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Recent summer reviews and extensive testing have highlighted several top innovative television brands that promise an exceptional viewing experience. These brands stand out for their advanced technology, impressive picture quality, and intuitive, intelligent platforms. They offer vibrant displays and seamless integration with popular streaming services, ensuring a thrilling and immersive entertainment experience. When selecting a TV, these leading brands deliver both innovation and high performance. These are the brands to consider for the best combination of features and quality.
Best Smart TVs Reviewed: 10 Top Innovative Brands!
Samsung S90C OLED
The Samsung S90C OLED is the top smart TV we’ve tested, offering a superb combination of advanced features and excellent picture quality. It supports both Bixby and Alexa voice assistants for convenient content discovery, and those who prefer a more traditional approach will appreciate the intuitive Tizen innovative interface, which grants convenient access to a broad range of streaming apps. The TV’s QD-OLED panel stands out with its vibrant colors, surpassing the typical WOLED panels and making it one of the most visually striking options.
Performance-wise, the Samsung S90C OLED shines in dark and bright environments, delivering impressive black levels and near-infinite contrast in dimly lit rooms while maintaining high brightness and excellent reflection handling in well-lit settings. It avoids distracting blooming around bright objects and provides a clear picture across various viewing conditions. Although the Samsung S95C OLED offers superior brightness, the S90C remains a more cost-effective choice for most users. The newer Samsung S90D/S90DD OLED model provides minor improvements but comes at a higher price, making the S90C a better value, especially when on sale.
Sony A95L OLED
While the Samsung S90C OLED offers excellent value for most users, the Sony A95L OLED is the top choice for those willing to spend more on the ultimate home theater experience. The A95L supports Dolby Vision HDR, providing superior brightness and color accuracy compared to Samsung’s HDR10+ format, aligning more closely with the content creator’s intent. Additionally, it boasts enhanced audio features, including DTS passthrough over eARC, which facilitates a seamless connection to your audio-video receiver while maintaining high-quality sound.
The Sony A95L runs on Google TV, offering a rich selection of features and streaming apps, though it is slower than Samsung’s Tizen OS. It includes hands-free voice control for easier content searches and device management without needing the remote. Offered in 55, 65, and 77 inches, the A95L delivers exceptional HDR performance and advanced intelligent functionalities, making it the premier choice for creating a top-tier home theater setup.
Sony BRAVIA 9 QLED
The Sony BRAVIA 9 QLED excels as the best TV for bright rooms due to its remarkable brightness and effective reflection handling, which minimize glare and ensure clear viewing even in sunny environments. Thanks to its advanced local dimming technology, it also performs impressively in darker settings, delivering exceptional contrast and deep blacks with minimal blooming. The Google TV interface complements this with a wide range of streaming apps, making it easy to find and enjoy new content.
While its viewing angle could be more varied, making it less ideal for large groups, the BRAVIA 9 is an excellent choice for home theater setups and modern gaming. It supports HDMI 2.1 with up to 4K @ 120Hz and a Variable Refresh Rate (VRR). Its fast response time and minimal input lag enhance the gaming experience, and the built-in speakers are a practical addition. For those seeking a more affordable Sony option, the X93L/X93CL offers good performance at a lower price, though it doesn’t quite match the BRAVIA 9’s brightness and contrast.
LG C3 OLED
The LG C3 OLED is a top choice for an upper mid-range OLED TV, offering a balanced mix of quality and affordability. While it doesn’t match the brightness and color vibrancy of higher-end QD-OLED models like the Samsung S90C or Sony A95L, the C3’s WOLED panel delivers excellent performance with near-infinite contrast, making it ideal for dark room viewing. LG’s webOS platform enhances usability with its intuitive interface and unique point-and-press remote, providing easy navigation and customizable profiles.
Offered in sizes ranging from 42 to 83 inches, the LG C3 fits various room sizes and viewing preferences. For a more premium option, the LG G3 OLED offers better HDR peak brightness and advanced audio and video support but comes at a higher price. The newer LG C4 OLED, with its improved refresh rate of up to 144Hz, is also available but may need to offer more added value over the C3 to justify its higher cost. Unless the C4’s specific features are essential, the C3 remains a robust and cost-effective choice, especially when on sale.
LG B3 OLED
For a solid mid-range OLED TV, the LG B3 OLED is a strong option that offers many higher-end LG C3 OLED features at a more affordable price. While it lacks the HDR peak brightness and additional HDMI 2.1 ports of more expensive models, the B3 still delivers excellent picture quality with its WOLED panel. It provides deep blacks and a near-infinite contrast ratio ideal for dark-room viewing. Its color accuracy and wide color gamut ensure that movies and shows are presented true to the creator’s intent.
The B3 supports Dolby Vision HDR and advanced DTS audio formats, making it suitable for home theater setups. Although it may not reach the brightness levels of pricier OLEDs, its affordability and robust feature set make it a standout in the mid-range category. The newer LG B4 OLED offers incremental improvements such as increased brightness and additional HDMI 2.1 ports and is available in a new 48-inch size. However, its higher price makes the B3 a more cost-effective choice unless the B4’s upgrades are essential for your needs.
Hisense U7N
The Hisense U7N stands out in the lower mid-range smart TV category, offering impressive features and solid picture quality at an affordable price. Although it may not match the precision of more expensive models like the Sony BRAVIA 9 QLED, it effectively uses local dimming to deliver deep blacks and bright highlights. Its narrow viewing angle can lead to some image degradation from the sides, and the 75-inch variant features a different panel type that slightly affects contrast but improves viewing angles.
The U7N excels in brightness and color performance, with excellent SDR peak brightness and effective reflection handling, making it suitable for bright rooms. It supports HDR10, HDR10+, and Dolby Vision, ensuring vibrant colors, and includes Dolby and DTS audio formats for versatile sound options. The Google TV interface offers straightforward access to streaming services, and its upscaling capabilities improve lower-resolution content. With HDMI 2.1 support on two ports and compatibility with modern consoles and high-end PCs, the U7N is an excellent choice for gamers seeking high performance and smooth visuals.
Hisense U6/U6K
For those seeking a budget-friendly TV, the Hisense U6/U6K is an excellent choice, offering solid performance at a lower price point. While it doesn’t match the brightness of higher-end models like the Hisense U7N and struggles with HDR highlights and reflection handling, its full-array local dimming feature provides deep blacks, making it better suited for darker rooms. Despite some noticeable blooming around bright objects, it excels in upscaling content and maintains good accuracy, ensuring content appears as intended by its creators.
The U6/U6K runs on the Google TV interface, which is easy to use and provides a broad selection of streaming channels. Its remote includes voice support and an integrated microphone, which can be turned off for privacy. For Costco members, the Hisense A6/A65K is a comparable, more affordable alternative with some feature trade-offs. The new Hisense U6N offers improved local dimming and brightness but is priced higher, so unless these upgrades are essential, the U6K remains a cost-effective option with a strong balance of features and performance.
Roku Select Series
The Roku Select Series is a standout option for those on a budget, providing satisfactory performance at a lower price. While it doesn’t match the picture quality of pricier models like the Hisense U6/U6K, it gives satisfactory contrast and black uniformity, lacking local dimming and struggles in dark rooms. Its brightness for HDR content is limited, but it handles reflection reasonably well and performs adequately with SDR content due to its good SDR brightness.
The Roku Select Series features a fast and intuitive Roku TV innovative interface, giving easy access to a wide range of streaming apps. Its remote includes voice command functionality and a headphone jack for private listening, adding value to the price. Although its image processing is less advanced, and 4K content may not be as sharp as on higher-end models, it remains a solid choice for affordability. Costco members also consider the Hisense A6/A65K, which offers slightly better performance at a similar price. Overall, the Roku Select Series is a reliable option for those seeking essential smart TV features on a budget.
TCL QM8 mini-LED TV
For those looking for a great combination of performance and affordability, the 2023 TCL QM8 mini-LED TV is a standout choice. This 4K mini-LED QLED model impresses with its remarkable brightness, boasting peak levels of up to 3,500 nits in HDR mode, far exceeding the 2,000 nits claimed by TCL. Such brightness, with excellent black levels and virtually no noticeable blooming, sets the QM8 apart from other high-end models. Its ability to deliver stunning HDR performance with support for Dolby Vision IQ, HDR10+, and HLG, along with an excellent color gamut covering 97% of DCI-P3 and 76% of BT.2020, makes it a versatile option for both dark and brightly lit environments.
While the QM8 excels in brightness and contrast, it does exhibit some minor motion artifacts, though these can be mitigated with the available de-judder settings. Gamers will appreciate its support for VRR and AMD FreeSync Premium Pro, enhancing the gaming experience. Despite a few quirks, the TCL QM8 offers an impressive feature set at a more affordable price than premium brands like LG, Sony, and Samsung. Its strong performance and competitive pricing make it an excellent choice for top-tier quality without breaking the bank.
Samsung QN90C Neo QLED
The Samsung QN90C Neo QLED is a standout 4K TV that offers premium features without exceeding the flagship models’ exorbitant prices. Its exceptional HDR performance, outstanding color accuracy, and impressive black levels make it a top contender in its class. With peak brightness reaching around 2,000 nits for both SDR and HDR content, the QN90C delivers vibrant, detailed images that rival other high-end TVs like the TCL QM8 and Hisense U8K. The TV also excels in upscaling lower-resolution content, effectively reducing color banding and pixelation, making it an excellent choice for enhancing older streams and DVDs.
Despite its many strengths, the QN90C’s Smart TV interface can be frustrating, and its price point remains high. However, including four full-bandwidth HDMI 2.1 inputs supporting up to 144Hz refresh rates enhances its appeal for gamers. Adopting ADS panels also improves off-angle viewing, and mini-LED backlighting contributes to its impressive black levels. Although it may not reach the highest level of performance of Samsung’s S95C or an OLED display, the QN90C offers a premium experience at a more accessible price.
Conclusion:
The Samsung S90C OLED and Sony A95L OLED impress with their advanced technology, stunning HDR, and vibrant colors. The TCL QM8 and Samsung QN90C offer excellent brightness and black levels at more accessible prices. Each model features strong performance and intuitive smart TV platforms, catering to various needs, from premium home theaters to budget-friendly options. These brands excel in providing a captivating and immersive entertainment experience.
