Nvidia announced that they are releasing drivers that will allow G-sync to work on FreeSync monitors at CES 2019. FreeSync monitors are generally more affordable than their G-sync counterparts, which makes this is very exciting news for PC gaming fans.

A few years ago, graphics leader Nvidia spearheaded their G-sync adaptive sync technology. Aimed at eliminating screen tearing and touted as a better alternative to Vsync, it allows a display to adapt to the framerate of the graphics card instead of the other way around. Not to be outdone, AMD introduced FreeSync which was a royalty-free alternative with a similar implementation.

While G-sync works really well in practice, it hasn’t really taken the world by storm due to its proprietary nature and the expensive prices of G-sync compatible displays. All of that changes with this big announcement which is sure to make shockwaves throughout the industry.

Nvidia however is not letting just anyone run with the G-sync ball – it found that majority of FreeSync monitors aren’t up to its image quality standards and found a lot of them with flickering and artifacts. Nvidia is still testing hundreds of FreeSync monitors to check if they’re compatible with the G-sync standards, and so far they are making 12 FreeSync monitors from companies such as Acer, AOC, Asus and BenQ compatible with G-sync in an upcoming driver update which will be rolling out soon.

The affordability of FreeSync compatible displays has been a selling point for AMD graphics cards and Nvidia is addressing it with this move. This is great news for the industry and PC gamers alike as broader ecosystem support can only mean better gaming experiences for everyone.

Article by Franz Francisco Chan