12 hours ago
8K TVs Are Stunning Engineering Feats. You Shouldn't Buy One.
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TVs with stunningly high 8K display panels were initially very niche and mind-blowingly expensive. When it arrived on the market in 2015, the first 8K TV by Sharp cost a cool $133,000, as much as a luxury car. And the screens didn't become available to mainstream consumers until the turn of this decade. It was in 2020 when big-name manufacturers like LG, Samsung, and Sony began offering them.
By that time, 8K TVs were much more reasonably priced, but still in high-end territory. You needed to drop around $4,000 (and way up) to get the sharpest TV screen in your living room.
I got my initial glimpse of the first mainstream 8K TVs a little before that, in late 2019. With a resolution of 7,680 x 4,320 pixels, these products had four times the pixel density of 4K (3,840 x 2,160) TVs, resulting in sharper and more detail-rich visuals. It was clear to me then that 8K is the future of video entertainment. And it still is—as in, maybe I'll be able to recommend buying an 8K TV at some point in the future. But I can't right now.
Today, six years later and several generations of TVs behind us, I still can't find a reason why you should switch to 8K TV, even if it fits in your budget. Here's why.
The almost complete lack of native content is the primary reason why you should avoid buying an 8K TV. None of the leading streaming services offer movies and shows in this resolution. YouTube and Vimeo are the only options for 8K content, but there isn't much to choose from there either.
A quick search for 8K video on YouTube led me to short clips of beautiful vistas around the world and a few movie trailers, but nothing else. This isn't enough to warrant spending big to get an 8K TV.
To make up for the lack of content in their original resolution, 8K TVs will upscale lower-resolution footage to match theirs. Since an 8K TV has four times the pixels, upscaling fills the missing pixels in when displaying 4K content. But there's no actual data with which to do that. And I can't imagine the oomph necessary to fill in approximately 25 million blank pixels.
I've witnessed this upscaling multiple times, and its benefits are limited and not worth overspending on. While undeniably sophisticated, it can't bring lower-resolution video on par with content captured by an 8K camera. The footage looks less natural than native content. It's not uncommon to encounter blurry artifacts, which, depending on the content, can compromise an otherwise perfect scene.
Speaking of cameras, there are more 8K options on the market than TVs, ranging from Android phones by Samsung and Google to action cameras, all the way to pro-grade tools for filmmakers. I'd suggest an 8K TV to only those who are obsessed with viewing memories recorded in such high resolution—but you'll need an expensive camera or a high-end phone with ample storage to capture those memories in the first place. Even if you have one, the data requirements are massive.
Despite being on the market for half a decade, 8K TVs still cost significantly more than 4K units. The most affordable option I found is the Samsung QN800D, which costs a couple of dollars below $2,000 for a device with a 65-inch screen. The tech giant's latest QN900F 8K TV, with a 65-inch panel, on the other hand, comes with a hefty $3,298 price tag.
That's a lot of coin, especially considering the lack of native 8K content I mentioned above. For comparison, a 65-inch LG C4 4K OLED TV with stunning picture quality runs below $1,500, while an 85-inch TCL QM7K Series 4K TV goes for $1,700. You can even order the latter with a truly cinematic 98-inch panel for less than $2,500.
In addition to a bigger variety of screen sizes and price points, the above 4K TVs will get you superior picture quality and more onboard features (e.g., OLED screens, support for Dolby Vision across all prices, etc.) than today's 8K TVs. Additionally, the products I mentioned are just a small fraction of the high-quality 4K TV options available today.
On that note, if you are hellbent on making the jump to an 8K TV today, I have bad news for you: There aren't many choose from. Alongside the Samsung TVs I already mentioned, you can consider Sony's Z9K Series, though this one is expensive and dated, as it has been on the market since 2022. The 2024 LG 99 Series QNED 8K TV is still available at some retailers for around $2,000, offering another reasonably priced option in this product category. However, you can't find it on its maker's official online store, so it's probably getting phased out.
Given the lower price of entry into the 8K realm than before, overly eager upgraders can order one today and bide their time until native content becomes widely available. I strongly advise against this strategy, because the 8K TV you bought now will inevitably be due for an upgrade by the time its native resolution goes mainstream.$1997.99 at at at at
Between the crucial lack of compatible content, the high price to upgrade, and the limited choice (not to mention that we don't have a clue what minimum internet speed it needs and how much it will cost to stream video from subscription services on it), I don't recommend buying an 8K TV in 2025. The ultra-high resolution these products have is years away from going mainstream, so don't waste your money on one, despite the mesmerizing picture quality it could deliver one day. Rather than spending so much money on one 8K TV, consider investing in an excellent 4K TV and a soundbar, or a full surround sound system.
I'd take a similarly (or lower) priced 4K TV over an 8K set any day. And with other review experts sharing the same view and TV manufacturers launching the latest and greatest products with 4K panels, it certainly looks like this trend won't be changing anytime soon.$1498.00 at at at at
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