Golf Simulator TV vs Projector: Which Display Should You Use?

Once you have picked a launch monitor, the next question I get asked on almost every simulator enquiry is the same: do I need a projector and impact screen, or can I just use a TV? It is a fair question, because the projector route roughly doubles the visual budget, while a decent TV might already be sitting in the room. I have installed both types of setup in garages, garden rooms and spare bedrooms across the UK, and the honest answer is that neither is "better" — they solve different problems. A projector and impact screen give you the full ball-through-the-picture immersion that makes a simulator feel like golf. A TV gives you a cheaper, brighter, simpler display that works in rooms where a screen and enclosure will not fit. This guide walks through the real trade-offs: cost, room light, safety, space, and the hybrid setups that use both.

The short answer

If you have the space and budget for a full enclosure, a projector firing onto an impact screen is the better simulator experience, full stop. Hitting the ball into the picture — watching it vanish into the fairway you are aiming at — is what separates a simulator from a glorified net session. But if your room is tight, your ceiling is low, or your budget stops at the launch monitor and a net, a TV mounted safely off to the side is a perfectly good way to play. Plenty of my customers run a net or cage with a TV beside it and get 90% of the practice value for a fraction of the cost. The mistake is not choosing a TV — the mistake is choosing a TV and then positioning it somewhere a golf ball can reach it.

Looking for a ready-made setup? Our Pro Golf Cage & Hitting Mat Bundle (3m × 3m × 3m) covers exactly this — available cage-only or with a professional hitting mat.

How each setup works

A projector setup puts an impact screen at the end of your hitting area — a tensioned, heavy-duty polyester screen designed to absorb ball strikes at 150+ mph — with a short-throw projector mounted on the ceiling or floor behind you, throwing the image onto that screen. You hit directly into the picture. The screen is both your display and your ball-stop, which is why screen quality matters so much; I cover the details in my impact screens and enclosures guide.

A TV setup separates the two jobs. The ball flies into a net or cage, and the TV displays the software from a position the ball can never reach — typically wall-mounted to the side of the hitting bay, or on a stand behind and beside the golfer. You hit into the net, then turn your head slightly to watch the shot play out on screen.

Immersion: where the projector wins

There is no way around this: hitting into the image is a different experience from hitting into a net and glancing sideways. On a projected screen the ball leaves your clubface, thumps into the screen, and the simulated ball flight picks up exactly where the real one disappeared. Your eyes never leave the target line. After a few sessions your brain stops registering the screen at all — you are just playing golf at a course.

With a TV, there is always a disconnect. You strike the ball, it hits the net, and then you look left or right to see the result. For casual practice this is fine. For playing full rounds on GSPro or E6, it takes some of the magic away — several customers who started with a TV setup have come back within a year to upgrade to a screen and enclosure precisely because of this. A projected image is also simply bigger: a typical simulator screen is around 3m wide, which at normal hitting distance fills most of your field of view. Even a 75-inch TV is under 1.7m wide and sits off-axis.

Practicality: where the TV wins

Now the other side of the ledger, because the TV has real advantages beyond price.

Room light. Projectors hate ambient light. In a garden room with big windows or a garage with the door open, a 3,000-lumen projected image washes out badly in daylight. A TV is far brighter — modern panels manage daylight viewing without breaking a sweat. If you cannot black the room out, the TV wins on picture quality every time. I tested a mid-range short-throw projector in a customer's south-facing garden room in Surrey and the image was unusable until we fitted blackout blinds; his TV in the corner looked perfect all day.

Space. An impact screen needs an enclosure or frame, ball-stop clearance behind it, and a projector mounted where you will not cast a shadow on the screen — usually a short-throw model on the ceiling. That is a permanent installation in a dedicated room. A TV needs a wall bracket. If your simulator shares space with a car, a home gym or a utility room, the TV-plus-net route is dramatically easier to live with. Check my room size guide before committing to a full enclosure.

Simplicity. No keystone correction, no throw-ratio maths, no bulb or laser-source maintenance, no aligning the image to the screen borders. You plug the TV in and play.

The safety question: never put a TV in the firing line

This is the part I insist on with every customer. A golf ball leaves the clubface at up to 180 mph. Shanks and toe-strikes do not go where you aimed — they go 30, 40, sometimes 60 degrees offline. A TV positioned anywhere in the forward arc of your swing is living on borrowed time, and no impact screen exists that lets you hit "through" to a TV behind it safely at close range without proper tensioning and clearance.

My placement rules, learned from installs and from one customer's expensive mistake with a wayward wedge:

• Mount the TV behind the hitting position or level with it, never in front of the leading edge of the mat.
• Keep it on the opposite side from your ball flight bias if you can — right-handed slicers should favour the left wall.
• If it must sit forward of the mat, protect it: side netting or barrier panels on a cage such as the Forza practice cage will stop the mishits that cause the damage.
• Never rely on "I don't shank it" — everyone does eventually, and a replacement 65-inch panel costs more than the side netting that would have saved it.

An impact screen, by contrast, is designed to take the abuse. A properly tensioned screen with adequate clearance behind it will absorb full driver strikes for years — the failure mode is gradual fading and fibre wear at the impact zone, not a shattered panel.

Cost comparison

Here is what the two routes realistically cost in the UK, over and above the launch monitor, mat and PC or iPad you need either way.

So the projector route typically costs £1,000–£2,000 more once the enclosure is included. Whether that is worth it depends entirely on how you will use the simulator: for swing practice and data work, honestly, it is not. For playing rounds, leagues and family use, it usually is. My full cost breakdown puts these numbers in the context of a complete build.

Choosing the projector if you go that route

If you land on the projector side, the two numbers that matter are throw ratio and brightness. You want a short-throw projector (throw ratio around 0.5:1 to 0.8:1) so it can sit behind your swing arc without casting your shadow onto the screen, and at least 3,000 ANSI lumens for a UK room that is not fully blacked out. Manufacturers publish full specification sheets — BenQ's golf simulator projector range is a good reference point for what the dedicated units offer. I have written a separate projector buying guide covering throw ratios, mounting positions and specific models, so I will not repeat it all here.

Hybrid setups: the best of both

Some of the best simulator rooms I have installed use both displays, and it costs less than you would think if the TV already exists.

Projector for play, TV for data. The main image goes on the impact screen, while a TV on the side wall mirrors the launch monitor's data screen — club path, spin numbers, dispersion charts. You hit into the picture but check your numbers at a glance without walking to a laptop. Coaches love this layout.

TV now, projector later. This is the route I recommend to anyone unsure about budget. Start with the launch monitor, a mat, a cage and a TV — a working simulator for the lowest sensible outlay. If the simulator earns its keep over the first winter, add a SimBox enclosure and projector later. Nothing from the first stage is wasted: the cage becomes garden practice kit, and the TV becomes the data display. Most of our simulator bundles are structured so the enclosure and screen can be added as a second stage rather than bought on day one.

TV above the screen. In rooms with generous ceiling height, some owners mount a TV above the impact screen enclosure for sports or music between shots. Fine — just keep it above the enclosure's top frame, where the netting return protects it.

Which should you choose?

After years of installs, my honest steer:

• Dedicated room, playing full rounds, budget allows: projector and impact screen. It is the experience you are picturing when you imagine a golf simulator.
• Bright room you cannot black out: TV. A washed-out projected image is worse than a crisp TV every single session.
• Shared or temporary space: TV and a net or pop-up cage. Pack-away friendly, no permanent mounting.
• Practice-focused golfer who mainly wants data: TV. You will spend more time looking at numbers than scenery.
• Unsure: start with the TV route and upgrade. One customer in Cheshire ran a Mevo Gen 2 with a cage and a spare 55-inch TV for eight months before adding a screen — by then he knew exactly what size enclosure his room needed and nothing he had bought was wasted.

FAQ

Can I hit golf balls at my TV with a foam or plastic ball?

With soft foam practice balls at short range, the risk is low but not zero — a hard strike from a couple of metres can still crack a panel. I would still angle the TV away from the target line. With real golf balls, never. No consumer TV survives a genuine strike, and screen-protector films do nothing against a 100+ mph ball.

Is a TV good enough for GSPro and E6 Connect?

Yes — the software neither knows nor cares what display it is on. You lose immersion, not function. All the major packages run identically on a TV, projector or even a laptop screen, so you can start on a TV and move the same software to a projector later.

What size TV do I need for a golf simulator?

Bigger helps because you are viewing from 2–3m away while standing, but 55 inches is a sensible minimum and 65 inches is the sweet spot. Beyond 75 inches the price climbs steeply and you are approaching the cost of a projector-and-screen setup that would give you far more immersion per pound.

Do I need a special projector, or will an office projector work?

An ordinary long-throw office projector will technically display the image, but it usually has to sit so far back that you or your club cast a shadow on the screen mid-swing. Short-throw models solve this, which is why they dominate simulator builds — my projector guide covers the throw-ratio maths for typical UK room depths.