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OLED vs LED vs MiniLED vs. LCD: What's the Best? – CNET

Posted on October 12, 2023

OLED vs LED vs MiniLED vs. LCD: What's the Best? - CNET

We’re in a golden age of TV tech. There’s everything from quantum dots to massive screen sizes, all for less than budget TVs from little more than a decade ago. If you’re buying a TV for the first time in a while, or maybe the first time at all, there’s a confusing bombardment of acronyms and abbreviations, all conspiring to hide what’s truly good, and bad, about a TV.

For the discerning, or fugal, viewer, what’s the best option? OLED gets all the hype, but what’s mini about Mini-LED? What’s the difference between QLED and ULED? What TV technology produces the best picture with movies? Games? What’s the best looking overall?

While there are standouts with every technology, as well as significant pros and cons, we can make some generalizations. Certain technologies are better than others, sometimes at just a few things, some times for a lot of things. Finding the right TV for you is a matter of balancing these strengths and weakness for your specific needs. First, though, we need to figure out what those strengths and weaknesses actually are.  

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” overridecredit=”Samsung” linktext=”Check out the best OLED and QD-OLED TVs” linkurl=”https://www.cnet.com/tech/home-entertainment/best-tv/” usepricing=”true” data-key=”cnetlisticle__6bf828c0-48ee-4efe-a2f8-b4c82ccfe5cf” position=”1″ contenttype=”News” filtershortcodetypes=”” totalfilteritems=”0″ pagelayout=”Default – Article Page w/ original publish date” showdetails=”true” tocheadlineitem=”[object Object]” class=”c-shortcodeListicle g-border-thin-light-top g-inner-spacing-bottom-medium g-inner-spacing-left-large g-inner-spacing-right-large g-outer-spacing-bottom-large g-border-thin-light-bottom g-border-thin-light-right g-border-thin-light-left”>

Two Samsung QD-OLED TVs side by side
Samsung

OLED and QD-OLED

Best for picture quality, but pricey

Pros:

  • Excellent overall picture quality
  • Excellent contrast ratio

Cons:

  • Not quite as bright as some technologies
  • Potential for image retention
  • Cost

For the best overall picture quality, most experts agree that OLED is the winner. The combination of perfect black levels and a bright image make images pop in a way other technologies can’t quite match.

The latest “flavor” of OLED, called QD-OLED, pairs it with quantum dots. This can improve the color and brightness even more than traditional OLED. These QD-OLEDs are some of the most expensive TVs per-inch on the market, but they’re quite impressive.

On the down side, there’s the potential of image retention. If you watch the same thing all day (cable news, the same video game), the static parts of the screen can “stick.” Typically this goes away when you watch something else, but if you only watch one channel for hours at a time, OLED’s not for you.

Learn more about QD-OLED.

Check out the best OLED and QD-OLED TVs.

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The Sony X95L uses an improved Mini-LED backlight and is only available in a massive 85-inch size.

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The Sony X95L uses an improved Mini-LED backlight and is only available in a massive 85-inch size.

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The Sony X95L uses an improved Mini-LED backlight and is only available in a massive 85-inch size.

","imageCredit":"Candice Greene/CNET","imageDoNotCrop":false,"imageDoNotResize":false,"imageWatermark":false,"imageFilename":"p1100445-00-04-09-20-still001.jpg","imageDateCreated":"2023/02/23","imageWidth":3840,"imageHeight":2160,"imageParallax":"","imageCrop":"","imageEnlarge":false}” overridecaption=”

The Sony X95L uses an improved Mini-LED backlight and is only available in a massive 85-inch size.

” overridecredit=”Candice Greene/CNET” linktext=”Check out the best Mini-LED TVs.” linkurl=”https://www.cnet.com/tech/home-entertainment/best-tv/” usepricing=”true” data-key=”cnetlisticle__ebacdf3e-d30a-4163-aa63-0310835ce834″ position=”2″ contenttype=”News” filtershortcodetypes=”” totalfilteritems=”0″ pagelayout=”Default – Article Page w/ original publish date” showdetails=”true” tocheadlineitem=”[object Object]” class=”c-shortcodeListicle g-border-thin-light-top g-inner-spacing-bottom-medium g-inner-spacing-left-large g-inner-spacing-right-large g-outer-spacing-bottom-large g-border-thin-light-bottom g-border-thin-light-right g-border-thin-light-left”>

p1100445-00-04-09-20-still001
Candice Greene/CNET

Mini-LED

Big, bright, with a great image, though not quite as good as OLED

Pros:

  • Bright images
  • Great contrast
  • Huge screens

Cons: 

  • Not quite as good as OLED
  • More expensive than some other tech

Technically, Mini-LED is an evolution from LED LCDs. They both use LEDs to create light and an LCD layer to create an image. The difference is the size and number of LEDs. Mini-LED has a LOT more LEDs, and they’re a lot smaller. This might not seem like a huge difference, but it’s enough to warrant a different entry on this list.

The main issue with LED LCDs is their contrast ratio isn’t as good as OLED. As such, the picture isn’t quite as good. Mini-LEDs, like all local dimming LED LCDs, can improve their contrast ratio by dimming certain areas of the screen so dark areas can appear darker. The problem with that is even the best local dimming zone was still a fairly large area of the screen. So a small bright object on a dark background, a streetlight say, would raise the level of the surrounding dark area, making it appear gray. While engineers have done a lot over the years to minimize this problem, it persists. It has to, it’s just physics.

With Mini-LED, a greater number of smaller LEDs are spread across the back of the TV. In most cases these greatly reduce the size of the local dimming zone, so to a casual viewer the contrast ratio is fantastic. Not per-pixel perfect like OLED, but close enough. Mini-LED TVs can also produce some extremely bright images, which can be handy for daytime viewing in brighter rooms. There’s also basically no chance of image retention, so for gamers worried about marring their OLED screens, Mini-LED is a great alternative. 

The downside?  Mini-LEDs are more expensive than their lesser LED LCD counterparts, though they’re usually cheaper than OLED. 

Learn more about Mini-LED.

Check out the best Mini-LED TVs..

Related on CNET

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” overridecredit=”TCL” linktext=”Check out the best TVs that won’t break your budget.” linkurl=”https://www.cnet.com/tech/home-entertainment/best-4k-tv/” usepricing=”true” data-key=”cnetlisticle__d85baed7-6aee-481a-b551-b8d80fb5d1ad” position=”3″ contenttype=”News” filtershortcodetypes=”” totalfilteritems=”0″ pagelayout=”Default – Article Page w/ original publish date” showdetails=”true” tocheadlineitem=”[object Object]” class=”c-shortcodeListicle g-border-thin-light-top g-inner-spacing-bottom-medium g-inner-spacing-left-large g-inner-spacing-right-large g-outer-spacing-bottom-large g-border-thin-light-bottom g-border-thin-light-right g-border-thin-light-left”>

The TCL Q8 TV seen from the front.
TCL

LED, QLED, LED LCD (and everything else)

Inexpensive, with lots of screen sizes

Pros:

  • Inexpensive
  • Widest variety of screen sizes

Cons:

  • Picture quality a step behind the other technologies

Every TV on the market that’s not OLED is based on LCD technology. That includes Mini-LED that we separated out above, as well as LED, QLED, QNED, ULED, and so on. Currently the oldest TV tech still in production, LCD TVs have been around for over 20 years. Improvements to their size, brightness, and overall picture quality have been impressive, but they still lag behind OLED. Whatever the LED LCD “flavor,” they all use some amount of LEDs to create light, and then an LCD layer to create the image. 

The main benefit to LED LCDs is cost. They’re extremely inexpensive to produce in a wide range of sizes. OLED can’t match that flexibility. Thanks to decades of improvements, even budget LCD TVs look quite good, often far better than the better TVs from 10+ years ago. Many LED LCDs use quantum dots (that’s where the “Q” comes from in their naming), like their more-expensive counterparts, to boost brightness and color.

The downside is you can get better picture quality, sometimes a lot better, with one of the other TV technologies. Better contrast, better and deeper color, higher brightness, and more, all give the other techs more “wow.” That “wow” is going to cost you, though. 

Learn more about LED local dimming technology.

Check out the best TVs that won’t break your budget..

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” overridecredit=”Geoffrey Morrison/CNET” linktext=”Learn more about microLED” linkurl=”https://www.cnet.com/tech/home-entertainment/wall-sized-million-dollar-microled-tvs-point-to-the-future-of-television/” usepricing=”true” data-key=”cnetlisticle__ffed5287-e560-4bdd-bf0d-222e2522c66c” position=”4″ contenttype=”News” filtershortcodetypes=”” totalfilteritems=”0″ pagelayout=”Default – Article Page w/ original publish date” showdetails=”true” tocheadlineitem=”[object Object]” class=”c-shortcodeListicle g-border-thin-light-top g-inner-spacing-bottom-medium g-inner-spacing-left-large g-inner-spacing-right-large g-outer-spacing-bottom-large g-border-thin-light-bottom g-border-thin-light-right g-border-thin-light-left”>

nanosys-factory-tour-32-of-38
Geoffrey Morrison/CNET

Future tech

Someday…

There are two techs on the horizon worth mentioning. Neither compete with the above technologies for TVs right now, but they might in the near future.

The first is direct-view quantum dots, aka NanoLED. These skip LED and OLED completely, using just quantum dots to make up an image. The tech is promising, with the potential for incredible picture quality. It’s still in the development stages, though, so don’t expect it for a few years. We saw some behind-the-scenes research on it recently.

The other is MicroLED. These are displays where each individual pixel is its own LED. With LED LCDs there are somewhere between a few dozen and a few thousand LED that create the light so you can see an image. With MicroLED, each pixel is an LED, so there’s millions of them. Right now this tech is exclusively in the giant display realm, more of a projector replacement than a TV replacement. As the tech matures it’s possible we’ll see more TV-sized MicroLEDs (if “TV sized” means 100-inches to you). The tech is quite expensive and energy intensive, so like NanoLED, don’t expect a 65-inch MicroLED at your local Best Buy anytime soon. 

Learn more about NanoLED. Check out where quantum dots are made. 

Learn more about microLED.

As well as covering TV and other display tech, Geoff does photo tours of cool museums and locations around the world, including nuclear submarines, massive aircraft carriers, medieval castles, epic 10,000-mile road trips, and more. Check out Tech Treks for all his tours and adventures.

He wrote a bestselling sci-fi novel about city-size submarines and a sequel. You can follow his adventures on Instagram and his YouTube channel.

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