Several years after TV's largest manufacturers made big promises around 8K TVs, almost all are either continuous models from previous years or discharge 8K in full. In 2025, Only Samsung Announces new models and they are all too expensive for what they offer. This is why we do not recommend 8K TVs this year.
This may seem strange because it would be easy to assume, based on their price and resolution, that 8K TVs are top TVs. How we do not recommend the “best” TVs in our list of Best TVs? The fact is, while the 8K TVs we tested were generally good, they greatly surpassed models with technology that has a greater effect on image quality, such as OLED And Mini-undergoingWhile cheaper after inch on the screen.
Failed promise of 8k
If we take a step back, it's not too surprising to see how we got here. 8K TVs promised even more detailed, sharper images, but were rarely able to really make that promise. Although they have four pixels like 4K TVs, 8K TVs were limited to their potential because there is very little 8K content. Without the actual content of 8K, all that can be shown on these TVs is above -contaminated 4K content. And while he's overwhelmed It became quite goodIt is not the same as, nor does it seem detailed as, the actual 8K content.
This is undoubtedly the old script for chicken and egg. Why make 8K TVs when there is no 8K content? But why make 8K content when there are no 8K TVs? This was the same question with the early 4K, and if we go back, even early HDTV. With the latter, there was strong pressure through several industries to distance everyone from their old standard TVs for defining.
There was a similar pressure with 4K because it provided much larger screen sizes, and most importantly, most of the inheritance content can benefit from the additional resolution. This is because most films and TV shows were historically caught on film. Without going too far from the rabbit hole and generally speaking, the 35mm film has more details than what is possible to catch HD and is often similar to what you can get with 4K. That's a great broad statement, but for our purposes, the bigger question is that the same cannot be said about 8K.
8K of Hisens, since 2023.
Of course, maybe about 35 mm of negatives, and probably the larger 70mm negatives on several big budget films, could look better at 8K versus 4K, but it's just part of the total number of films and TV shows. While many shows and movies now use at least 4K cameras, almost not using 8K. Even productions using cameras with higher than 4K rarely, if ever, release the content with higher resolution. The best is 4K.
The other question is where would you get even 8K content, even if they were more available? Meinstream streaming services are set for 4K and can theoretically offer 8K content of selected devices (again, chicken and egg). The cable and satellite often still fight with 4K content in many areas. This is all to say, 8k TVs are racing cars without a track race and driving poorly on the street.
Where did 8k TVs go?
Scott Ramirez, Vice President of TC Product Marketing and Development for Domestic Cinema, had an insight during a wider conversation with CNET:
“I don't think i don't think 8k is going to be very imported in the neear Future. There's Very Little Content Available for 8K. Premium. Gamut, Increasing the Brightness, (and) the overall HDR impact.
Hysens takes more access to waiting and watching, according to Onder Clark, TV marketing director:
“Hisense led the replacement to larger high -performance TVs, making the premium large screens more accessible than ever. We saw an incredible growth in this space, and we continue to press the boundaries of performance and quality and features that today relate to viewers.
LG also sees the potential of 8K while recognizing reality. David Park, Head of Media Solutions, Customer Value, told us:
“There is an element of” future proof “when buying 8K television, but due to lack of available 8K content, 8K consumer adoption is extremely slow. Given that, LG is currently focusing on providing the best image and experience to watch our 4K OLED, QNED and UHD TVs. ”
The numbers
What do we think under “expensive”? Let's look Samsung's lining in 2025compared to one's own (great) QD Models, as well as some other options. The cheapest 8K model is the 65-inch QN900F, which has a proposed retail price of $ 3,299. Its 65-inch S95D OLED, which we described as “The best image quality we've ever tested“is 2,000 USD. There is no magical sauce, especially no AI sauce as shown in its new models, it will make an 8K LCD to look better than QD-OLED.
But let's say you want to go bigger. 77-inch S90D you're Currently it is 2,100 USD. 75-inch QN900F 8K? $ 4,299. The comparison is tilted even more in favor of OLED than the models with a higher 8K, the QN990F line. Then, it's $ 5,499 for a $ 65-inch and $ 6,499 for 75 inches.
If you want to go Really Large, and you should need to get a return on the investment of all those pixels, has a 98-inch QN990F that is blisting $ 39,999. You can get a right now 100-inch Hisense for 5% From that. It is certainly “only 4K”, but since there is no 8K content, the smaller pixels will be spent, unless you really sit, really close.
Are the above comparisons reduced because they are mostly last year's models? Well, they are for sale from this writing, so I would argue no. Also, if they are replaced with new models, they will still be cheaper than 8K TVs.
Looking forward
Does this mean that we will never recommend another 8K TV? To protect ourselves a little, we'll see. The problems listed above have nothing to do with the ability of each manufacturer to make a product. We know they can do 8k as they did. The 8K problem is a lack of content. There is very little company (well, except Sony), it can do for it. Without 8K content, as we mentioned, there are very few point out on the 8K TV.
That would not be a huge question if the TVs were the same price or cheaper than their 4K colleagues. However, they are usually more expensive, and only perform as good or worse as some of their matches. Since resolution is just one aspect of image quality and is not one of the most important, this makes an 8K expensive feature that you really can't use.
So, for 2025, we do not recommend any 8K TVs. If prices fall, the 8K content suddenly becomes widely available, or there is some other big and unexpected change, maybe we will in the future.