A lot of our favorite TVs and monitors function shows with excessive refresh charges, promising smoother on-screen motion and a sharper image. The identical is true for the best Android phones and all of Apple’s iPhone Pro models (for the reason that 13 Professional and onward). In the present day, every iPhone 17 model can attain a 120-Hz refresh fee. It has turn into customary throughout the board.
Excessive refresh charges are often mentioned in gaming, the place quick reactions and immediate on-screen updates can imply the distinction between victory and defeat. That features gaming monitors and even gaming phones, which may often hit 144 Hz, 165 Hz, or larger. However what precisely does display refresh fee imply? We break it down.
Up to date September 2025: We have added point out of the newest iPhones, updates to display expertise, new hyperlinks, and refreshed copy.
Desk of Contents
What Is a Refresh Charge?
All content material in your show, whether or not it is a cellphone or laptop monitor, is made up of particular person nonetheless frames (photographs) proven in sequence at a really excessive pace. The refresh fee is measured in hertz (Hz), and it dictates how usually the body can change. A refresh fee of 120 Hz permits a brand new body to be displayed as much as 120 occasions each second. A 60-Hz show can solely refresh the display 60 occasions per second. And you’ll guess what number of occasions a 90-Hz display can refresh.
What About Body Charge?
The potential good thing about a excessive screen-refresh fee is restricted by the body fee of what is enjoying on the display. With movies or online game graphics, that is expressed as frames per second (fps). Motion pictures sometimes run at 24 frames per second as a result of it is a theatrical customary, whereas many video games can run at 120 fps.
And Contact-Response Charge?
To confuse you extra, producers generally record the touch-response fee (or contact pattern fee) for touchscreen shows, which can also be measured in hertz. This quantity pertains to how usually the touchscreen scans for a contact out of your finger. The upper the touch-response fee, the quicker it responds to your contact.
How Refresh Charges Affect Your Cellphone
Google by way of Simon Hill
The next refresh fee permits a cellphone’s show to maintain up with gaming motion and reduces movement blur on video, however it will possibly additionally make navigating across the interface really feel extra responsive than it might on a show with a decrease refresh fee. Video games look much less uneven throughout frenetic motion, video footage of fast-paced sports activities motion seems smoother, and any jerkiness when scrolling an extended net web page is diminished. To get the total good thing about a excessive refresh fee, you additionally want a excessive body fee, and ideally, the 2 match.
The associated fee is commonly your battery life. Refreshing the picture on a show extra occasions per second requires extra battery energy. Processing energy can also be wanted to run graphics at a better body fee. Processors have improved enormously, however battery life continues to be restricted on smartphones. For that motive, most telephones with excessive refresh charges don’t run on the highest fee on a regular basis.
Increased refresh charges first got here to smartphones with the gaming-focused Razer Phone in 2017, then producers like Apple, Samsung, OnePlus, and Google adopted them in flagship units just like the iPhone range, Galaxy series, and the Pixel range. Apple calls its model “ProMotion.”
