QLED vs OLED:
Looking for a new TV? Then you’re about to be faced with two similar-sounding terms:
QLED and OLED.
If you judged them purely based on how they’re spelled, QLED and OLED TV seem almost identical. Heck, even the Q and O look alike. But don’t be fooled: That one-letter difference makes all the difference in the world.Let’s take an in-depth look at these two competing TV technologies. We’ll discuss where they come from, how they’re different from each other, and whateachone does well (and not so well). We’ll also share which one we think most people will be happiest with. Spoiler:
It’s OLED TV, but there are caveats you needto be aware of.Ready? Let’s begin …
What is QLED?
QLED stands for Quantum Light-Emitting Diode. In non-geek-speak, that means a QLED TV is just like a regular LED TV, except it uses tiny nanoparticles called quantum dots to
super-charge its brightness and color. The technology was initially introduced by Sony in 2013, but shortly after that, Samsung began selling its QLED TVs and established
a licensing partnership with other manufacturers, which is why you’ll findQLED TVs from Sony, Vizio, Hisense, and TCL.As cool as quantum dots are, a QLED TV still produces light more or less the same way as a regular LED TV — by using a backlight made up of hundreds (or in some cases thousands) of LEDs, which sits behind a traditional LCD panel. It’s these LEDs that give LED (and QLED) TV its name.Curiously, it’s this use of QLED as a marketing term that started a war between LG and Samsung in 2019. In a complaint to South Korea’s Fair Trade Commission (FTC), LG claimed that Samsung’s so-called QLED TVs aren’t real QLED TVs at all. That’s because according to LG, a true QLED TV would use quantum dot LEDs that emit their own light, and not the quantum-dot-film-over-an-LED-backlight that Samsung uses.
In a retaliatory move, Samsung told the FTC it was unhappy with all of the ads LG had been running, which attacked Samsung’s QLED TVs.
The FTC ultimately took Samsung’s side, but with a stipulation: It must make it clear in
future advertisements that its QLED TVs use a backlight.
The LCD panel — essentially millions of tiny shutters that open and close too quickly to see — in conjunction with color filters, creates the picture you see by letting just the right amount of light and color escape and reach your eyes. It’s a clever system, but it relies on a combination of dimming the LED backlights and using the shutters to block the remaining light to produce accurate on-screen blacks, and it doesn’t always succeed. We’ll discuss
this more below.
for these kinds of displays: “Emissive,” or “self-emissive.”
There are several advantages to this design, but most would agree that when it comes to OLED TVs, the biggest advantage is the superb black level that can be achieved. Unlike a QLED or LED TV that must dim its backlight and block what remains for dark scenes, an OLED TV simply turns off the pixel. When the pixel is off, it emits no light and no color, making it as dark as when the TV itself is turned off. With no separate backlight, it’s also alot easier to make an OLED screen flexible, which is why OLED pioneer LG has developed
several OLED TVs that roll up (or down) to disappear entirely.
Only one company currently makes OLED TV panels: LG Display. It sells those panels to its sister company, LG Electronics, which uses them to build some of the very best TVs you can buy. But LG Display also sells OLED panels to companies like Sony, Philips, and Panasonic, which is why you’ll see OLED TVs from these companies too. Even though the panels themselves are essentially identical, the image processing that Sony, LG, and others do is proprietary, so you’ll still see significant differences in picture quality from one OLED TV to another.What about mini-LED?
In late 2019, TCL started selling the 8-Series — the very first QLED TVs powered by a mini-LED backlighting system. Mini-LEDs are tiny when compared to regular LEDs. This means that a QLED TV that could normally only accommodate hundreds of LEDs, can now accommodate tens of thousands of mini-LEDs. The result? Way more control over backlighting, leading to black levels that come far closer to OLED than any non-OLED display has ever achieved.Mini-LED is still in its infancy, but if TCL and other companies continue to improve it (which they no doubt will) the technology has the potential to greatly improve QLED picture quality with pricing that should be considerably less than OLED.
QLED vs OLED.
Now that you know what all those letters stand for, and what they mean in terms of display technology, let’s compare QLED to OLED in the categories that matter most when buying a TV: Brightness, contrast, viewing angles and other notable performance considerations, like response time and lifespan — all important factors when you’re shelling out up to $6,000 for a top-of-the-line TV.
Black levels and contrastContrast is the difference between the darkest part of an image and the brightest part. If a TV can deliver a truly black dark portion, it doesn’t have to make the bright parts quite as bright to achieve good levels of contrast. That’s why, when it comes to black levels, OLED reigns as the undisputed champion — because of its ability to go completely blackwhen it needs to.QLED TVs (ahem) by contrast, are forced to dim their LED backlights and block the remaining light, something that is very hard to do perfectly. It can trigger something called “light bleed,” as the light spills onto what’s supposed to be a black section of the screen.But is it noticeable? Definitely. If you’re watching an intense action movie and two characters are running through a parking lot at night, for example, you may notice a slight glow on parts of the scene that are supposed to be pitch black, or in the letterbox bars at the top and bottom of the screen while watching a movie that uses a wider-than-16:9 aspect ratio.As we highlighted earlier, mini-LED backlights are one way QLED TV makers are trying to improve this situation. It has real potential, but we’re not quite ready to declare it an OLED-killer.For now, OLED comes out on top; if a pixel isn’t getting electricity, it doesn’t produce anylight and therefore stays totally black.
Winner: OLED
Looking for a new TV? Then you’re about to be faced with two similar-sounding terms:
QLED and OLED.
If you judged them purely based on how they’re spelled, QLED and OLED TV seem almost identical. Heck, even the Q and O look alike. But don’t be fooled: That one-letter difference makes all the difference in the world.Let’s take an in-depth look at these two competing TV technologies. We’ll discuss where they come from, how they’re different from each other, and whateachone does well (and not so well). We’ll also share which one we think most people will be happiest with. Spoiler:
It’s OLED TV, but there are caveats you needto be aware of.Ready? Let’s begin …
What is QLED?
QLED stands for Quantum Light-Emitting Diode. In non-geek-speak, that means a QLED TV is just like a regular LED TV, except it uses tiny nanoparticles called quantum dots to
super-charge its brightness and color. The technology was initially introduced by Sony in 2013, but shortly after that, Samsung began selling its QLED TVs and established
a licensing partnership with other manufacturers, which is why you’ll findQLED TVs from Sony, Vizio, Hisense, and TCL.As cool as quantum dots are, a QLED TV still produces light more or less the same way as a regular LED TV — by using a backlight made up of hundreds (or in some cases thousands) of LEDs, which sits behind a traditional LCD panel. It’s these LEDs that give LED (and QLED) TV its name.Curiously, it’s this use of QLED as a marketing term that started a war between LG and Samsung in 2019. In a complaint to South Korea’s Fair Trade Commission (FTC), LG claimed that Samsung’s so-called QLED TVs aren’t real QLED TVs at all. That’s because according to LG, a true QLED TV would use quantum dot LEDs that emit their own light, and not the quantum-dot-film-over-an-LED-backlight that Samsung uses.
In a retaliatory move, Samsung told the FTC it was unhappy with all of the ads LG had been running, which attacked Samsung’s QLED TVs.
The FTC ultimately took Samsung’s side, but with a stipulation: It must make it clear in
future advertisements that its QLED TVs use a backlight.
The LCD panel — essentially millions of tiny shutters that open and close too quickly to see — in conjunction with color filters, creates the picture you see by letting just the right amount of light and color escape and reach your eyes. It’s a clever system, but it relies on a combination of dimming the LED backlights and using the shutters to block the remaining light to produce accurate on-screen blacks, and it doesn’t always succeed. We’ll discuss
this more below.
What is OLED?
OLED stands for Organic Light-Emitting Diode. Somewhat surprisingly, the “Light Emitting-Diode” part of that name has nothing to do with an LED backlight as it does with QLED and
LED TVs. Instead, it refers to the fact that every single pixel in an OLED TV is also a teeny, tiny LED light — but one that is incredibly thin and can produce both light and color in a single element. In other words, OLED TVs don’t need a backlight because each pixel produces its own light. If you want to impress your friends, you can use the industry termsfor these kinds of displays: “Emissive,” or “self-emissive.”
There are several advantages to this design, but most would agree that when it comes to OLED TVs, the biggest advantage is the superb black level that can be achieved. Unlike a QLED or LED TV that must dim its backlight and block what remains for dark scenes, an OLED TV simply turns off the pixel. When the pixel is off, it emits no light and no color, making it as dark as when the TV itself is turned off. With no separate backlight, it’s also alot easier to make an OLED screen flexible, which is why OLED pioneer LG has developed
several OLED TVs that roll up (or down) to disappear entirely.
Only one company currently makes OLED TV panels: LG Display. It sells those panels to its sister company, LG Electronics, which uses them to build some of the very best TVs you can buy. But LG Display also sells OLED panels to companies like Sony, Philips, and Panasonic, which is why you’ll see OLED TVs from these companies too. Even though the panels themselves are essentially identical, the image processing that Sony, LG, and others do is proprietary, so you’ll still see significant differences in picture quality from one OLED TV to another.What about mini-LED?
In late 2019, TCL started selling the 8-Series — the very first QLED TVs powered by a mini-LED backlighting system. Mini-LEDs are tiny when compared to regular LEDs. This means that a QLED TV that could normally only accommodate hundreds of LEDs, can now accommodate tens of thousands of mini-LEDs. The result? Way more control over backlighting, leading to black levels that come far closer to OLED than any non-OLED display has ever achieved.Mini-LED is still in its infancy, but if TCL and other companies continue to improve it (which they no doubt will) the technology has the potential to greatly improve QLED picture quality with pricing that should be considerably less than OLED.
QLED vs OLED.
Now that you know what all those letters stand for, and what they mean in terms of display technology, let’s compare QLED to OLED in the categories that matter most when buying a TV: Brightness, contrast, viewing angles and other notable performance considerations, like response time and lifespan — all important factors when you’re shelling out up to $6,000 for a top-of-the-line TV.
Black levels and contrastContrast is the difference between the darkest part of an image and the brightest part. If a TV can deliver a truly black dark portion, it doesn’t have to make the bright parts quite as bright to achieve good levels of contrast. That’s why, when it comes to black levels, OLED reigns as the undisputed champion — because of its ability to go completely blackwhen it needs to.QLED TVs (ahem) by contrast, are forced to dim their LED backlights and block the remaining light, something that is very hard to do perfectly. It can trigger something called “light bleed,” as the light spills onto what’s supposed to be a black section of the screen.But is it noticeable? Definitely. If you’re watching an intense action movie and two characters are running through a parking lot at night, for example, you may notice a slight glow on parts of the scene that are supposed to be pitch black, or in the letterbox bars at the top and bottom of the screen while watching a movie that uses a wider-than-16:9 aspect ratio.As we highlighted earlier, mini-LED backlights are one way QLED TV makers are trying to improve this situation. It has real potential, but we’re not quite ready to declare it an OLED-killer.For now, OLED comes out on top; if a pixel isn’t getting electricity, it doesn’t produce anylight and therefore stays totally black.
Winner: OLED
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