Another solution: In MacOS System Preferences -> Display -> Choose to show all resolution and Alt+click on the options, and try the options shown. Let me know if it works.

I bought a 24-inch 2560x1440 monitor today. I initially set the resolution to 1920x1080, but found the font blurry. I didn't want to use the native 2560x1440 resolution though since it would make everything too small. After installing BetterDisplay and enabling scaled smoothing at 1920x1080, the fonts became much sharper! I was ready to return the monitor, but with BetterDisplay I can keep it. I'm really impressed with the improvement in clarity it provides.

Dude this worked, wtf! All people on the internet are like "Get a 5K screen" but this hack makes it look great

Just spent the last hour trying to fix this. I was so mad that I almost returned my monitor to the store. This app works perfectly. Thanks 👍

I have been frustrated with this for 2 years since I got a 4K 28” monitor. I use my Mac and PC on the same monitor and Windows has scaled perfectly while macOS has looked really janky. This app has my Mac looking just as good as the PC. Thank you!

You are the first one on KZfaq who helped me with my WQHD resolution and the shitty macOS settings. Thank you very much.

You should win a noble prize for this video mate! Life saver. You just made me love my Dell monitor again!

EVERY. SINGLE. TIME. Since I found your video, I was able to configure my 2.5K screen correctly with all my Apple devices, with clear and sharp letters, it's a pleasure to use my monitor now. I was about to return it, but I'm glad I found your video.

Thank you for addressing this issue and providing a solution, this was perfect and I was just about to suffer through this until I went digging down the rabbithole and found your video. So wonderful, worked great with M1 Macbook Air!

Thank you so much, I've been using my work MacBook Pro for over a year with a 1440p 27 inch monitor running it at 2048x1152 and never realised just how bad the built-in scaling is until I switched back to native 1440p where everything looks sharp but small. Now I can have 2048x1152 scaling but it looks like 1440p quality!

My friend a PC user sold me his 27in gaming monitor with nVidia chip that look amazing but in my computer looked fuzzy, looked into so many videos trying to adjust the settings but no success and finally this video showed me how its done. the resolution in my new display monitor is fantastic.

Lifesaver! I just bought the Kamvas Pro 16 2.5k and was disappointed that the text looked so fuzzy at a scaled resolution. I work as a professional graphic designer and blurry/fuzzy text is a no go. This app works perfectly. Thank you so much for posting this video.

The fact that Apple doesn't fix something as fundamental as this themselves is such a joke. I really admire macOS for how stable and simple it is, but I am very sure that a proper solution to this issue wouldn't break the operating system. They're probably just using it to sell their own 5K display. Thankfully the community is doing the work for us again!

This app is absolutely fantastic! All-in-one solution for display issues. Thank you for the video.

Not to be overdramatic but this video saved my life

I was a long term windows user, and this is my first Macbook Air. I was really frustrated when looking at text font's in Safari. I was pretty disappointed with the way Mac renders fonts. Feel like anti-aliasing was not properly handled. After reading through the history of Mac fonts and its obsession to render each letter to its shape (which is a madness Apple took it), I feel little disappointed. And came to the rescue BetterDisplay. Thanks to this Video and Better Display. Now, I'm pretty happy to use Mac. 🙏

Omg, Im new with Mac OS and I've been looking for this kind of solution for months! Your video is very helpful, thanks mate!!

I can not thank you more for this video! Initially with my 16inch portable display with resolution of 2560x1600 all was either too small or too fuzzy. Enabling Better Display I included semi native HiDPI and 2048by1280 works perfect, as it is 1.25 of original resolution. And using Better Display I can control all the brightness, volume, color etc from my mac menu!

I just came here to say thank you. I bought an ultra wide monitor and its looked like crap with my Macbook pro for the last year...now its look how I thought it would. +100000000

Best video by far. To understand and resolve making display text crisp and sharp for external monitor.

very very thanks 🙏. i just bought 34 inch ultrawide curved monitor and this app save me to fuzzy blurry pixels .

Just to echo what others have said here really, thank you for this, fantastic advice, and a great little app. I'm running my external display through a hub and it was forcing a non native resolution. This app solved the problem. It says I have 14 days of premium left, so I guess we will find out which features I need to pay for when the 14 days is up :)

This was an issue with 1080p displays as well, before macOS Ventura. BetterDisplay scaling seems to look the same as native macOS scaling (on 1080p displays) now. But sometimes I’m tempted to reinstall BetterDisplay just to be sure :)). So people who used external displays with a mac between 2012 and whenever Ventura came out had blurry text? yikes.

On a Mac Mini M1 running Sonoma with two dual 27" 4K monitors, currently scaled at 2560x1440, we're not seeing the settings you're showing in this video. The video cuts out important parts at the 1:29 mark, so we can't tell where in the BetterDisplay settings those checkboxes are. We're not seeing anything associated with Resolution Scaling.

Amazing! Fixed my screen scaling problem and also the volume and screen brightness (now I can use my apple keyboard to adjust) at the same time.

This just works! I think it is unacceptable that Apple itself does not fix this and has to resort to external applications, but this solves the problem! Thank you so much!

For anyone wanting to breath life into an old iMac, i suggest installing OCLP and using this better display app (on a mac or laptop) to use your imac as a full fledged 5k monitor (by turning it into an airplay reciever) 👍

Thank You So much! I did not know about the resolution scaling issue in macbooks until recently. My monitor is much sharper now!

Thank you so much man. I just bought a 2K monitor and got so upset with the display. I was going to return it. Now it’s still not Apple Retina display, but it’s much better, and the text is much smoother.

Thank you very much for this video! I solved the problem after 4 months:) I asked Hidpi at the store where I bought the external monitor. I asked at apple support. No one was able to help me. Thanks!

I was amazed about modifying the native screen brightness of my external monitor. I don't what will be cut down after trial. But, I appreciate your indication.

Was just a few hours of returning my monitor after you saved me. Highly appreciate this great tutorial...

2:55 The UI is adjusted together with the resolution displayed.

Thanks so much, I use dual monitor setup with 1440p, and was struggling with small text appearence, where using default Mac's resolution change (changing to 1080p) was making screen look fuzzy or not sharp. Using BetterDisplay seem to retain the monitor native high resolution and still let us scale the content. Thanks for sharing.

My display's USB stopped working, and for some reason the HDMI was always like this. Your recommendation worked like magic!!! Only problem is now I can't get to 60hz, I'm gonna try a new cable...

This is so good, i spent $800 on a monitor and it did not work like it was supposed to so i refunded it, got another monitor for $250, and found this video, and this made my screen so much clearer.

I’ve been looking for a app like this for ten years! Ten years! I’m grabbing a licence immediately!

It's works, excellent tutorial. I was almost buying a new monitor cuz this issue.

I was looking for a solution for that and it worked finally, now i can get to work without having to deal with back pain, thank you so much!

Wow, thanks for this. I have an LG Ultragear and was getting annoyed at the fuzzy text.

There isn't an option for configuration override (edit the system configuration of this display) and Resolution scaling (set up native smooth resolution scaling) or the other options you ticked. Is there a way to resolve this?

I have an AOC 24G2U 24' 1080p with an M2 Air and couldn't achieve much with this app except brightness control which is a godsend. However "fontsmoothingadjuster" did make the fonts a bit more bearable.

Wow!! This is so helpful. Thank you so much. I got my New LG Dual Up Monitor and some how I was not happy with the screen resolution on it where I was using a split screen in P{BP mode with TYPE-C and HDMI. Sadly Mac OS gives 2 different set of resolutions for these 2 input types and I was not able to find the right setting for the text and colors to look good. This app fixed everything for me. I even tweaked the colors to get deeper blacks and its so much better for the eyes now. It feels like I am using 2 large AMOLED display one below the other and the mouse and windows move seamlessly between screens. Great.

I spent hours on my last monitor matching pixel density to prevent this. I wish i would have know this tool existed.

Your the bestt bro! thanks it works :)

You are a life saver. Thank you so much!

idk why but some of the text is still blurry to the point its unreadable for me. If i do 80% scaling on 2560x1440 I get blurry text in Google Docs on both Chrome and Safari. I'm not sure what's causing it but when I move the bar back to 100% its also a bit blurrier and need to set it back in the Settings instead - anyone encounter similar issue?

Did you notice any Mac performance issues with this app when scalling? I'm considering Dell's U32219Q to go with MBP 2017 Many thanks.

oh my god thank you so much, almost returned my mac

Perfect app, work so well, thanks a lot

Excellent solution, i worried about my second monitor!

Oh, thanks. I already returned an ultrawide 1440p monitor that was destroying my vision due to the ridiculously small text, it took me days to fix this! Now I bought a cheaper one and I'm hoping to apply this app. Thanks so much. PD: I only have Mac for work. This doesn't happen on Windows, hahaha

Thank you for your quick response.

Thank you so much for the video! I have a question: in the current version of Betterdisplay the settings changed vs your video, and the "Flexible scaling" option is a Pro (paying feature). My questions is, is it worth buying the app to unlock this feature, do I need this feature to improve font rendering on my display? Background: I bought a Dell (3440 x 1440) monitor, when I apply HiDPI in Betterdisplay, the largest resolution I can set is 2048 x 858 (which from comments in the thread below makes sense I guess). The font scaling definitely looks great, but I'm wondering if there is a way to get similarly good font scaling in the native resolution (3440 x 1440), or at least closer to it; i.e. after unlocking the Pro "Flexible scaling" function, I can get better font scaling closer to the native resolution, without HiDPI? Thanks a ton!

You are a legend! Thank you so much! 👌

This was very helpful. Thank you!

You're a legend!

outstanding guidance! Thank you!

Thanks so much for this. Now, I think it's important to determine if this would punish the GPU performance. I mean, would it take a big toll of the GPU hijacking performance form video/3d edition software? That's what it's important to know, IMHO.

$3 trillion dollar company but can't figure out display scaling its just insanity.

Sometimes this issue could be fixed by adjusting sharpness and contrast settings on your monitor. In my case, I did not see any improvement when using this app or changing the resolution

Thanks so much for this!

We need to know if all the scaling tricks cause a dip in performance. So many are looking at 27 inch monitors since there are no iMacs anymore. Lots of videos showing a performance hit when mac os tries to operate on a 4k monitor.

can't believe it takes one person to write better display scaling functionality than apple does. apple display scaling is a joke and super limiting. according to them, buy our 5k display at 60hz or pound sand. what kind of business model is that? there are a bazillion monitors I can use with windows and it scales fine to all of them but with mac I have to rely on external programs to accomplish this and its still not perfect

you saved us, big thank you

Thanks, Teoh!

Thanks !! this video helps a lot

Thank you very much! It helped me, but my macbook air 2017 13'' is not strong enough to pull HiDPI, it lags a little and the laptop warms up, but at least I'm calm, because I understand that it's not my fault and now I'm calmly working with LoDPI

Great video!!!!! Thank you very much for your help !!!!

Great video! What monitor stand are you using?

Thanks! It works for me

I don’t get this. If your Mac supports 4K and HiDPI rendering of lower resolution, for example, “looks like 2560x1440” (what is good for 27”), but in fact it is rendered as 5120x2880 - you don’t need that stuff. If it does not support - nothing helps you.

wow! that’s a great video, thank you! tell me please what’s the name of the monitor in the video? (nvm, found in the comments section!)

Hi, congratulations for the tutorial and for letting me discover this software! I have a BenQ BL2420PT monitor (it's a 23.8" WQHD 1440P) what configuration do you recommend? I can't get the same sharpness of the texts as I have on a 27" LG 4K monitor with scaling to 1080p perhaps for the dpi? in any case, adapting a resolution of 1280p from the macos system settings basically enables hidpi and even if everything is bigger it seems more defined! so I assume that it is a matter of setting the correct configuration perhaps with a larger resolution. Thank you

Perhaps I missed something, but I just got a 24"1080p monitor to use with the macM1 air and the app has not made any discernable difference that I can see. The text is still blurry/looks oversharp.

I can't believe the amount of issues that Mac has with External monitors. I've been having issues with an external 4k Screen that suddenly turns on and off for no reason. Furthermore, I have tried different cables that support 4k 60Hz, and suddenly I get the same issues the screen just turns off and on. This does no happen at any PC or laptop with the same monitor. I have tried all possible settings and for some reason, the HDR active seems to fix this issue, but it turns some icons blurry so I dislike it. I love the performance and battery life of my M1 Macbook air, but OMG what a pain in the ass is to use external monitors with this thing, what a shame from Apple

Gonna try this !!😊 thank you

There is a free solution by choosing HiDPI in the resolution tab for your external monitor in the Display settings.

Just after starting the App, i have no Icons on my Desktop and i cant switch between Desktops.

I mean if u adjust the UI-Scaling stuff it also changes the Resolution. So UI-Scaling is not existing rly

Wonderful. Thank you.

27" monitors work great at 1440p, it seems at least

Can you please help me? i got mbp and feeling eyestrain and neck tension. Heard this is because of dithering and EWM. I am not sure. I could work on my last laptop for a long time, but it is not the same with mbp. Please help

Thank you for the video! Unfortunately, for my 1920x1080 external display, the text seems to be the same, and or a bit worse. I wonder if it's the case for others with a 1920x1080 display?

idk why but i can't set 1920х1080 HiDPi only 1920x1079 HiDPi bit it worse than 1920х1080 LoDPi

You mentioned that 27 4k isn't a good size for OSX - what is the best size for a 4k monitor and mac OSX is you're buying specifically for that task and you don't want to spend £1500 on an Apple Studio Display? Is there any way I can make OSX look good on a 4k monitor without resorting to using scaling or third party apps like better display? Thanks

Theo, what are the external monitor and stand you're using in this video?

Thank you very much bro 🙏

You said scale is not well supported for 27" 4k screen and 1440p resolution. Where did you find this information? I can't find more searching about it. What would be the resolution and screen size which would suit the best for Mac os then ? Thank you very much for this video 🔥

Thanks a million.

How would this solve the problem if the PPI won't be around 110 or 220 at the end?

MacOS sucks, it's now probably years behind windows and even ubuntu is much better now. How is it possible I can't change the text on the screen without lowering the resolution dramatically.

THANKS. You should activate the $

Something that just works in windows, but with mac os you need to buy an app?

i have fuzzy text in my 90* rotation, is this can be fixed? when i enabled HDR it gets fixed

I was planning to buy a 16" portable monitor (LG gram view 16MR70), resolution 2560 x 1600p. I read some reviews that when connecting to a macbook pro, text is not so crisp.It's possible that BetterDisplay could fix this issue?

Perfect! Thanks A LOT. However I still wonder if there are any downsides of doing this? Any idea?

Teoh, Please help. I want the font size of the display on my 16 inch mac look like 1168 x 755 but I want the crispiness of 1728 x 1117(default). How can I do it? I am not using any external moniter. I want to change things on my native display. Waiting for you reply.

Hello Teoh, I'm currently running macOS Sonoma 14.3.1, and am unable to shrink the user interface from the top taskbar and can't find the option to in system settings. Do you have a fix for this?

it works for me...but the problem, when i disconect from external monitor, and i wanna work from my mbp m1 14", it shows 1512 x 982, when the default is 3024 x 1964.. i change to 3024x1964 and everything is very small.. i dunno what to do..