4K and Ultra HD: Everything you need to know about the hot new resolution

If you're only just getting used to the clarity and detail of HD then we've got bad news for you. There's a new high resolution format in town called 4K. If you thought HD had a lot of pixels, then you ain't seen nothing yet. 

4K (or Ultra HD as it's also confusingly known) has enough pixels to fill four Full HD 1080p screens. With four times the amount of pixels it's able to display four times the level of detail. 

This is especially helpful on television's that are 50-inches and above. 

Whereas traditional HD is limited to 1920 vertical columns and 1080 horizontal rows of pixels, Ultra HD has a total resolution of 3840 pixels by 2160 – a slightly smaller resolution than the 4,096 x 2,160 resolution seen on cinema screens (that, for the record, is called Cinema 4K).

We're used to being slightly wary of new television technologies that try to entice us into parting with our hard-earned cash (thanks 3D), but when it comes to 4K there are relatively few downsides - except, perhaps, price, but even that is changing over time.

• Check out our guide to the best 4K TVs.

It used to be the case that you'd have to part with thousands in order to purchase a 4K set, but as technology has improved, prices are rapidly falling with even budget sets now being 4K-compatible. 

At the end of the day it might not be the raw resolution of 4K that tempts you into your next TV purchase, but the inclusion of other cool technologies like High-Dynamic Range, Quantum Dot and OLED panels. Before we get into the specifics of each technology, here's a video outlining 4K in a nutshell.

Check out our video below for an introduction to the world of 4K. 

What is 4K?

Pure and simple, 4K means a clearer picture. It's more pixels (8,294,400 to be exact) on the screen at once that creates images that are crisper and capable of showing more details than standard HD.

That's it?

That's it.

What is the resolution of 4K?

4K resolution, at least the way most TVs define it, is 3840 x 2160 or 2160p. To put that in perspective, a full HD 1080p image is only a 1920x1080 resolution. 4K screens have about 8 million pixels, which is around four times what your current 1080p set can display.

Think of your TV like a grid, with rows and columns. A full HD 1080p image is 1080 rows high and 1920 columns wide. A 4K image approximately doubles the numbers in both directions, yielding approximately four times as many pixels total. To put it another way, you could fit every pixel from your 1080p set onto one quarter of a 4K screen.

Why is it called 4K?

Because the images are around 4,000 pixels wide. And before you ask, yes, the industry named 1080 resolution after image height, but named 4K after image width. For extra added fun, you also might hear this resolution referred to as 2160p. Welcome to the future. It's confusing here.

Do all those extra pixels matter?

They matter very much. More pixels means more information. More information means sharper pictures. Sharper pictures are more engaging. More engaging content is more fun. And fun... well fun is the thing, isn't it?

So I'll see a huge difference?

That's where it gets sticky. We're talking about a similar jump in resolution as the one from SD (480 lines high) to HD (1080 lines high). And 4K screens are noticeably sharper than 1080p screens. But there are a few reasons you might not feel the same thrill you did when you upgraded your old CRT to a flatscreen.

When most people went from a 480 to a 1080p set, there was a good chance they were making a big jump in TV size as well. In terms of wow factor, display size is more powerful than any resolution jump could ever hope to be. Last time around most people got big jumps to both screen size and resolution. But this time screen sizes are staying about the same, with the most popular models falling in the 40 inch to 70 inch range.

Most importantly, though, you'll only be able to see the resolution difference on a 4K set if you're 1) watching 4K content through it and 2) you're sitting close enough.

Sitting close enough?

Yup. Remember when Apple made a big fuss about "retina" displays a few iPhones back? "Retina" refers to screens that have sufficient resolution that at a normal viewing distance your eye can't make out individual pixels. Get far enough away from a 1080p set and, hey presto, it's a retina display! More importantly, at that same distance, your eyeballs won't be able to squeeze any more detail out of a 4K image than a 1080 one. If you're at "retina distance" from your 1080p set now and don't plan on moving your couch closer, upgrading to 4K may not make a big difference to your experience. This chart shows how close you need to sit at any given screen size to see the difference.

So I should sit closer?

Oh my yes. The ability to get up close to the screen without the image breaking down is one of the most intoxicating things about 4K. Sitting closer allows the same sized screen to fill more of your visual field, which yields greater immersion. The up-close factor is one of the reasons 4K computer monitors have become one of the technology's fastest growing sectors. 4K monitors remain pin-sharp even when you're just a foot or two from the screen, as you are when you're sitting at your desk.

Difference between Ultra HD and 4K

Technically, "Ultra High Definition" is actually a derivation of the 4K digital cinema standard. However while your local multiplex shows images in native 4096 x 2160 4K resolution, the new Ultra HD consumer format has a slightly lower resolution of 3840 X 2160.

This is one reason why some brands prefer not to use the 4K label at all, sticking with Ultra HD or UHD instead. However, the numerical shorthand looks likely to stick. As a broad brush label it's so much snappier!

Why should I care about 4K Ultra HD?

There are many reasons why 4K should make you rethink your next TV purchase (actually, there are eleven and you can read about them here), not all of them immediately obvious.

Photographers who routinely view their work on an HD TV are seeing but a fraction of the detail inherent in their pictures when they view them at 2160p.

A 4K display reveals so much more nuance and detail – the difference can be astonishing. While 3D has proved to be a faddish diversion, 4K comes without caveats. Its higher resolution images are simply better.

The higher pixel density of a 4K panel also enable you get much closer without the grid-like structure of the image itself becoming visible –this means you can comfortably watch a much larger screen from the same seating position as your current Full HD panel. Currently all available 4K Ultra HD TVs are in excess of 50-inches.

Ultra HD Premium

If you're sitting there thinking that all these new technologies and acronyms sound confusing then you'd be right. That's why a group of companies decided to form the UHD Alliance with the expressed aim of defining what technologies should be included in the next generation of TV sets.

The UHD Alliance is comprised of 35 companies including television manufacturers such as LG, Panasonic, Samsung, Toshiba, Sony, Sharp, audio companies such as Dolby, and film and television production companies such as Netflix and 20th Century Fox.

The idea then is that if everyone can agree on what features they think UHD should include then Disney (an example member of the alliance) can produce a movie that Netflix will be able to stream through a Samsung TV, and the eventual image will be exactly what the director at Disney intended.

The result of this alliance was the UHD Premium specification announced at CES 2016. The specification comprises a list of features that should be included in products like TVs and Blu-ray players to ensure maximum compatibility with other content and hardware produced.

Currently, in order to adhere to the UHD Premium specification a product must have:

• A resolution of at least 3840x2160
• 10-bit color depth, allowing for 1,024 shades of each of the three primary colors red, green and blue, as opposed to the 256 allowed by the current 8-bit standard.
• Be capable of displaying pixels at a certain brightness and darkness for HDR purposes (technically this light level is from 0.05 to 1,000 'nits' for LEDs and 0.0005 to 540 'nits' for OLED sets for all you number lovers out there). Adhering to these standards means blacks should look truly dark as opposed to just milky black and whites should really pop.

Now that this standard has been defined it should just be a case of checking that your next purchase has the 'Ultra HD Premium' logo and not having to worry about your set being incompatible with the slew of 4K content that's about to emerge over the next few years.

Except of course it's not that simple.

Samsung and Panasonic are embracing the new standard, with both of their flagship lineups wearing their UHD Premium badges with pride. Sony however have decided to go down a more confusing route and have decided to stick with their internal '4K HDR' label despite their sets all actually meeting the required specification. Philips won't be using the alliance's badge, but its sets don't currently meet the specification anyway.

It's only natural that while a technology is still emerging these problems will continue to exist, but we hope that soon we'll be able to recommend looking for a UHD Premium set without reservation. Until the whole industry unambiguously backs the standard however, we'd still recommend you tread carefully to ensure maximum compatibility.

You also said "and up." Can UHD also designate higher resolutions than 4K?

Yes. This is the slightly confusing part. An 8K display would also be UHD.

What is this 8K you speak of?

It's the next resolution standard up from 4K. Basically it doubles the pixel height and width again to yield approximately 32 million pixels. It's a regular pixel party.

Find out more about the new resolution in our full guide to 8K. 

That sounds awesome. Should I just get one of those?

Absolutely not. The 8K standard is primarily for the exhibition market (aka movie theaters). To make that many pixels matter, you need to be feeding a truly gigantic screen and sitting right in front of it. Besides, you can't buy an 8K screen today without having it custom built, which would cost approximately seven hojillion dollars. And there's no commercially available 8K content. You'd need to get movies directly from distributors the same way theaters do. You do not need this unless you are Jerry Bruckheimer. (If you are Jerry Bruckheimer, though, give me a call. I know a guy.)

My friend told me about 4K OLED. What's that?

More acronyms! Isn't this fun? OLED - organic light emitting diodes - have been around for some time, but producing big screens using this technology has proven to be prohibitively expensive, something which has so far prevented OLED television from being a mainstream proposition.

It's a real shame because OLED technology can be stunning, offering vibrant colors, deep blacks and bright whites. But don't give up hope just yet. Several companies (most prominently LG) are laboring away to bring OLED to 4K televisions. We recently took a look at LG's new 4K OLED sets, but while they're gorgeous, pricing remains sky high. Hopefully that will change soon, though. "I believe the price and yield rate will be higher immediately and the price will be down," Mr K I Kwon, president of LG Electronics UK, told TechRadar recently. We hope his predictions hold and we aren't ruling out OLED as a big player in the next generation of televisions.

I've heard Netflix has been streaming in something called HDR. What is that?

HDR, UHD, OLED ... there's no shortage of acronyms in home entertainment.

HDR, or high dynamic range, essentially increases the difference between the lightest and the darkest portions of an image. Blacks get properly dark rather than milky grey, and whites get blindingly light.  

This means that images have more depth to them, and you should also be able to perceive more detail in the lightest and darkest portions of the image. 

Netflix was the first content provider to release HDR video in 2015, but Amazon Instant Video also offers high dynamic range content. HDR has also been included in the new Ultra HD Blu-ray standard. 

HDR is a big enough topic by itself, so we've got a full explainer dedicated entirely to it. 

Why isn't broadcast TV all in 4K?

Because every 4K frame contains four times the information of HD, 4K content is four times more bulky than regular HD content in terms of its raw file size. That makes it a challenge to get it to you.

Steps are being made to get 4K content into broadcast television. In the UK, Sky has started broadcasting select sports in 4K, and BT is also using IPTV technology to do likewise. 

On the streaming side, bandwidth is a definite issue. The internet's bandwidth is already dominated by Netflix's traffic, prompting ISPs to go after them for extra cash, and that's with most of its streams at SD and HD levels. Upping everything to 4K doesn't sound like a reasonable option just yet. And even if it were possible to stream 4K content to everyone without breaking the internet, streaming 4K content requires a 25Mbps or faster downstream internet connection, which is faster than most people have at the moment.

So what can I watch?

Your best UHD options right now come from Netflix and Amazon.

Netflix is leading the 4K streaming waters with most of its original shows (The Defenders, House of Cards, Breaking Bad, The Blacklist) being available in 4K, alongside select films (Ghostbusters, The Smurfs 2). 

The selection might be more limited than the amount of HD content, but it's increasing day by day. 

Amazon has also gotten into the 4K UHD streaming game by offering some of its highest-rated shows – Transparent, Mozart in the Jungle, Man in the High Castle, The Grand Tour and Mad Dogs – in Ultra HD.

Both streaming services say even more content is on its way and expects the roll-out to ramp up once more TV watchers make the jump to the higher-resolution standard.

What about gaming in 4K?

We've had 4K gaming on the PC for a while now for those with a powerful enough rig, but 4K gaming on consoles has been heating up over the last year thanks to the efforts of Sony and Microsoft. 

Sony got the ball rolling with the PS4 Pro, which uses an advanced form of upscaling to generate a 4K image. It might not be native 4K, but we think the results are excellent. 

Although Microsoft dipped its toe in the 4K water last year with the upscaling Xbox One S, but is embracing it fully with the Xbox One X - the new console from Microsoft that offers native 4K resolution on a handful of titles.

What kind of cables will I need for 4K?

The two standard cables you're most likely to use are either a standard HDMI or if you're connecting a PC to a Ultra HD monitor, DisplayPort.

HDMI cables now come in four flavors: high speed with ethernet; high speed without ethernet; standard speed with ethernet and standard speed without ethernet. Standard speed cables are capable of 1080i, but aren't able to handle the bandwidth of 4K. High speed cables can do anything higher than 1080i. Now, as long as you're using the same class of cable, there is no distinguishable difference in terms of performance between one manufacturer's set of cables and another's.

The speed of your connection will depend on the types of connectors, which includes HDMI 1.4, HDMI 2.0 and HDMI 2.0a. HDMI 1.4 connectors support a 3820x2160-resolution at 30 frames per second, while HDMI 2.0 is the latest spec and can output video at Ultra HD resolution at 60 frames per second. (But more on that below!) HDMI 2.0a is capable of HDR.

The bottom line is that if your HDMI cable is able to handle 1080p (the standard for a number of years now) then it should be able to also do 4K. Don't get conned into buying expensive cables. 

The other type of cable you can use is DisplayPort. DisplayPort carries 4K image and audio signal from most high-end graphics cards to monitors without any noticeable artifacts or delays.

So should I buy a 4K set now or should I wait?

If you're buying a TV that's 55-inches and above that you should absolutely think about investing in 4K. All of the major players are embracing it as the new standard, and the amount of content is only going to increase over time. 

If you're buying a TV smaller than 55-inches then the question gets a lot more complicated. 

The problem is not that 4K doesn't make enough of a difference at these sizes, but instead that the additional technologies that have been combined with 4K in most sets haven't trickled down to the smaller models just yet. 

As a result, while it's totally possible to get a 4K TV that's as small as just 40-inches, at this point it's unlikely to have a decent level of HDR (which we'd consider as going as bright as 1000 nits or more), 10-bit color, or wide color gamut. 

Sure you'll get the right amount of pixels, but they won't have the additional technologies to make them look really beautiful. 

Eventually they'll make their way to smaller sets, but for now 4K is at its best at 55 inches and above where you can get all the bells and whistles that really matter. 

Scott Alexander originally contributed this article