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What is the Aspect Ratio? (4:3, 16:9, 21:9) - RTINGS.com
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Home TV Guide Misc Aspect Ratio
Updated Jun 15, 2017 By Cedric Demers , Mehdi Azzabi
What is the Aspect
Ratio?
(4:3, 16:9, 21:9)
The aspect ratio refers to the proportions of the height and width of an
image. It defines its overall shape, and it is usually shown as W:H (W is the
width and H is the height). The most common aspect ratio today is 16:9,
which means that if the width is divided into 16 equal parts, the height of the
TV or picture should be 9 parts.
16:9 works great for TVs since that is the format modern TV shows are
delivered on, but most movies are made using the cinema standard, which is
21:9. 21:9 is much wider, so parts of the screen need to be filled with black
bars above and below the image in order to fit most TVs. These horizontal
bars a called "letterboxes". Similar to movies, TV shows used to be made
using a 4:3 aspect ratio, which is a lot more square than current TVs (this is
why 16:9 is often called a widescreen aspect ratio). To fit modern TVs,
vertical black bars or "pillarboxing" is used. We've listed the most common
aspect ratios in this table, but every TV sold today uses 16:9.
In theaters, this is why the screen grows wider at the beginning of a movie.
Ads shown before the movie follow the TV ratio of 16:9, while the movie itself is
21:9.
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Aspect Ratio
Uses
TVs
4:3
1.33:1 Standard Channels
Old TVs
16:9
1.77:1
HD Channels
The majority of HDTVs
21:9
2.35:1
Most movies
Most theaters
14:10
1.4:1
IMAX Film
Very few theaters
19:10
1.9:1
IMAX Digital
Most IMAX theaters
The most common aspect ratios in the video industry.
What do the black bars look like on TVs with
different aspect ratios?
Black bars fill the extra space when the aspect ratio of the screen and content do not match.
Black bars appear when the aspect ratio of the content playing isn't matched
with the aspect ratio of the TV.
Depending on the type of mismatch between the picture and the display's
ratio, the black bars appear in different places. Content wider than the
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screen it is played on will have horizontal black bars, while content that is
taller will use vertical bars. The following picture shows the black bars for
various televisions and aspect ratios (4:3, 16:9 and 21:9). All televisions
have the same diagonal length.
As you can see, when you watch a 21:9 movie on a normal 16:9 widescreen TV,
you will have some black bars at the top and bottom. This is represented by the top
center TV in the illustration.
Cropping
Original picture
Stretched to fit
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Cropped to fit
If you do not like having black bars, you have two options available within the
settings of your TV: cropping or stretching.
Cropping the picture is the equivalent of zooming, but will result in
the sides of the picture being removed.
Stretching retains all the information but it distorts the image to fit your
screen.
Different TVs have different settings for this, so here's a table with the
different options found on different brands, as well as their specific name.
Some of them have two types of zoom; either two levels of crop or one of
them combines both zoom and stretch at the same time.
Brand
Stretch
Crop
Crop #2
Sony
Full
Zoom
Wide Zoom (Zoom+Stretch)
Samsung
Fit to
screen
Zoom/Position
N/A
LG
16:9
All Direction
Zoom
Vertical Zoom (Zoom+Vertical
Stretch)
TCL
Stretch
Zoom
Normal (Overscan feature)
IMAX Aspect ratio
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IMAX scene in Interstellar
IMAX movies and
theaters are a complete
ecosystem that
encompasses everything
from cameras, speakers,
room shapes, screen
finishes and even film
types. More importantly
though, part of IMAX's
proprietary system is their
own aspect ratio. IMAX
has a few different ratios
used now to
accommodate for different
types of rooms, but there
are two major ones: 1.9:1
and 1.4:1.
1.9:1 is meant for more
standard digital projectors
and is used in IMAX
Digital theaters. It is a bit
taller than the standard
Cinema 2.35:1 (21:9)
ratio.
1.4:1 is the more iconic
ratio. It is the incredibly tall
and almost square in
shape. This is what IMAX
is most known for since
16:9 scene in Interstellar
the screens are usually
much larger than normal cinema theaters and the height makes them a very immersive
experience.
Most movies today that use IMAX still are filmed with a mixture of 21:9 ratio and 1.4:1 IMAX. As seen in
the picture above, IMAX content fills up the entirety of the 16:9 screen. The image itself goes beyond the
height of a 16:9 TV, but it is cropped in Blu-ray films to fit the screen. You don't get the whole experience,
but you still get a more complete picture than if it was letterboxed to the standard cinema ratio.
What are 21:9 ratio TVs?
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21:9 TVs were made a
few years ago and were
aimed at cinephiles since
they match the standard
motion pictures aspect
ratio and allow you to
watch movies from edge
to edge of your screen.
They aren't available
anymore, and they were
rare even at the time of
their release. Unless you
only turn on your TV to
A 58" 21:9 TV is equivalent to a 61" for 21:9 media, but only 47" for 16:9 media.
watch movies, you're
better off with a standard
Nowadays, the 21:9 ratio is only found on PC monitors. It roughly equates to two
16:9 TV. Watching normal
4:3 monitors side by side. Some PC monitors go even wider, causing even 21:9
TV shows on a cinemamovies to have vertical black bars. These are good for both productivity and
wide screen causes it to
immersive gaming.
show black bars on either
side, which isn't great. This reduces the viewing area for 16:9 content considerably. A 58" 21:9 television
corresponds to the same viewing area as a 47" TV for 16:9 content, as you can see in the illustration.
Conclusion
TV shows are made and distributed using a 16:9 aspect ratio, and every TV sold today uses the same.
Movies are usually found with a 21:9 ratio, however, which causes them to have black bars above and
below the pictures on standard TVs. Some PC monitors share that ratio, but it isn't very practical on a TV
since normal content would have vertical bars.
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Discussions
When I download a 1080p movie, the resolution is not 1920x1080
but 1920x800 and there are black...
Jan 27, 2014 06:04 PM By LegacyQA 83K
63
25
-11
49
-9
30
-5
1 reply Follow
Will the standard aspect ratio change from 16:9 to 21:9? Just like it
24
did from 4:3 to 16:9?
Jan 07, 2015 04:39 AM By LegacyQA 83K
74
1 reply Follow
Which TVs have aspect ratio auto-switching?
Mar 18, 2015 09:46 PM By LegacyQA 83K
-9
1 reply Follow
How much area are the letterbox bars supposed to cover on a 16:9
40
TV?
Sep 03, 2014 03:40 AM By LegacyQA 83K
97
1 reply Follow
What is widescreen aspect ratio? 21:9?
Oct 13, 2014 04:26 PM By LegacyQA 83K
88
28
-4
1 reply Follow
See all discussions
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