The BenQ GV50 Projector Lets You Watch Movies Anywhere—Including Your Ceiling

You can slide the projector up or down on the base for a vertical shift up a wall or ceiling. For a horizontal tilt, you can fold out the base’s two feet and point the projector at a slight angle on the ceiling. No matter the direction, it’s easy to slide around but also stays put.

The projector only has one HDMI port, which you can use for ARC 5.1 pass- through audio or connecting to another source, like a gaming console. There’s a USB-A port and a USB-C port, both for connecting a thumb drive or a hard drive (or charging a gadget), plus a 3.5-mm port. The GV50 does not have an Ethernet port and uses Wi-Fi 5, which is older and not as widely compatible or as speedy as modern standards like Wi-Fi 6E or Wi-Fi 7. I had some connection issues with my Google Nest mesh network where the projector couldn’t connect.

Aside from needing to complete a system update that took about 45 minutes, setup was ultra-smooth and mostly involved using the Google Home app to scan a QR code and install the apps. The GV50 used auto-keystoning to map to my projector screen, and it worked well. When I used the projector on a wall and on the ceiling, the keystoning also worked—I only made a few minor adjustments to the size. The GV50 remote uses the typical, intuitive BenQ layout with a Home button in the center, a setup button that’s easy to find, and shortcut buttons for Netflix, YouTube, and Prime.

Not only can the GV50 run on battery power, but it also has plenty of settings to manage its efficiency, including powering down automatically after a set period. I found Battery mode to be marginally helpful, since I use the device in my house, connected to a wall outlet, but the capability does add portability should you want to use the projector while camping or living anywhere else that outlets are sparse. You can use the projector on battery charge alone for a few hours, but the device will dim a little bit to save power.

Picture Quality and More

The GV50 is not trying to be a cinematic marvel by any means, but the projector failed my typical Spears & Muncil benchmark tests. I noticed the skin tone tests were about average for a midrange model like this, not showing much tonal variation. In the demo reel tests, the 1080p quality and lack of good contrast and brightness were much more obvious. A red cactus and yellow flower lacked vividness, and trees in the foreground of a mountain scene looked too dark and mixed into the inky black background. Butterflies that should have looked bright and colorful looked dull, flat, and a bit lifeless.

When I switched to streaming from my iPhone 17 Pro and an iPad 12.9-inch, the GV50’s slow processing speed became an issue. While both Google Cast and Apple AirPlay were functional, the playback was choppy and jittery. If I tried to fast-forward, the stream would pause or fail altogether due to the paltry 2 GB of RAM and 1.5-GHz processor.