Adventures in AV: I'm about to review LG's latest flagship OLED – and I have one big request

Wondering when we’re going to review the LG G6 OLED TV? Then I have some good news.

A 65-inch LG G6 is sitting in our test rooms right now, plonked next to its predecessor, the LG G5, and our current Product of the Year winner, the Sony Bravia 8 II.

Yes, I’m primed to start running them through our rigorous comparative testing process on Monday morning.

And while I’m 99 per cent excited, thanks to the firm’s step down model, the LG C6, impressing when we tested it a few weeks ago, there’s a tiny part of my brain that’s slightly worried.

Why am I worried, and moaning in general, when I’m about to get paid to play with (review) one of 2026’s most exciting TVs?

Well, it's because I wasn’t the biggest fan of last year’s LG G5.

In fact, if you read our coverage last year, then you’ll know that when we ran a head-to-head test with nearly all of last year’s flagship TVs, including the LG G5, Samsung S95F, Sony Bravia 8 II and Panasonic Z95B, I liked it the least.

While I stand by our five-star review, as the set is holistically great, it was the worst offender for a personal bugbear of mine with modern TVs: its bombastic focus on constantly showing how punchy and bright it could go

Yes, of all the flagship sets in the shootout, the LG G5's image felt the least finessed.

I said as much in a separate op-ed at the time, where I reported a particularly hazardous moment running a scene on our Dune: Part 2 4K Blu-ray test disc: “The image lacked finesse, with the TV raising the brightness across the entire panel, rather than limiting its efforts to the sections it was meant to.

"This is an issue I usually experience on Mini LED sets, which have to charge sections, or zones, of a backlight, but not OLEDs, which offer pixel-level light control. This hindered dynamic range, and the sheer aggressiveness of the continuous jumps in the peaks meant that I found myself wincing.”

Pretty damning stuff and further proof that, as I’ve said multiple times before, TV makers’ current focus on selling a high peak and operating brightness (nit count) as a primary metric for screen quality is misguided.

If you want an “as the director intended” experience, there are far more ingredients to consider: colour volume, colour accuracy, motion handling, and dark detail, to name a few. Just going bright isn’t good enough.

And because of that, I’m hoping LG’s toned things down with the G6 for 2026.

This is especially important as all evidence suggests we’re going to see far fewer new flagship OLEDs appear, thanks to Panasonic selling its European TV business and Sony "partnering" with TCL – a firm which famously thinks Mini LED is better than OLED.

So, if the LG G6 doesn't cut the mustard, buyers hunting for a good new flagship OLED may be out of luck.

Thankfully, despite my minor concern, there is plenty of evidence to suggest LG has learned its lesson.

Yes, the firm did make a big deal about the G6 going 20 per cent brighter than the G5 when it unveiled the TV at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas in January.

But when we talked to LG representatives at the show, they were equally eager to talk about the refinements it has made to let the G6 deliver a “more lifelike” picture.

Here’s hoping the work’s paid off, as it did on the LG C6. I’ll be finding out next week, regardless.

If you have any questions about the set, drop them in the comments below, or on our social media channels and forums, and I’ll endeavour to get you an answer.

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