I always favour 720p but a mate says I’m categorically wrong, so who’s right &’why?

Cheers.

They’re broadly comparable, they’re as good as each other for most practical purposes. FWIW I usually choose 720p out of the two, arguably 720p is “better” as there’s more information being used (720 lines per frame as opposed to 540). But test them side by side and I highly doubt you’ll see any discernible difference.

Now go to 1080p and stop arguing. (-:

Oh, and your mate is categorically wrong in saying that you’re categorically wrong.

I’ve just thought. I’m assuming that you have control of the source here (eg, a games console with the option to output either format). If you don’t, then it’s probably better to match the output to the source.

For example, AFAIK Sky HD broadcasts at 1080i (or at least, they used to, I don’t know whether that’s still the case or not). The Sky box gives you the option to output in either 720p or 1080i, so whilst 720p may be nominally ‘better’ the signal will have to be converted. In this case it be better to leave it as 1080i assuming you have a Full HD TV. If your TV is merely “HD Ready” it’s probably got a native resolution of 768px, which is a whole other can of worms.

Interesting, thanks for the info, I shall inform my mate he is wrong 😀

Agree with cougar for sky box. Leave it set 108i.

720p is better, interlaced video will give jagged edges on fast moving images.

The p means progressive and the whole frame is scanned once. i means interlaced and the frame is scanned over 2 lines, odd lines then even lines.

Always progressive if you have the option. Resolution is much less of an issue than people think. Source is important. I have a low res LCD cinema projector, but when fed HD it’s still excellent. Just: don’t be conned by the bigger numbers is better nonsense.

Progressive yes is technically better, but if the source is interlaced you’re generally better off matching the source. Especially with Sky HD (probably true of Freesat/Freeview HD also). Sky HD does have the 720p option and in theory that was better for some sources but as I understand it, they never use 720p and 720p output is undergoing a conversion from 1080i. I found 1080i looked better for Sky HD generally whatever the source.

Interlaced video is two ‘fields’ (not frames) of half the resolution combined into one, done for bandwidth reasons (in the old days, related to the scan frequency of a TV), though modern TVs do good handling of interlaced sources.

Depends what you want to do with it and what you view it on. 3 minute clip of your bike ride uploaded to YouTube and watched on a mobile then 720 is ideal. 60 minute cinematic production in a cinema, then 1080 is better.

Sky Q is now 1080p for standard HD and 2160p when viewing ‘Ultra HD’.