What is VESA? Understanding VESA TV Bracket Standards

When looking to purchase a new TV bracket, along with the type of TV wall bracket that you require. You will need to make sure that it actually fits your TV! Inevitably you will come across a thing called VESA within the mounting bracket specs and you may wonder what is VESA? What does it mean. In this blog, I answer these questions which will hopefully help you find the correct TV bracket for yourself.

What is VESA? 

The acronym VESA stands for the Video Electronics Standards Association, but you may also find it mentioned as the Flat Display Mounting Interface. The Video Electronics Association is a group of over 300 who have come together with the goal of bringing about certain standards between manufacturers. One of these was standardising TV bracket fixing screw positions on the rear of TV’s, so you can be sure that when you purchase a TV bracket with a matching VESA pattern to the TV, you can be sure that it will fit.

How To Find The VESA On Your TV 

This information should be in your user manual or specifications of the TV, but assuming you do not have this. It easy to find yourself. All you need is a tape-measure or ruler. To find the VESA measurements on your own TV is easy, you simply measure in millimeters(mm) the distance both horizontally and vertically between the TV fixing holes on the rear of your TV. You must measure centre to centre of the holes and the measurements you have should be a whole number like, 100, 200 etc with the exception of 75mm on very close together mounting positions on small TV’s.

VESA is Very Helpful! 

Prior to the VESA standards and with the first flat-screen TV’s that could be mounted to walls. I can remember it could be difficult to find the right TV bracket for the installation. Often you would need to purchase a special bracket from the manufacturer for it to be mounted to the wall. I remember one installation many years ago where the fixing holes on the rear of the TV were so far apart that they were near the edges of the TV screen. This meant that I couldn’t find a bracket to fit it, without the bracket wall mount protruding the edges of the TV. Which would have meant that the wall bracket itself wouldn’t have been hidden by the TV itself which would have looked very silly. In this particular situation I had to use two separate mounting brackets for the TV to sit on. Obviously, to continue in this vein made no sense and the VESA standards mean brackets could be designed to fit a wide range of TV’s.

With the standards you can now check beforehand whether the TV bracket will fit your TV, after finding the measurements of your TV all you need to do is make sure that this corresponds to the bracket you buy. You can usually find all this information out beforehand. You shouldn’t rely on the advertised maximum TV screen size or weight as it’s possible that the bracket may not fit your TV.

Common VESA Measurements 

Overwhelmingly the most common VESA measurements I install on TV’s are 200x200 or 400x400, which is helpful as this means that I do not need to stock a wide variety of brackets other than fixed, tilting, full motion etc for small and large TV’s. A list of VESA measurements are below, obviously the larger the TV to wider the fixing screws are spaced on the rear. Remember one is the vertical measurement between holes and the other horizontal. These are never measured diagonally.

Horizontal x Vertical

75x75

100x100

200x100

200x200

300x200

300x300

400x200

400x300

400x400

600x400

800x600

There are actually larger and smaller versions but it’s unlikely that your screen will ever exceed these.

TV's Not VESA Compatible 

If your TV bracket is not VESA compatible usually you will need to buy a special bracket from the manufacturer for this to attach to your TV. There was for a short period of time a range of Sony TV’s where the TV stand included would be converted into the TV mount with a couple of adapters purchased with the TV. This was a good idea as it meant that you didn’t need to purchase a separate bracket to mount it to the wall. The problems with this were that as they only included two fixing holes, instead of four on the rear of the TV, this meant that universal TV wall mounting brackets could not be used and you would need a special adapter to attach the TV to other types of brackets if you wanted a bracket that would allow movement of the TV after installation.

‍

This is just one example and you may find that the holes on your TV do not correspond with the whole number measurements in the VESA standards, 100mm, 200mm etc. Do not despair in this case, all you need is a bracket that allows to fixings between the TV and the mount to be adjusted. A lot of brackets can slide left and right whilst on the TV is on the mount and you will need a bracket like this. Obviously too much movement on a bracket is not good and there are usually fixing screws/ bars that prevent the bracket from moving once installed.

“VESA-like” Standards 

You may find, advertised on your mount other things listed instead of VESA like ‘MIS’. This is a very similar thing which usually applies to computer screens/ monitors and some of these standards are below.

MIS-B - 50x20 – This is for very, very small screens usually not exceeding 7.9”

MIS-C – 75x35 This is for very small screens not exceeding 11.9”

MIS-D – 75x75 or 100x100 – For screens up to 23.9”.

MIS-E - 200x100 – For screens up to 30.9”.

MIS-F- Screens above 31”

Other Relevant Content From Smart Aerials 

To accompany this article, you may also find the following articles helpful.

How to pick the right TV bracket

Power options for wall mounted TV’s

How much should a TV wall mount installation cost?

How high should my TV be mounted?

How to hide TV cables & wires

VESA & TV Mounting Questions – In Blog Comments Only Please 

If you have any comments or questions arising from this blog, please feel free to post them in the BLOG COMMENTS SECTION directly below this blog and please be patient with a reply. I endeavour to respond to all of these personally so I will help where I can. By posting your comments/ questions in the Blog Comments section you will:

-Help the blog

-Give everyone reading the blog at a later date the benefit of the question asked and the answer given.

-Provide me with a central location to answer all the comments on our blogs.

-Lets me know what blog you have read and what your question relates to(We have over 100 on the site).

PLEASE DO NOT CALL OUR TELEPHONE LINES WITH YOUR QUESTIONS. We are a small business operating in Sussex & Kent only and do not have the staff to deal with your enquiries and I admit receiving these types of calls is becoming a bit of a nuisance.

PLEASE DO NOT FILL OUT THE WEBSITE CONTACT FORMS OR PRIAVATELTY E-MAIL YOUR QUESTIONS. These are intended for customers only and it’s highly likely that should you choose to contact us this way not concerning a quote or an installation that you will not receive a response, or you may receive one asking you to put your questions in the Blog Comments section.

That being said I will help where I can.

Until next time,

Tom