Skip to main content

Will Samsung’s massive MicroLED TVs make their way into homes next year?

Samsung-146-inch-MicroLED-detail
Rich Shibley/Digital Trends

Earlier this year at CES, Samsung wowed attendees with a 146-inch MicroLED monster it dubbed “The Wall.” The TV was easily one of the most impressive at the show, but we didn’t expect to see it in living rooms any time soon. It turns out, though, that Samsung appears much further along than we thought will begin mass-producing MicroLED displays in September and plans to begin selling MicroLED TVs as early as next year, the Korea Herald reports.

It’s still too early to know exactly what sizes of MicroLED TVs Samsung will be selling, but it plans to aim for the home luxury market, so while for practicality’s sake the TVs may not be 146-inch behemoths, they likely won’t compete with Samsung’s QLED TVs either. We do know that Samsung’s current MicroLED strategy uses small tablet-sized panels in a modular fashion to make The Wall. If the company is still using that approach, then the size of the panels will have to be made smaller to make suitable screen sizes for home use.

Recommended Videos

There is no word on what the pricing might be, either, but considering Samsung’s use of the term “luxury,” the new displays won’t be cheap. That said, the president of Samsung’s visual display business Han Jong-hee said that “the price will not be as high as people think.”

As the name implies, MicroLED is a type of light-emitting diode (LED) that is much smaller, similar to organic LEDs (OLED). Both are small enough to make up individual pixels, but Samsung claims that it has an advantage over OLED as it doesn’t use organic materials, which it says makes its MicroLEDs longer-lasting and less susceptible to burn-in.

Samsung is in a position to know, as it has used OLED displays for its smartphones, though it decided to use its own QLED technology for TVs. While those TVs are great, we still tend to prefer OLED displays for their deep blacks and incredible contrast. As for MicroLED, we’ll have to see. Samsung’s “The Wall” was truly impressive at a distance when we saw it at CES, but when we got closer, the individual panels making up the gigantic display were easy to see, especially when the brightness was lower. Samsung will likely address this issue in its consumer TVs, but the jury is still out for now.

If you’re looking for a TV upgrade, it’s probably not worth holding out for MicroLED. Instead, take a look at our list of the best TVs available right now. If you want to know more about this promising new technology, take a look at our comparison of MicroLED and OLED.

Kris Wouk
Former Digital Trends Contributor
Kris Wouk is a tech writer, gadget reviewer, blogger, and whatever it's called when someone makes videos for the web. In his…
Samsung’s latest see-through display uses microLED panels
Samsung's transparent micro-LED display.

Samsung's transparent microLED display at CES 2024. Phil Nickinson / Digital Trends

Let us be perfectly clear: When you see through all the smoke and glitz and glamour, transparency very much rules the early hours of CES 2024. The latest entry comes from Samsung, which is hardly a stranger to clear displays. The new hotness, though, is a transparent microLED display.

Read more
Mini-LED vs. QLED TV: how one technology is improving the other
The Samsung QN90C ron a media stand with white speakers.

Mini-LED and QLED are two TV tech acronyms that have more in common than one might expect. They're technically both types of LED lighting, but the former is one type of LED lighting, while the latter is what you get when you combine the TV's LED backlighting with a layer of quantum (that's where the "Q" comes from) dots. If we're starting to confuse you, our sincere apologies, but do bear with us.

Let's take a closer look at both mini-LED and QLED tech, starting with the most important element: the LEDs.

Read more
Are TCL and Hisense the next LG and Samsung?
A village built into a seaside mountainside shown on a Hisense U6K.

If you had told me 20 years ago — or, heck, even 15 — that Samsung and LG were going to be the top TV brands in the U.S., I’d have laughed in your face. But I feel like I’ve learned to see the writing on the wall since then. And now I’m wondering: Are TCL and Hisense the next Samsung and LG?

If we take a look at TCL and Hisense's 2023 TV lineups, their recently inked partnerships with huge national sports organizations, and their progress over the last five years in terms of both technological advancement and sales, I think there's a strong argument in favor of TCL and Hisense becoming the top two TV brands in the U.S.
TCL in 2023
We’ll start with TCL’s 2023 TV lineup. You already know about the QM8 Mini-LED,  right? If not, you have got to check out that TV. But what else does TCL have in store? Well, there’s the Q7, which, while not a mini-LED TV, does have a full-array local dimming backlight system, quantum dots, high brightness with 1,000 nits peak, and a slate of other desirable features. Plus, the 65-inch model, for price reference, is $1,000. Now, in case you don’t recall, last year’s 6-Series, the R655, was a mini-LED TV, and the 65-inch version of that TV sold for $1,000.

Read more