DisplayTuneCalibrating a monitor without a calibrator
A colorimeter is expensive, and for games and everyday work a visual calibration is enough. It takes 15 minutes and fixes the worst mistakes.
Preparation
- Turn the monitor on 20–30 minutes before calibrating — the backlight needs to warm up.
- Set the room lighting the way it usually is when you work or play.
- Reset the monitor to factory settings and choose Standard or User mode.
- Turn off dynamic contrast, Eco modes, Night light and third-party color apps.
The Windows calibration wizard
Press Win+R, type dccw and press Enter. The "Display Color Calibration" wizard walks you through:
- Gamma — move the slider until the dots in the middle of the circles are barely visible.
- Brightness — with the monitor buttons: the shirt is distinguishable from the suit and the "X" in the background is barely visible.
- Contrast — with the monitor buttons: wrinkles on the shirt are visible and white does not clump.
- Color balance — remove any color tint from the grey bars.
Test patterns
| Test | Checks | Target |
|---|---|---|
| Black level | Shadow detail | All dark squares visible except the first |
| White level | Highlight detail | All light squares visible |
| Gamma | Mid tones | Stripes blend with the background at 2.2 |
| Gradient | Banding and steps | Smooth transition without bands |
All four are in our free online monitor test, along with a fullscreen dead pixel test.
Next — game profiles
Calibration gives you a correct base for work. For games it is handy to keep separate profiles with saturation and gamma on top of it — they only switch on in the game and do not spoil your desktop calibration.
Saturation up to 350%, brightness, contrast, gamma and temperature, per-game profiles that switch on automatically, and hotkeys. Works on NVIDIA, AMD and Intel. First day free.
Try it freePricing — from 200 RUBWant to see how it looks first? Load your own screenshot into the free Vibrance simulator →
Frequently asked questions
How do I calibrate a monitor without a colorimeter?
Reset the monitor settings, run the built-in Windows wizard (dccw) and check the result with black level, white level and gamma test patterns.
What is dccw?
The Display Color Calibration wizard built into Windows. Run it with Win+R → dccw.
Do I need calibration for games?
A basic one, yes: it removes grey blacks, blue tints and wrong gamma. Keep game settings on top of it as separate profiles.