These days when discussing tech, we often ask ourselves the question, “Have we reached peak… (insert gadget name here)?”

Take phones, for example. For a while there, every second article about the latest handset claimed there wasn’t much more phones could do. Then they folded. So, a pretty dramatic development.

Then, when it comes to monitors – especially gaming monitors – I’d say we’re still a fair way off reaching any kind of ultimate “peak”.

This one’s gotta be close, though.

At almost 32-inches, the LG UltraGear is about as big as you want to get on your desk – anything wider or taller and you’d just be too close - like sitting in the front row at the movies.

Admittedly, my usual dual-screen setup is wider but due to the 16:9 aspect ratio of the UltraGear, if it was even bigger still, you’d literally be craning your neck to take in both top and bottom of this 4K OLED masterpiece.

Setup of the GX870A is as easy as plugging it in. There are DisplayPort, USB-C and 2 x HDMI slots to connect to with quality, corresponding cables included in the box.

While there are a couple of fiddly desktop apps you can download to fine-tune colour calibration if you really insist, they're not compulsory as most settings are easily accessible via the universal toggle controller situated behind the centre of the bottom of the screen.

Using this manual control, you can easily adjust which input you wish to use, brightness, colour temperature etc, the volume of the internal speakers and yes, there are a bunch of gamer-specific settings like the Crosshair and FPS Counter too.

I've admitted it plenty of times before; I'm no gamer. But even I can appreciate the difference between a display running at 60Hz and one at 240Hz.

Of course, the headline here is you can bump that refresh rate right up to 480Hz - although there are a couple of strings attached. Obviously your source device needs to be able to support such an insanely hight rate and the UltraGear will only run 480Hz at the lower FHD resolution - so you'll need to choose between a faster response or a better picture.

Either way, at a peak brightness of 1300nits, glorious depth of colour and incredible contrast through VESA DisplayHDR TrueBlack 400 technology, this is likely to be the best picture you've seen on a monitor yet.

There's one thing on the LG website for the UltraGear GX870A that I definitely can't endorse though; the so-called "Spatial Sound" from the two built-in 7W speakers. Somehow this sound system has been certified for DTS Virtual:X, allegedly, "simulating up to 7:1 channels." You can get these speakers to go reasonably loud but there's no, "deep sound" as such and I certainly didn't find myself being immersed in any kind of 3D acoustic illusion.

No matter; there's a 3.5mm AUX jack, if you want to hardwire a set of headphones or a proper external sound system instead. 

On the other hand, there are two things I particularly love about the UltraGear GX870A that might not be super obvious.

Firstly, the stand. It's exactly the kind of simple-but-ingenius design that appeals to me - for so many reasons. Given the size of the monitor - which, as we've established, is pretty darn huge - the stand is about as minimalist and as subtle as it can be. The heavy but flat Unity Hexagonal base is easily attached to the support column with a few simple screws of the fold-out wing nut underneath. Then the screen itself just tilts and clicks into place.

As I say, although the base has to be reasonably large for stability, it's only a couple of millimetres thick, so it doesn't really take up any space on your desktop because you can just put things on top of it, as if it wasn't there. Once in place, the screen is perfectly balanced so it can slide effortlessly up and down to your preferred height - despite weighing in at 5.6kg, There's also plenty of swivel and tilt to get it looking at you at just the right angle.

But the really clever bit is you can easily rotate the whole screen 90° to use in portrait mode, no unscrewing or rescrewing required. This is essential if you're developing content for a phone app or editing video for vertical consumption.

The second under-the-radar feature is the anti-glare and low reflection tech LG has applied to this panel. I don't recall ever having seen anything quite like it - even on a TV, let alone a gaming monitor. OLED displays may be renowned for their sharp, crisp, deep colours but they're also pretty well-known for being prone to bad reflection issues, especially in a home-office setup like mine, with a set of floor-level windows directly behind my desk.

I've tried OLED screens in the past that have been so shiny, I had to angle them away from my direct line of sight to see what was on them properly. That simply isn't an issue with the UltraGear GX870A. If you've been holding off investing in OLED because of reflection worries, delay no longer. This is the one you've been waiting for.

As I said earlier, I'm used to the productivity boost a dual-screen setup offers but the UltraGear GX870A is plenty big enough for me to divide the desktop up into two, three or even four windows and still maintain a meaningful and useful amount of content within each one. For example, writing this review on one side while scrolling through the LG product page on the other.

Sure, this is probably overkill for boring officey tasks like that - but it's still fun seeing your work appear on a giant, IMAX-like screen.

As for the gaming experience... well, how can it get much better? Instant response times and pristine colour, light and shading performance make the latest 3D graphics seem so much more real. All the while, that 31.5-inch display brings you right inside the game - that's how big it really is and you can't ask much more than that.

Click here for more information and pricing on the LG UltraGear 32 Inch Dual-Mode OLED gaming monitor.