Last year’s OLED TVs were about pure performance; this year, there’s a bigger differentiator

I have covered the OLED TV market since the technology came to consumer TVs many moons ago. There has been plenty of attention-grabbing stuff to write about in all that time, but I have to say the past three years have brought some of the most interesting.

In that time, we've seen LG Display's cutting-edge Micro Lens Array (MLA) technology launch and then go to the big TV farm in the sky, seemingly in the blink of an eye, after being replaced by the firm's Primary RGB Tandem OLED tech.

And all while Samsung has been improving its Quantum Dot OLED (QD-OLED) tech, helping it and Sony develop some of the best OLED TVs we have tested – as proved by the Sony Bravia 8 II, which won our hallowed Product of the Year accolade last year and is described by our TV and AV editor, Tom Parsons, as “the best OLED [he’s] ever reviewed, period.”

And I expected this trend – where boosting performance on key metrics including peak and operating brightness, colour volume and accuracy and AI-powered upscaling is king – to continue in 2026.

But at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas this week, where big names including Samsung and LG show off new TVs, this wasn’t the case – at least not entirely.

Yes, there was a lot of chat about AI – of course – and the standard gumph about X per cent improved brightness levels during every briefing we attended.

But there was no silver-bullet next-generation OLED panel technology to be seen, or talk about holistically “new” stuff. It was all refinements on what has come before.

Surprising? No. Companies can move only so fast, and I have been amazed at the amount of “next-generation” OLED panel tech recently. So it makes sense that LG Display is honing, rather than starting from scratch.

Instead, future-looking home cinema fans were fed a wealth of new information on companies’ plans for RGB Mini LED, the panel technology set to take on OLED when it launches later this year.

That, though, doesn’t mean there aren’t big changes coming to OLED in 2026. It’s just that they aren’t as focused on performance – at least from what we’ve seen so far.

Instead, it was the Samsung S95H and LG W6 OLED that caught the What Hi-Fi?team's eye at the show. In our mind, they offer the biggest hint on where the technology is going in 2026.

These sets reveal LG’s and Samsung’s new focus on improving OLED TVs’ designs as much as their performance.

The S95H, for example, has a completely new design that, Samsung told our senior staff writer, Lewis Empson, at the show, aims to give it more “lifestyle” appeal.

Lewis even went so far as to describe it as “being clearly inspired by The Frame”, a range of sets that Samsung has long pushed to more casual movie fans, who don’t want a TV dominating their lounge’s feng shui.

It even includes a Samsung One Connect wireless box, so there is no ugly tangle of cables disfiguring the look when the set is wall mounted.

LG, while sticking to a more traditional look with the LG G6 it unveiled at CES, clearly agrees that there is a market for discreet, picture frame-like OLEDs, as it unveiled the LG W6 alongside its new flagship.

The W series isn’t new, but what makes this interesting is its focus on offering the same flagship performance as the G6, while giving buyers a more discreet “wallpaper-like” design.

It’s clear, then, that both Samsung and LG think consumers want flagship-level OLED TV performance, in a sleeker, more discreet, lifestyle package.

While we need to test both sets to confirm if they are worth buying, my gut tells me both companies may be right.

Lifestyle TVs aren’t anything new, and I know a lot of people are drawn to them – a fact demonstrated by the constant questions I get about Samsung’s The Frame range from friends and family every year.

I have never been able to recommend them, though, as there have been performance issues that go beyond their picture quality, which is middling at best and well below what you’ll get on equivalently priced OLEDs.

This, along with the premium that the lifestyle design adds to their price tag, makes them a tough sell, even if you’re only a casual movie fan.

The price issue probably won’t be fixed with this year’s models, but I have high hopes that the performance element might be. And if it is, I can see many cash-flush movie fans being drawn to the new lifestyle models and willing to pay the premium for their wireless, aesthetic charms.

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