CES 2022: Sony announces world’s first consumer QD-OLED 4K TV

Sony has introduced the world’s first QD-OLED (quantum dot organic light emitting diode) TV for consumers, kicking off its 2022 lineup with a high benchmark. The company’s current OLED TV sets use LG Display panels, tuned with Sony’s processing. However, the upcoming flagship Bravia XR A95K TV will include a Samsung Display-manufactured QD-OLED panel. The TV will come in 65- and 55-inch sizes, both with 4K resolution.

Samsung Electronics was also rumoured to announce a QD-OLED 4K TV at CES 2022. However, those rumours proved to be unfounded, leaving Sony with the spotlight. QD-OLED has been in development at Samsung Display for years and the technology could become a middle step between standard OLED and Samsung’s own MicroLED displays.

QD-OLED combines the best traits of OLED such as infinite contrast and perfect blacks with the benefits of quantum dot LED TVs such as improved brightness and more vivid colour reproduction at higher brightness.

Sony will, however, continue to source display panels from LG Display for its other OLED models for 2022 — the A90K and A80K.

Aside from the one-of-a-kind panel, the A95K will come with a unique stand that can put the TV either in a front or a back position. The tricked-out stand can also be raised to place a soundbar without obstructing the view.

The A95K will come with four HDMI inputs — two of them being full HDMI 2.1. All of the company’s latest OLED TVs will support 4K gaming at 120Hz refresh rates, auto HDR tone mapping when connected to a PlayStation 5, and auto low latency mode. The TVs will also have variable refresh rate out of the box instead of a software update like previous models.

Google TV will remain Sony’s choice for software in 2022, and the lineup will continue with branded features such as XR Triluminos Max (for the A95K) or Pro (for the others), XR OLED Contrast Pro, and Acoustic Surface Audio Plus.

Sony also announced its first line of MicroLED TVs.