The Best Portable Mini Projector

If you want to enjoy the occasional impromptu movie night but don’t necessarily want a big-screen TV taking up space in your home, a portable mini projector lets you easily display video on a wall anywhere. They are small enough to carry from room to room and can show a 50-inch-plus image on a wall or screen. You won’t be able to use a mini projector as a TV replacement if you tend to watch TV during the day or in a very bright room, but in a dim to dark room their images look fine, and they are great space savers. Many of these models are battery powered and have apps such as Netflix built in, so you don’t need to lug around power cords and source devices—which makes them great to take with you to a friend’s house or on vacation. These projectors likely aren’t bright enough for an outdoor movie night, but if you keep the image small and your yard is dark, they might work. In a pinch, the brightest portable mini projectors can also show a PowerPoint or other presentation in a room with the lights on, but these aren’t primarily business projectors. This is not the type of projector for a dedicated home theater room. They are not bright enough, and their black-level performance and color accuracy are not up to home theater standards.