But even apart from the number of pixels, why must screens be shaped like a letterbox? The only thing 16:9 is good for is watching movies, and if you happen to want to do that on your laptop, small black bars at the top and bottom really aren't any problem at all.
Nope. These are some of the useful side by side compositions:
- Terminal/Editor + Documentation
- Teleconf + Meeting Notes
- One master, two slave terminals
- IDE + Browser (for real time testing)
- etc.
In fact, 15 years ago I had a coworker who used two 20" 1200x1600 on their side next to each other. That worked really well for having lots of text next to each other. It's basically a gigantic 3:2 screen, which is still a tiny bit taller than 16:10.
A 15" FHD screen is as effective as 24" FHD screen for me. If the panel quality is good enough, I can work for hours without scaling and eye-fatigue.
At that scenario menus, extra screen clutter doesn't change anything since everything is proportional to the bigger screen.
For a laptop size screen, yeah, wide aspect ratio is not as useful.