Best TVs of 2025
Ranked by our critic's grades, best first.
The 2025 televisions, seven of them, ranked by critic grade. One thread is brightness, where OLED stopped conceding to Mini LED: LG's four-layer tandem stack, Samsung's QD-OLED, and Sony's move to a quantum dot panel. The other is the matte glare free coating on both the Samsung OLED and the Samsung LCD.
LG G5 OLED is the year's one S. Its four-stack tandem panel reaches roughly 2,200 nits calibrated without a micro lens array and runs 165Hz on all four inputs. It listed at $3,399 and fell fast. Five A grades follow. LG C5 OLED is the safest recommendation of 2025, a refined C4 with the widest size range of any OLED, bought on a markdown rather than at list. TCL QM8K brings flagship brightness and dimming to $2,199 with a short fault list that stays visible. Samsung S95F QD-OLED is the brightest OLED anyone sells, behind a matte screen and still without Dolby Vision. Sony Bravia 8 II has the most accurate picture Sony has made, in two sizes with two full bandwidth HDMI inputs.
Samsung QN90F Neo QLED takes a B as Samsung's best bright room LCD, at a $2,499 price that invites an OLED comparison. Samsung QN990F Neo QLED 8K takes the year's only C, wireless, $5,499 for the 65-inch, with essentially no native 8K content to show.
LG G5 OLEDThe four-stack tandem panel ended the brightness argument between OLED and Mini LED, without needing a lens array to do it.Read the review
LG C5 OLEDThe safest television recommendation of 2025, and the one to buy on a markdown rather than at list.
Panasonic Z95BThe colorist's OLED, tuned for accuracy above all
Samsung S95F QD-OLEDThe brightest OLED anyone sells, behind a matte screen that makes a sunlit room stop mattering.
TCL QM8KFlagship brightness and flagship dimming for mid range money, with a short fault list that stays visible.
Sony Bravia 8 IIThe most accurate picture Sony has made, on a set that still ships with two gaming inputs in 2025.
Samsung QN90F Neo QLEDSamsung's best bright room LCD, with a matte screen that kills glare and a price that invites an OLED comparison.
TCL QM9KAbout as bright as a television has ever been measured, sold at flagship money with the same two fast inputs as the cheap ones.
Sony Bravia 5Sony's mid-range Mini LED leans on class-leading processing rather than raw brightness, and only two of four HDMI ports hit 4K120.
TCL QM6KMini LED contrast and a native 144Hz panel for what a plain LED television used to cost, with the brightness that price implies.