In MATLAB, how do I obtain information about my screen resolution and screen size?

Using MATLAB, I want to obtain information about my screen resolution and screen size.

Answer 1

[MathWorks Support Team]

MATLAB uses certain APIs in order to get information about the size and resolution that the system is using. The information returned is made available to the user through the Root properties 'ScreenSize' and 'Units'. The following example demonstrates how to use these properties:

%Sets the units of your root object (screen) to pixels

set(0,'units','pixels')  

%Obtains this pixel information

Pix_SS = get(0,'screensize')

%Sets the units of your root object (screen) to inches

set(0,'units','inches')

%Obtains this inch information

Inch_SS = get(0,'screensize')

%Calculates the resolution (pixels per inch)

Res = Pix_SS./Inch_SS

On the test machine used for this example, this was the result:

 Res =

        Inf       Inf   96.0000   96.0000

This means that my screen has a resolution of 96 pixels per inch in both the x and y directions.

You can confirm these numbers on a Windows 2000 machine by right-clicking on the desktop and selecting Properties -> Settings -> Screen Area. This will display the number of pixels per inch which should match the number obtained by the command:

Pix_SS = get(0,'screensize')

NOTE: Sometimes inaccuracies creep into the results you may get. This is due to the fact that the system may return incorrect information. If you begin to notice this, you can compensate by updating the video drivers or switching the resolution of the monitor. However, this is rare.

[Walter Roberson]

You will need to use Java methods for that. The root properties are not refreshed dynamically.

Answer 2

[Dominik Mattioli]

Res = get(0,'ScreenPixelsPerInch')

This functionality might have been added since MathWorks originally posted their own answer above.

Answer 3

[broken_arrow]

Concerning size measures in plotting, the fixed "virtual" DPI value on Windows or Linux systems returned by

get(0,'ScreenPixelsPerInch')

means that setting e. g.

figure('Units','pixels','Position',[0 0 1920 1080]) 

equals a figure size of 1920x1080 screen pixels if the "true" monitor DPI is less than or equal to that "virtual" value (meaning that on a 1920x1080 monitor, the figure will cover the entire screen). For monitors with a true DPI greater than the virtual one, the number of screen pixels per "unit pixel" increases accordingly (props to Walter): https://www.mathworks.com/help/matlab/creating_guis/dpi-aware-behavior-in-matlab.html (thus on a 4K monitor of same size, the aforementioned figure would still cover the whole screen).

The true monitor DPI can be easily calculated manually (Pythagorean theorem) or with an online tool (google "calculate monitor dpi")

[Walter Roberson]

96 is used for Windows. For MacOS it is 72.

https://www.mathworks.com/matlabcentral/answers/100792-in-matlab-how-do-i-obtain-information-about-my-screen-resolution-and-screen-size#comment_400769