Hands on: Hisense UR8 review

Hisense wants to be the RGB Mini LED brand. It came out swinging with the 116-inch UXQ last year to kick off its new range with a bang, and now it's bringing a duo of more reasonably sized models with the next generation panel tech to the market.

The UR9 sits at the top of its conventional TV lineup, and it aims to offer movie fans a brighter panel and a better sound system, so you'd think that would be what caught my eye during a trip to Munich, Germany, with the brand. But, at the event I found myself gravitating towards the step-down model instead.

Upon announcing the new panel technology, I began gearing myself up to report on sky-high prices that echo the early days of OLED and QLED, and yet, Hisense is determined to bring this new panel tech to the masses, and I think the UR8 will be the TV to do just that.

The TV sits below the two flagship RGB Mini LEDs mentioned above, and yet it offers a lot of the same features and on-paper performance benefits. My brief run-in with the TV left a strong first impression, and while we'll need to test it in our dedicated AV testing facility to settle on a final verdict, I do have a few early thoughts to share.

Price

Pricing hasn't been revealed for the UR8 quite yet, but we're under the impression that it will be fairly competitive. Hisense promises that pricing information should come soon, and the TV itself is currently slated to launch in the first half of this year.

It'll be available in five sizes when it launches, including a few more "average" living room-friendly ones, such as 55- and 65-inches. XL TV fans are, of course, still catered for, with Hisense also offering this TV in 75-, 85- and 100-inch sizes.

In terms of competition, it looks as though the UR8 will be going up against Philips' new mid-range RGB Mini LED, the MLED981, and Samsung is slated to launch a step-down RGB Mini LED model later this year, too.

Build

The UR8 isn't the flashiest TV I've ever seen, but the build is solid, stylish and slender at just 58mm in width. That's fairly slick by backlit TV standards.

Furthermore, it features a centralised pedestal stand, meaning you won't have to worry about obtaining a wide media unit to accommodate this TV. We saw the UR8 in its 75-inch screen size, and it featured this style of stand; however the very largest screen sizes may differ.

Hisense has also bundled in its button-heavy solar-powered remote. While it may look a little old school next to the slick minimalist remotes included with most TVs these days, we actually appreciate that every function has a dedicated button rather than having to remember a bunch of short cuts and long presses to access simple things like the input menu.

Features

It should come as no surprise that the headlining feature of the UR8 is the new RGB Mini LED panel technology. Hisense says that it delivers purer and more vibrant colours, and the Chinese AV giant has even achieved certification from colour-validating powerhouse Pantone.

Brightness is also a key benefit of the RGB Mini LED panel technology, and Hisense claims that the UR8 can reach a peak brightness of 3500 nits. That's below the 4000 nit figure quoted by Hisense for the UR9 step-up model, but it's still an impressive figure.

This new panel is being driven by the company's HiView AI Engine RGB processor, which has been specifically designed with the RGB Mini LED panel technology in mind.

Furthermore, this has to be one of the best-equipped TVs for gamers that we've ever come across. The UR8 sports a 180Hz panel, which tops the 165Hz limit we've seen on recent sets from LG, Samsung and Philips. On top of that is the inclusion of four full-bandwidth HDMI 2.1 sockets, all of which support VRR and ALLM, with one socket doubling as HDMI eARC.

Hisense hopes that you won't need to use that HDMI eARC socket, though, as the built-in 2.1.2 channel speaker system, which supports Dolby Atmos, has been tuned by Devialet to reportedly deliver punchy, immersive cinematic sound.

Vidaa remains on board for all of your streaming needs, and while this isn't our favourite operating system on the market, we find that it covers a majority of the available streaming apps, based on our experience from using it on other Hisense TVs and projectors.

Last, and by no means least, the UR8 will be among the first Hisense TVs to gain Dolby Vision 2 support. Despite being announced as a launch partner back at IFA 2025, Hisense doesn't seem entirely sure when Dolby Vision 2 is coming to its TVs; however, it insinuated that it will be added via an over-the-air update after the TV's launch. It will also support HDR10, HDR10+ and HLG.

Picture

Unfortunately, Hisense didn't demo any real-world content on the UR8, but we did see a looping demo in the TV's dynamic picture setting.

While that's not ideal for assessing what the TV is like when watching movies and TV shows, it did give us a good idea of what the RGB Mini LED panel technology is capable of.

Furthermore, the content shown seemed fairly low-resolution to my eyes, which introduced some unfair banding and haloing around bright and colourful content on black backgrounds.

I will therefore reiterate that these hands-on impressions won't reflect the verdict from our future full review of the UR8.

That all being said, Hisense seems to have delivered on its promise of delivering rich, pure and vibrant colours based on this early look, as every shade pops on this display.

Reds, blues, greens, yellows, pinks and purples all appear rich and vivid, and while this will likely be reining in for an authentic cinematic experience, it's an eye-catching demonstration of the capabilities of RGB Mini LED.

These look especially effective against dark backgrounds, as the UR8 seems to deliver some seriously convincing black levels for a backlit TV. This is thanks to the RGB Mini LED system's more advanced backlight control, which should address the my, and the wider What Hi-Fi? team's, biggest issue with "traditional" Mini LED sets.

I couldn't test other crucial picture performance aspects, especially including motion, during this session, so you'll have to wait until our full review to discover if the UR8 can nail the majour pillars of picture performance.

Sound

I'll keep this short and sweet. Despite highlighting the UR8's Devialet-tuned 2.1.2 channel sound system, Hisense didn't actually demo it during the event.

However, based on the team I's experiences with last year's U8Q, we have fairly high expectations. We found that the U8Q delivered a powerful, spacious and cinematic sound, and while the bass could have been a bit more controlled, we ultimately deemed it to be a rather impressive built-in sound system.

Early verdict

It's too early to decide on a verdict for the UR8, but this TV is certainly worth watching out for based on what I've seen so far, combined with the on-paper specs.

It touts the latest panel technology. superb gaming specs, a high-spec sound system and plenty of software smarts, so as long as Hisense can nail the price, it could be on to a winner.

As a team, we're eagerly awaiting both of Hisense's RGB Mini LED models to land in our home cinema testing room, so check back soon for a full review.

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