It's been 12 months since we began aggressively burning-in our 4K OLED monitor by using it exclusively for productivity work. With a full year of usage behind us, this marks an important milestone, so it's time to check in and see how the monitor is holding up. Is it horribly burnt in and completely unusable, or is it still faring reasonably well despite how we've been using it?There have been no changes in how we've been using our MSI QD-OLED. That is, a worst-case scenario for OLED usage, using the display mostly for static content, such as writing scripts, browsing the web, editing videos, and so on. As a result, there's basically no content consumption or gaming occurring on this display the complete opposite of how we normally recommend people use OLED panels.If you missed the previous updates, we recommend going back and checking out at least the initial article where we explain the setup we are using and why we decided to use MSI's 4K 240Hz QD-OLED gaming monitor as our workstation display. The idea is to perform a real-world test of OLED longevity in the worst possible configuration, effectively burning in the display on purpose.The Worst-Case OLED Usage ScenarioTo see whether OLED monitors can truly be used as long-term LCD-equivalent productivity displays, I personally swapped my workstation's 32-inch 4K IPS LCD for this QD-OLED and changed nothing about my usage no dark mode, no screensavers, nothing...I use my monitor more than 8 hours a day, and sometimes that usage is continuous, with no breaks for the display to turn off and rest. This leads to hours upon hours of static usage something that has been perfectly fine for LCDs for a long time but is quite risky on newer OLED screens.The progression to this point has been as follows:After one month and 200 to 250 hours of usage, we saw no signs of burn-in.After three months, 650 to 750 hours of usage, and 71 panel compensation cycles, we saw faint signs of burn-in.After six months, 1,200 to 1,500 hours of usage, and 141 compensation cycles, burn-in was a bit more noticeable than at three months but not overly problematic.At nine months, 2,000 to 2,300 hours of usage, and 224 compensation cycles, burn-in was still present but had changed relatively little compared to six months.12 Months Later: How Visible is Burn-In?Now, at one year of usage, this is the state of play. The 321URX is reporting 322 compensation cycles, which aligns with our typical daily usage, if slightly more than usual. At this stage, we estimate the panel has been used for between 2,700 and 3,000 hours, which is 8 to 10 hours of usage at 200 nits of brightness per compensation cycle. This is the equivalent of using the display for eight hours a day, every single day, since we got it.The recommended rate for panel protection cycles is every four hours, so this is a particularly intense stress test. Not only is the panel being used in a worst-case scenario for static content, but it's also being run at a relatively high brightness level with no software mitigations to minimize burn-in (such as putting the display to sleep after a few minutes of inactivity) all while running the panel protection cycle half as often as recommended.The only burn-in protection features enabled are some of the display-side tools, like dimming the display after a period of inactivity. But this is a very realistic use case: it's exactly how we used an LCD before switching to OLED.Comparing Burn-In Progression Over TimeIn this update, we're focusing on the 3, 6, 9, and 12-month results. Again, we're looking at the center of the display, where visible burn-in was noted in previous months: a line down the center of the screen, most likely due to frequent use of side-by-side applications.The 12-month update continues a stretch of relatively good news. Burn-in is still isolated to the same types of tests as in previous months, mostly affecting mid-to-dark grey test patterns. It remains essentially impossible to spot burn-in with brighter content, such as applications that use a mostly white background.However, in apps with a uniform dark grey background, like Adobe Premiere, the line down the center of the screen can be visible at times. After 12 months of usage, we rarely notice the line in everyday use it's likely my brain has just tuned it out but if I actively look for it, it's visible in darker apps.The impact across the various subpixels remains relatively unchanged. There is no visible burn-in with the red subpixel, a faint but barely noticeable amount with the blue subpixel, and a more obvious amount with the green subpixel. The green subpixel continues to be the primary contributor to the burn-in visible in greyscale tests.Month-over-month changes show that the vertical line was more visible in the 12-month update than at 9 months. Interestingly, in the previous update, we found this line to be slightly less burned in at 9 months compared to 6 months, suggesting that the compensation cycle had reduced its visibility. In the 12-month results, the level of vertical line burn-in is more similar to the 6-month mark than the 9-month mark, and usually slightly worse than at 6 months. If we take the worst-case result of either the 6- or 9-month images, that's basically what the screen looks like after 12 months.Taskbar burn-in has not progressed significantly compared to previous months, even when using the burn-in enhancement filter applied in prior articles to highlight differences.This filter creates a higher-contrast version for analysis purposes only, so it does not reflect how the monitor looks in real life. Like in previous months, taskbar burn-in is difficult to spot in real-world usage because the taskbar itself obscures the affected area. Even when viewing full-screen videos, burn-in is hard to detect unless the content is very uniform.The right side of the vertical line continues to become slightly less uniform and a bit darker than the rest of the screen, likely due to favoring snapping applications to the right side. However, this aspect of burn-in is subtle and far less obvious than the vertical line itself in darker applications like Premiere and Photoshop.Brightness remains unchanged after 12 months. We have recorded 243 nits at max brightness in every update, and this month is no exception. Typically, panel compensation cycles reduce brightness over time to address burn-in and maintain uniformity, but after 322 cycles, brightness remains unaffected.The one noticeable impact is that the monitor is becoming very slightly redder over time. This shift has resulted in around a 100K impact to white balance, dropping from approximately 6,450K when initially tested to 6,350K now. This appears to be due to uneven aging of the subpixels there is essentially no burn-in on the red subpixel, but more on the green, which drags the color balance toward red as green output diminishes.How is the Burn Shaping Up?Where do things stand overall after 12 months of intentionally burning in our OLED monitor? Panel degradation is progressing slowly, with results similar to or slightly worse than at 6 and 9 months. The general characteristics of the burn-in haven't changed much it remains largely confined to dark grey test patterns and while the vertical line and taskbar area are still visible in certain conditions, the overall impact remains minimal.After 2,800 hours of use, it's no surprise that burn-in has increased since the 700-hour mark at three months. However, the slow rate of burn-in has been a pleasant surprise. Across many tests, only minor changes have occurred despite an additional 2,000 hours of use.Burn-in is not significantly impacting daily usage, and the monitor remains close to, though not quite, a non-issue. The faint vertical line is visible in some dark grey applications but is not particularly distracting. Given that we have been subjecting this display to extreme conditions, we expected to see more burn-in at the one-year mark than we're seeing today.If we extrapolate how burn-in might progress after an additional year of usage, we're guessing that the panel will still be quite usable when we check back at the start of 2026. Of course, we will continue with regular updates between now and then, but we're optimistic this MSI 321URX will have a level of burn-in after 2 years that still isn't distracting in everyday use. We have no idea how it will perform after 4 or 5 years, which is within the reasonable lifespan of this type of display, but 2 years shouldn't be problematic or so we hope.We think the results we're seeing are good news for people with more realistic usage scenarios. 2,800 hours of use is equivalent to 8 hours a day of static content every single day for a year, or 8 hours a day, 5 days a week, for 16 months.Burn-in with OLEDs is directly related to hours of usage and is cumulative. So if you only use static apps for four hours a day, you should expect to see your lifespan double compared to what we're suggesting here. Mixing in dynamic content between periods of static content usually won't improve the burn-in results it's all related to the cumulative number of hours displaying the same static content on screen.Relative to our usage scenario, you'll also see lifespan improvements if you run the monitor at a lower brightness level (below 200 nits), turn off the display more frequently after inactivity (with a timer set below 2 hours), and use dark mode in Windows (we use light mode).Running the compensation cycle more often we run it every 8 to 10 hours on average, whereas every 4 hours is recommended will also theoretically help extend the lifespan. Taking all these factors into account, we believe most people will not experience significant burn-in concerns using an OLED, even for productivity use, within the first two years, possibly two and a half years. That is to say, the results we've shown after 12 months are probably more similar to what you'll see after 24 months or more. That timeframe could extend further if your OLED is primarily used for gaming.We still believe that 5 or more years of use from a $1,000 monitor is reasonable, so getting only two to three years without significant burn-in would not be acceptable. How it fares beyond that timeframe remains uncertain. Based on our testing, these panels will likely survive a few years of normal use, and burn-in has not progressed as quickly as we expected. Hopefully, the good news continues as we monitor progress throughout 2025.Shopping Shortcuts:MSI MPG 321URX on Amazon, NeweggAsus ROG Swift PG32UCDM on AmazonSamsung Odyssey QD-OLED G8 on AmazonSamsung Odyssey QD-OLED G9 ultrawide on AmazonAsus ROG Swift PG32UCDP WOLED on Amazon, NeweggAlienware AW3423DW 34" QD-OLED on AmazonLG C4 42" OLED TV on Amazon