The war on OLED TVs and QLED

The battle between OLED TV technology and QLED TV is quite fierce in the market.
In Vietnam, consumers can experience OLED TVs from Sony, LG and QLED TVs from Samsung and TCL. Worldwide, QLED TVs are mainly found in the brands Samsung, TCL and Hisense. Meanwhile, OLED TVs are wider, besides LG and Sony, there are also Panasonic and Philips (UK), Vizio (US), Loewe, Bang & Olufsen, Skyworth and ChangHong.

In terms of resolution, color, video processing, and image quality factors, the OLED and QLED technologies are essentially the same. However, OLED TVs excel in image quality uniformity, especially the contrast and depth of black. According to some experts, there is hardly a noticeable difference in picture quality between OLED TVs at different price points. The OLED display also has the advantage of thinness over the QLED, mainly due to the lack of backlighting. The downside of current OLED TVs is that the price is too expensive and the screen is darker than the QLED (1,000 nits versus 2,000 nits). According to What Hi-Fi ?, currently on the market, the OLED TV does not have a small or extremely large screen size, with the smallest being 55 inches and the largest being 88 inches. The 48-inch OLED TV first appeared in 2020 with the LG OLED48CX, but was priced not much lower than the 55-inch OLED TV. Meanwhile, in QLED TVs, the picture quality varies depending on the technology (mainly in terms of lighting) and the market price. QLED TVs are brighter than OLED TVs. The screen size of the QLED TV is also varied, from 32-100 inches. The most important advantage of QLED TVs is the cheaper selling price compared to OLED TVs. In Vietnam, Sony 55 inch 4K OLED TV (XR-55A9G) costs about VND 54.8 million and LG 55 inch 4K OLED TV (OLED55B1) costs about VND 49.8 million. Meanwhile, Samsung 55 inch 4K QLED TV depending on its life price ranges from VND 18.4 million (QA55Q65) to VND 36.9 million (QA55Q95). With the TCL branding, the 55-inch 4K QLED TV costs 21 million dong (55C725). According to some market researchers, OLED technology is improving, especially in terms of brightness (which will appear on 2021 models). The price of OLED TVs is also expected to drop further with the efforts of LG, the sole maker of OLED TV panels today. LG is actively selling OLED panels to other TV manufacturers such as Sony, Panasonic, and Philips to help increase production volume (thereby reducing costs). The more affordable, less than 50-inch OLED TVs may soon be brought to the market to offer a variety of choices for users. What Hi-Fi? says OLED also struggles to achieve the highest brightness levels of an average QLED TV. Even ultra-bright OLED models like the LG OLED65G1 and Panasonic TX-55HZ2000 have a hard time getting half the brightness of today’s flagship QLED TVs. Meanwhile, as the leading producer of QLED, Samsung is constantly improving this display technology. That’s why on the 2021 TV list, Samsung added Neo QLED and microLED. However, this innovation has made the cost of the new TV higher, not far from the OLED TV. While QLED TVs are working hard to achieve the same quality as OLED, OLED TVs are looking for ways to gain advantages like QLED (brightness, size …). In terms of price, the gap between OLED TVs and QLED TVs is being reduced thanks to two seemingly opposite trends: the decrease in the cost of OLED TVs and the increase in the cost of QLED TVs. However, consumers are only concerned with the picture quality, features and utilities of the TVs sold at the store and especially the price. When the image quality is almost the same, the advantage will belong to the brand with a beautiful design, many convenient features and an affordable price.