Projectors
A projector gets you a genuinely huge image — 100 inches and up — for less money than an equivalently sized flagship TV, and it's the only realistic way to get a true cinema-scale picture in a home. The tradeoff is that projectors need a reasonably controlled lighting environment and more setup thought than a TV you just place on a stand.
The spec that gets the most marketing attention, brightness (lumens), is only meaningful in the context of your room's ambient light and screen size. A projector that looks great in a dark, dedicated home theater room can look washed out in a living room with windows, regardless of how many lumens are printed on the box.
Below we break down what actually determines picture quality, our current picks across lamp and laser models, and a buying guide focused on matching a projector to your specific room.
What to look for
Match brightness to your room, not just image size
A dedicated dark room can look excellent with 2,000–2,500 lumens. A living room with any ambient light during viewing needs considerably more brightness, or an ambient-light-rejecting (ALR) screen, to keep the image from looking washed out.
Contrast ratio matters more than brightness for perceived picture quality
Marketing contrast ratio numbers are inconsistent across brands and not directly comparable, but as a general rule, dedicated home theater projectors used in dark rooms produce noticeably deeper blacks and a more film-like image than bright 'lifestyle' projectors optimized for daytime use.
Laser light sources cost more but need far less maintenance
Traditional lamp-based projectors need replacement bulbs every couple thousand hours of use, which is an ongoing cost. Laser and LED light sources are rated for tens of thousands of hours and don't dim as noticeably over their lifespan, at a higher upfront price.
Check throw distance and lens shift before you buy, not after
'Throw ratio' determines how far back the projector needs to sit to fill a given screen size, and it varies a lot between models. If you can't mount the projector at the ideal distance, look for models with generous lens shift and zoom range so you have flexibility in mounting position.