The best TV in 2023: our top picks from LG, Samsung, Sony, TCL, Vizio and more
We’ve found the best TVs for you, with the best budget options along with 4K and 8K TVs
1. The list in brief
2. Best OLED TV
3. Best QLED TV
4. Best QD-OLED TV
5. Best value TV
6. Best gaming TV
7. Best mid-range TV
8. Best Roku TV
9. Best 8K TV
10. Best Hisense TV
11. Best Vizio TV
12. Best budget OLED
13. Best outdoor TV
14. TV lab test data
15. How to choose
16. How we test
Finding the best TV shouldn't be a full-time job. Our list of the best TVs you can buy will help you get the set that delivers the best performance for your money. We test all the top TVs each year — close to four dozen of them — and these are the 4K TVs that we recommend.
Because TV technology evolves fast, we're frequently updating this guide to keep up with the latest and greatest models, whether that's a QLED TV from Samsung, an OLED from LG or Sony, or a Mini-LED TV from the likes of Hisense or TCL.
To that end, we want you to get the whole package when buying something new: great picture quality, rich sound, and all of the smart features available today, and it would be nice to save a buck or two while you're at it.
So what are the best TVs available now? The LG G3 OLED is now the best TV that we've tested. Not only is it the best OLED TV thanks to an impressive display panel, but a premium design, maximum versatility and great smart TV platform hit all the high marks, too. Why not the new LG C3 OLED? It's a great option for gamers, but we think that the LG G3 delivers a better overall picture.
With so many new TVs coming onto the market this month, we've been reviewing them as they become available and we'll be adding them to the list below when they've cleared our tests and proven that they deserve a spot on the list.
My name's Nick and I look after our guides to the best TVs, best OLED TVs and best 4K TVs. Most of my day is spent watching and evaluating new screens from LG, Samsung, Sony, Hisense, TCL and Vizio. I have 10 years of experience in AV, and before I joined Tom's Guide I was formerly the Senior Editor, TV and AV at TechRadar. I love helping people find the perfect TV, so please feel free to reach out over email or tag me on Twitter and I can help you out.
The best TV in 2023: a visual guide
Why you can trust Tom's Guide Our writers and editors spend hours analyzing and reviewing products, services, and apps to help find what's best for you. Find out more about how we test, analyze, and rate.
The quick list
Here's a quick overview of the best TVs you can buy right now based on our testing and reviews. And keep up on scrolling if you want to see our in-depth analysis of all the top TVs for every budget.
The best OLED is also the brightest
The LG G3 is one of the brightest OLED TVs on the market, and its visuals are eye-catching no matter what you want to watch. Only a few tiny flaws, including its sound and less-than-cutting-edge HDR color, keep it from perfection.
The 4K QLED TV to beat in 2023
The Samsung QN90C Neo QLED TV brings the best-in-class HDR brightness, ample viewing options and strong picture performance into a single package.
The best value TV
The TCL 5-Series Google TV (S546) wowed us with its solid performance and great value for your dollar. The move to Google TV gives the affordable 4K smart TV a more premium smart TV platform.
Sony's QD-OLED really shines
The Sony A95K OLED is the first TV to combine OLED with quantum dots, resulting in a QD-OLED TV that offers the best of both panel types: superior color, brightness, and contrast in a single package.
The best gaming TV
We loved the Hisense U7H. It was able to deliver an excellent all-around image quality in its price range, plus it includes gaming-focused features like VRR, ALLM, and Dolby Vision Gaming. Gamers will be happy with this set.
The best mid-range TV
The TCL 6-Series Roku TV costs under $1,000, but with superior brightness and gaming capabilities, no one who watches it will ever know. If you’re looking for one of the best TVs you can find for less, this one is an excellent place to start.
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The best Roku TV
In addition to delivering a ton of screen and content for its starting price of $499, the Roku Plus TVs also give you surprisingly good picture quality and sound, two things that are usually the first to go with budget sets.
The best 8K TV
Samsung's QN900C Neo QLED 8K TV is the most premium television the company has delivered to date, reaching new heights in terms of design and performance, making it one of the best 8K TVs you can buy right now.
The best Hisense TV
The Hisense U8K Mini-LED TV is all about bringing high-end features to a mid-level price bracket. Its peak brightness exceeds any TV around that price, and its color reproduction is as good as some of this year’s best TVs.
The best Vizio TV
The Vizio M-Series Quantum X brings the best of Vizio’s top-performing TV to a budget price point. It’s a solid gaming TV, but you might notice some issues with upscaling and color banding.
The best budget OLED TV
The LG A2 OLED isn't as bright as the LG C2 or G2, but it offers a colorful picture and fairly strong audio along with a slick interface.
The best outdoor TV
The new SunBriteTV Veranda 3 stands above the competition by offering a performance that's worthy of plenty of indoor 4K TVs. It's not cheap, but if you're after a 4K outdoor TV, look here first.
Best OLED TV
Specifications
Reasons to buy
Reasons to avoid
✅ Outstanding brightness: The G3’s peak brightness of 1,361 nits puts it solidly in LED territory — no other OLED TV set comes close.
✅ Great for gamers and sports fans: 120Hz native refresh rate with four HDMI 2.1 ports makes this great for both gamers and sports fans alike. This set pairs well with the PS5 and Xbox Series X.
✅ Alpha 9 Gen 6 Processor 4K: LG's top processor provides excellent upcaling of HD content to Ultra HD, along with great motion processing.
❌ HDR color could be better: The G3 only manages to reproduce around 96.73% of the UHDA-P3 color space. That’s still good, but it represents a noticeable drop-off compared to other OLED TVs on this list that cover 99%.
❌Sound quality is lackluster: With a 4.2-channel 60W speaker system and Dolby Atmos, the set doesn’t sound bad, but it also doesn’t quite sound good.
📺 The LG G3 OLED TV is a spectacular TV. If you have the money to buy one of the best TVs out there, the LG OLED evo G3 should absolutely be on your shortlist — and maybe even at the very top of it.. ★★★★
1. The best 4K TVs
2. The best OLED TVs
3. Best LG TVs
What you need to know
The LG OLED evo G3, commonly known as the LG G3 OLED, offers the best of all worlds: It’s an OLED TV, so you get perfect blacks, infinite contrast, and intense colors, but it also boasts astonishing brightness that guarantees you won’t miss out on the full impact of the thrilling HDR effects so essential to movies today. Plus, it uses LG’s thoroughly refined webOS smart platform; it has a good remote control; and it’s gorgeous to look at — a true showpiece that will grace your wall as smartly and stylishly as higher-end framed artwork.
Design: From the front, the LG G3 OLED looks both similar to and more striking than most OLED TVs. The ultra-sleek panel is ornamented only by the single-piece IR receiver and power light at the bottom center. The only other visual feature is the bezel, which because it’s both incredibly slim (less than one-sixteenth of an inch) and silver rather than the usual black or dark gray, makes the G3 look as though it’s framed with light even when it’s turned off. Like Samsung The Frame, the G3 is intended to be mounted on the wall, with LG’s “One Wall” design reinforcing that in its every particular
Performance: Besides the OLED panel, LG touts its “Brightness Booster Max” feature as the G3’s main picture selling point (one not available on other LG sets), claiming that it “produces up to 70% brighter images” than “non-OLED evo B3 models.” But does it? Not having yet tested the B3, we can’t say for sure, but the G3’s picture is, conservatively, spectacular and much brighter than the LG C3 OLED we reviewed earlier this year.
Everything we watched on it looked sumptuous. Both the high-flying action scenes and the more intimate moments of Top Gun: Maverick popped off the screen with equal power and clarity. The interiors of Denis Villeneuve’s Dune looked just as haunted as the sands of Arrakis, with shimmering depths of color and shadow visible in each.
Smart TV: All LG 2022 TVs ship with webOS 23, an interface that gathers content on a whole-screen home page. The interface feels mostly the same from the other best LG TVs from last year, but with added user profiles for curating recommendations and keeping each user’s relevant content in reach. When nothing’s being watched, the LG 2023 TV Always Ready tool is an ambient mode that displays art, photos or a music player.
Value for money: The LG G3 OLED is the latest entry in LG’s “Gallery Series” of TVs at the very top of its 4K OLED lineup in terms of pricing and technology (i.e. it's one of the most expensive 4K TVs on the market). It's worth it, but the price will hurt.
Read the full review: LG G3 OLED
Attributes | Notes | Rating |
---|---|---|
Price | The pinnacle of price and performance. | ★★★★☆ |
Design | A familiar, yet stunning piece of hardware. | ★★★★★ |
Performance | Better and brighter picture than previous OLEDs. | ★★★★☆ |
Smart TV | Content-rich interface with curated recommendations . | ★★★★★ |
The best QLED TV
Specifications
Reasons to buy
Reasons to avoid
✅ You want better brightness than OLED: OLED is the king of contrast, but any ambient light can wash out the picture. Samsung's QLED TVs can handle more ambient light than almost any other TV because of its high peak brightness.
✅ Eye-popping colors and clarity: Yes brightness is important to counter glare, but it's also important in color reproduction and clarity. Better brightness, brighter colors.
✅ Great for gamers: Most TVs on this list are great for gamers, but the Samsung QN90C might be one of the best for PS5 and Xbox Series X due to its low input lag.
❌ You care about Dolby Vision: Dolby Vision is, by far, the best HDR format. It's tuned to match the brightness and black levels of each individual scene, so not having it on a TV this nice is a bummer.
❌ You're afraid of your TV tipping over: The central stand doesn’t offer as much stability as we typically expect. Samsung transitioned to a hexagonal base design that uses less space, but that seems to have come at a cost.
📺 The Samsung QN90C Neo QLED TV has all the hallmarks of a premium TV: best-in-class HDR brightness, ample viewing options and strong picture performance. ★★★★★
What you need to know
The Samsung QN90C Neo QLED TV has almost everything you’d expect from a premium 4K Mini LED TV — outstanding HDR brightness, a good selection of sizes, consistent upscaling, ample support for a variety of content, and more. Powered by Samsung’s high octane Mini-LED panel, the QN90C promises excellent performance across the top genres. For those who aren’t familiar, Mini-LED backlighting delivers high levels of brightness while maintaining realistic color and gradations of luminance. And though the QN90C Neo QLED isn’t the most premium of all the 4K Samsung 2023 TVs, it’s the one that you’ll probably be most tempted to buy.
Design: The Samsung QN90C Neo QLED TV is rather standard-looking — it more or less continues the slim, minimalistic design you’ll find on all the best Samsung TVs. Setting up the 65-inch TV was a two-person job, but with just a few parts to get it set up on the stand, this unit is easier to manage than some others. Though it doesn’t have Samsung’s One Connect Box (it’s reserved for the Samsung S95C OLED TV and Samsung QN900C 8K TV), the QN90C has four HDMI 2.1 ports located on the back. These ports support peripheral features like eARC, Auto Low Latency Mode and Variable Refresh Rate. Some of these settings are leveraged by the PS5 and Xbox Series X consoles, which is a plus if you plan to make this set your next gaming TV.
Performance: As was the case with last year's Samsung QN95B Neo QLED TV, brightness is perhaps the QN90C’s biggest strength. In Filmmaker mode with HDR content, the QN90C reached 1987.34 nits in a 10% window. This makes it even brighter than the 1905.8 nits achieved by the previous-gen model. For comparison, the LG C3 OLED TV hit 819.91 nits in the same window. In terms of TVs we’ve tested this year, only the Hisense U8K comes close to the QN90C with max 1788.31 nits.
Smart TV: The Samsung QN90C Neo QLED TV uses Samsung’s proprietary Tizen smart TV platform. We have mixed feelings about the overall ease of navigation and content exploration, but it’s similar to LG’s Web OS and the Google TV interface. The home screen displays tiles for different content and channels, which you can customize to suit your watching preferences. In terms of streaming services, you’ll find popular choices such as Netflix, Hulu and HBO Max, as well as some free streaming services including Samsung TV Plus.
Read the full review: Samsung QN90C Neo QLED TV
Attributes | Notes | Rating |
---|---|---|
Price | A bit more affordable than Samsung's 2023 flagship TV. | ★★★★★ |
Design | Flush bezels and 1-inch wide body. | ★★★★☆ |
Performance | Best-in-class brightness and impressive performance | ★★★★★ |
Smart TV | Not the best, not the worst. | ★★★★☆ |
The best value TV
Specifications
Reasons to buy
Reasons to avoid
✅ You want a cheap TV that still looks good: For the best smart TV experience in a TV under $1,000, it's hard to deny that the TCL 5-Series Google TV (S546) is a solid contender.\
✅ You demand good image quality: This TV offers better color, brightness, and shorter lag times than the previous Roku model. Color reproduction was an impressive 99.97% of the Rec 709 color space.
✅ You want a TV that comes with Google TV: It's also snappy, offering noticeably quicker and smoother operations than other platforms, including the sometimes slow Roku TV software that many TCL smart TVs use.
❌ You sit off-axis to the TV: You want to be sitting head-on with this TV. Sit too far off to one side, and you're going to lose a significant amount of color saturation.
❌ You want great-sounding audio: The TV is only outfitted with a pair of 8-watt speakers that merely offer passable stereo sound and decent volume. You might want a good soundbar.
❌ You're a big gamer: With a refresh rate of 60Hz, this is not the best choice for hooking up a PS5 or Xbox Series X. 120Hz would be better .
📺 The TCL 5-Series Google TV (S546) improves on a value-priced favorite, adding premium smart features to an already excellent affordable TV. ★★★★
What you need to know
The TCL 5-Series Google TV (S546) wowed us with its combination of smart TV features, solid performance and great value for your dollar. Building on the foundation of the already-good 5-Series, the move to Google TV gives the affordable 4K smart TV a more premium smart TV platform, one that offers personalized and customizable suggestions, a huge assortment of smart features, and deep Google Assistant integration that makes it a viable center for the entire home of connected gadgets. But it also offers a step up in other aspects of the TV.
As we found in our extensive testing, the 5-Series Google TV is a more polished version of the 5-Series TV when it comes to everything from color quality to lag times. And as well as delivering an excellent QLED 4K display, you also get a slick remote control, and a surprisingly wide array of gaming features for a 60Hz TV. For a smart TV that sells for under $1,000 for most size options, it's easily one of the best TVs on the market.
Design: TCL's mid-range TV designs aren't going to win any prizes, but the basic black plastic construction does the job, providing a sturdy housing for a decent 4K smart TV. It may not look flashy, or be the slimmest thing on the TV aisle, but it gets the job done. The chassis includes holes for a 200 mm by 300 mm VESA bracket, meaning that it can be easily hung on the wall using any of the brackets on our list of the best TV mounts.
Performance: Though some cosmetic differences from the 2020 TCL 5-Series Roku TV were a pleasant surprise, we were even more pleased to see that performance had improved across the board, with the display offering better color, brightness, and shorter lag times than the already excellent Roku model. Color accuracy was great right out of the box, with a Delta-E average of 1.3 as measured by our X-Rite spectrophotometer. Lower scores are better. Color reproduction was also impressive, with the S546 reproducing 99.97% of the Rec 709 color space.
Smart TV: There's a strong case to be made that Google TV is the best smart TV operating system on the market, offering a clean, easily-navigated home screen, with useful content recommendations, easy access to live TV and the convenience of voice control through the remote's built-in mic or the TV's integrated far-field microphones. The home screen and menus of Google TV look great, improving upon the already solid experience that Android 10 provided.
Read the full review: TCL 5-Series Google TV (S546)
Attributes | Notes | Rating |
---|---|---|
Price | Great value for your dollar. | ★★★★★ |
Design | Its basic plastic construction does the job. | ★★★★☆ |
Performance | Improved performance and a strong 4K HDR TV. | ★★★★★ |
Smart TV | The best smart TV system on the market. | ★★★★★ |
The best QD-OLED TV
Specifications
Reasons to buy
Reasons to avoid
✅ You want the best of both OLED and QLED: QD-OLED tech delivers a TV that's both bright and has near-perfect contrast.
✅ Design really matters to you: It bears repeating: the screen measures a trifle more than one-eighth inch thick. If you like that whole floating screen look, this TV has it.
✅ You want good out-of-the-box sound: The A95K can't beat a standalone soundbar, but music, dialogue, and sound effects sound crisp and clear.
❌ You care about low latency: Gamers might be turned off by the above average amount of input latency (16.2ms).
❌ You want more than two HDMI 2.1 ports: Unfortunately, the Sony A95K only has two full-spec HDMI 2.1 ports available.
❌ You want a cheap TV: Cutting-edge technology often comes at a premium cost, and the A95K is no exception.
📺 The Sony Bravia A95K OLED TV looks and sounds like a dream, no matter what you watch on it, making everything a transcendent viewing and listening experience.
What you need to know
By any standard, the Sony Bravia XR A95K OLED is a remarkable TV — and often, it’s far better than that. This set, which sits at the top of Sony’s expansive TV lineup, unites the industry’s defining technologies and Sony’s own groundbreaking processing and picture enhancements to deliver superlative performance in every area. And our own test results back this up.
The color and brightness on the Bravia XR A95K are dazzling. Unexpected but genuinely useful smart features transform everything from how you interact with the screen, how you make picture adjustments, and even what you do if you lose your remote control. Perhaps most important, this Sony OLED TV looks and sounds like a dream, no matter what you watch on it, making everything a transcendent viewing and listening experience.
Design: Outlining the jet-black display on all sides is a metal bezel only one-sixteenth of an inch thick, though there’s an added 0.75-inch band along the bottom for displaying the power light and, on the far left, a nearly imperceptible Sony logo. The screen is thicker than on most recent OLED sets (about 0.5 inch), but it's still super sleek.
Performance: One of the first TVs on the market to fuse OLED and quantum dot technologies into a single set, the A95K all but promises next-generation picture quality by dint of its existence — and it delivers. The picture on all of the movies, as well as a few TV series and YouTube videos we tried, plus our standard full-field, one-screen color screens, dazzled from anywhere in the room, as the set maintained almost its full color fidelity at even extreme angles relative to the screen. In the end, the A95K isn’t just first-rate today — it’s also sufficiently future-proof that you won’t need to worry about how it will handle next-generation content when it becomes more prevalent in the market.
Smart TV: Google TV is in serious competition for the simplest, cleanest, and richest smart TV interface, and it’s right at home on A95K. Simple and quick to navigate, easy to search, and adept at presenting plenty of new and recent options without overwhelming, it makes finding and watching movies, TV shows, and anything else a breeze.
Value for money: For $3,000, it's a bit much to ask — even given the myriad positives — considering the stiff competition out there from the likes of Samsung and LG, which are nipping at Samsung’s heels with new TVs that will build on the advances from their excellent last-generation sets, the S95B and the C2 respectively.
Read the full review: Sony Bravia XR A95K
Attributes | Notes | Rating |
---|---|---|
Price | Worth waiting for a price drop. | ★★☆☆☆ |
Design | This set’s svelteness is impressive. | ★★★★★ |
Performance | Next-generation picture quality (mostly). | ★★★★★ |
Smart TV | Simple, clean, and rich. | ★★★★★ |