a USB cable connected to use the monitor as intended.

(Credit: Joseph Maldonado)

One thing that immediately struck us about the physical design is how awkward it is to cycle through the OSD options because of the monitor's button placement. It's a minor annoyance, but if Sony revises this monitor, we hope that it moves the buttons down to the bottom.

Measuring 16.5 by 24.5 by 2.1 inches (HWD) without its stand and weighing 14.4 pounds, the 27-inch 4K (3,840-by-2,160-pixel) LCD monitor has a rated brightness of 400 nits and an Adobe RGB color gamut rating of 100% (both claims we’ll dig into later in this review).

Using the Sony ELF-SR2: Making Space for Spatial 3D

While the Sony ELF is a fairly familiar display on its surface, it's only when you put it to use that you notice just how impressive the monitor is. Many 3D devices have promised glasses-less experiences by way of stereoscopic 3D, which tricks our brains into interpreting depth from two-dimensional images. The Sony ELF approaches 3D differently—it’s more like a holographic display that, when combined with its high-speed sensor and algorithms, results in a 3D image that reacts to your position in real time and, depending on the program you're running, can even be manipulated.

If you’ve used a VR headset before, then you’ll probably be able to appreciate what’s on display here. It does come with some limitations—the 3D effect is lost if you’re outside of the camera's field of view, and if an object is too big or too close to the borders of the monitor, you’ll lose the effect as well. In addition to the 3D holographic effect, the ELF offers a 3D-to-2D function that downgrades the image to a more traditional 3D effect. Even if you’re unable to move the item around as seamlessly as you can with the Apple Vision Pro or the Meta Quest 3 (since the ease of manipulation depends on the program you're running), the illusion is an impressive one.

(Credit: Joseph Maldonado)

In a demo provided by Sony, we saw a short montage showcasing a variety of different use cases, including architectural, retail, and medical uses. Even within the limited range of the camera, I couldn’t help but try and look into the windows of a parked car or peer through the exposed bits of the cardiovascular system. You don’t have to face the monitor head-on to experience the 3D effect, either, and the camera can handle two people at the same time, though the alternating viewing can distort the image.  (We'd have tried to picture the effect here, but you can't capture it on camera; you just have to see it in person.)

The monitor is meant to be used in tandem with a variety of programs meant for content creation and 3D modeling. Sony’s software plugin for the ELF allows users to preview their 3D computer graphics (3DCG) creations in 3D spatial reality using Digital Content Creation (DCC) tools supported in programs like Zbrush, Blender, OpenGL, Unity, and Unreal Engine. 

We don’t use any of these programs regularly, but we still had some fun importing .STL files (the files we use for our 3D printer reviews) into Sony’s Spatial Reality Display Player and messing around with them in spatial 3D. The Player enables easy visualization of your 3D creations and even includes a demo mode for presentations. The UI is simple to navigate, and the layout reminds me of how Sony handled saved data on PlayStation 2 memory cards, where each game included its own 3D icon.

(Credit: Joseph Maldonado)

Unlike with many other monitors for getting work done, you'll need a powerful computer to accompany the ELF, as the monitor's 3D features won't fully work unless your computer is up to snuff. You'll need a GPU that's at least an Nvidia GeForce RTX 2070 Super or equivalent, an Intel Core i5 six-core CPU or equivalent, 16GB of RAM, and SSD storage. The ELF also only supports Windows 10 and Windows 11, not macOS.

Testing the Sony ELF-SR2: Bright and Colorful for 2D Viewing

In addition to our experiential 3D testing of the ELF-SR2, we tested its brightness, contrast ratio, and color-gamut coverage in 2D mode using our standard test gear: a Klein K-10A colorimeter, a Murideo SIX-G signal generator, and Portrait Displays' Calman for Business calibration software.

It fell a bit short of its 400-nit brightness rating, tallying 365 nits in our testing. That's still more than bright enough for any business use, including photo editing, video editing, and gaming, assuming you don't use the ELF in a space that's flooded with ambient light. We measured its contrast ratio at 849:1, short of its rated 1,000:1 contrast ratio. (See how we test monitors.)

(Credit: Portrait Displays)

In our color coverage tests, the ELF tallied 99.4% of the sRGB space (see above). Sony does not give a coverage rating for either sRGB, which is primarily used by artists preparing color material for print, or DCI-P3, a color space geared to digital video. The ELF covered 88.1% of DCI-P3 in our testing. It also covered 99.5% of Adobe RGB (see below), essentially matching its rating.

(Credit: Portrait Displays)

In the subjective, ad-hoc portion of our 2D testing, we viewed a select group of photos and video clips. Still images looked sharp, with rich and accurate-looking colors and good retention of detail in both light and dark areas. Videos were also easy on the eyes, with pleasing, well-saturated colors and good contrast.

Verdict: A Monitor for Those Already Well-Versed in 3D

Monitors like the Sony ELF-SR2 Spatial Reality Display are hard to describe, let alone review. You're not going to be using this monitor to send emails all day long—it would be a waste of the 3D tech. It's also a display that is far too expensive for even die-hard hobbyists to justify.

Instead, it's bleeding-edge tech, and it's really meant for professional use cases only. We're still a long time away from true holographic displays, but you can't deny the impressive 3D capabilities on display here. If you are working in a field that necessitates using cutting-edge monitors like this, then consider yourself lucky—this is easily the best 3D monitor we've seen so far. But it's not worth the investment of thousands of dollars if you don't fall into one of the specific use cases.