The Hisense UR9 is a great first shot against OLED’s bow

RGB LED TVs have been the discuss of the TV world this 12 months, with fashions coming from all of the producers, and the first one in all 2026 is right here — the Hisense UR9. It’s the first have a look at the viability of the brand new backlight expertise outdoors of demo rooms, and it’s a step above the standard mini-LED TVs of years previous. HDR is colourful and correct, it has great brightness, and it is able to displaying colours past the P3 coloration area for motion pictures and TV reveals which have wider coloration. But at $3,500, the 65-inch mannequin I reviewed is priced comparably to high-end OLEDs from LG and Samsung, which is robust competitors.

Hisense launched the very first RGB LED TV final 12 months, the $30,000 116-inch Hisense 116UX, so it’s not too stunning that its top-end fashions, the UR9 and UR8, are RGB LED TVs and never conventional mini LED (you might want to step right down to the U7SG for that). It’s additionally the first firm to launch a extra reasonably priced 2026 mannequin, nevertheless it’s nonetheless costlier than the flagship mini-LED TVs of final 12 months, just like the TCL QM9K.

The Hisense UR9 is out there in 4 sizes: 65 inches ($3,500), 75 inches ($5,000), 85 inches ($6,000), and 100 inches ($9,000). This places it in direct competitors with flagship OLED shows from LG and Samsung, and is a excessive bar for the UR9 and another RGB LED TV. I obtained a have a look at the 65-inch selection.

The 65-inch UR9 is 1.8 inches thick throughout the entire chassis and makes use of a pedestal stand. Like the U8QG final 12 months, the Hisense UR9 has solely three HDMI 2.1 inputs. Its fourth enter is a USB-C DisplayPort connection, which is located alongside the left fringe of the TV as an alternative of with the opposite connections on the again. I’m not a fan of this placement as a result of if you wish to have your laptop regularly related to the TV, the cable is clearly seen. The TV helps 180Hz native refresh fee, AMD Freesync Premium Pro, HDR 10+, and Dolby Vision. A future replace will allow Dolby Vision 2, however we’re not going to see any Dolby Vision 2 content material out there for a whereas.

One of the touted advantages of RGB LED TVs is their capability to realize 100% of the BT.2020 coloration area. That’s speaking about chromaticity, which is based mostly on saturation and hue and is unbiased of brightness (or luminance). You might need seen coloration area triangles on a CIE 1931 diagram. But what this chart doesn’t present us is how colours carry out throughout totally different brightness ranges, or in our residing rooms. (For a deep dive on this, Caleb Denison launched a wonderful video a couple weeks in the past.)

Also, the overwhelming majority of HDR content material makes use of the P3 coloration area, which is smaller than BT.2020. So even when a TV is able to extending past P3 and into BT.2020 colours (which the UR9 completely is), with most motion pictures and TV reveals it doesn’t matter. It’s additionally a little bit of a chicken-or-the-egg scenario — we’d like TVs that may precisely show BT.2020 earlier than the colour area is absolutely adopted by TV and film creators, but when there’s no content material, why get a BT.2020 TV?

Now, whereas it’s comparatively not a lot, there is some great video on the market that extends past the P3 coloration area and into BT.2020 colours. One instance is the BBC documentary sequence Planet Earth II, which I watched with a Kaleidescape Strato E participant. Episode 3 seems on the jungles of the world, and the greens of the timber particularly seemed extremely vibrant on the Hisense UR9. There’s additionally a phase about hummingbirds in Ecuador that reveals off the dazzling colours of the tiny creatures, which the UR9 dealt with very effectively. It’s on par with what I noticed on the $7,000 TCL X11L, and a extra colourful image than I’ve seen from OLEDs just like the LG G5 or Sony Bravia 8 II. Without any movement compensation, there was some judder because the digital camera panned by way of the jungle. Changing the movement setting to Film helped to clean that out with out giving it an unnatural impact.

One of the potential points with RGB LED TVs is coloration crosstalk, one thing that LG Display — notably a maker of OLED panels — made a video about again in December. An instance might be when somebody is strolling previous a colourful mural and the pink from the art work causes the individual’s face to look a little pink, which then adjustments to be barely blue once they go the blue a part of the mural. I didn’t see this occur on the UR9 with any of the fabric I watched.

The motive behind this might be one in all two prospects: wonderful processing and coloration filter efficiency able to deftly delineating side-by-side colours, or the backlight as an alternative utilizing white gentle and relying solely on the colour filter when the onscreen coloration data will get too difficult. The second possibility mainly negates the good thing about having particular person pink, inexperienced, and blue diodes, with the TV functioning as a blue or white backlit mini-LED TV, however the one approach to know for positive is to take the TV aside and look simply at what the backlight is doing. When it comes right down to it, although, what issues is how the image seems, and the UR9 seems actually good in HDR.

OLED nonetheless has a massive benefit over RGB LED with some of the essential specs: distinction. Contrast is extra essential to our eyes than coloration (it’s one of many first belongings you be taught throughout calibration coaching). It permits us to understand depth, motion, and form, and has been important to our existence as a species — and to our enjoyment of flicks, TV, and artwork. RGB LED TVs nonetheless use LCD panels, solely the backlight system has been improved, and with that comes the inherent LCD drawbacks of sunshine blooming and extra restricted viewing angles. The UR9 handles each of those points effectively (though I believe TCL nonetheless has a slight benefit with blooming management), however OLED nonetheless wins. And due to its pixel-level management, OLED nonetheless delivers higher general image high quality.

Then there’s value. With the 65-inch UR9 beginning at $3,500, Hisense has positioned its flagship instantly against top-end OLEDs from Samsung and LG — each of that are priced at $3,400 for a similar 65-inch dimension.

Hisense has traditionally been cheaper than Samsung, LG, and Sony for like applied sciences, so that would imply that costs on comparable RGB LEDs from these corporations will are available above the UR9, however I don’t suppose so — other than Sony, which just about actually would be the most costly of the bunch, and have the very best processing to assist the value. If the flagship RGB LED TVs from LG and Samsung are equal to or costlier than the Hisense UR9, it means these corporations are placing RGB above their very own OLED TVs. Especially with LG, the chief in OLED gross sales for greater than a decade, it might be a stunning transfer.

And there’s nonetheless the step-down fashions from Hisense and Samsung, the Hisense UR8 and Samsung R85H, which can doubtless be within the $2,000-or-under vary for the 55-inch dimension. But that once more places them up instantly against midrange OLED fashions just like the LG C6, which received’t get as vivid because the RGB LED TVs, however nonetheless has pixel-level management and wonderful distinction.

The world of TVs in 2026 is fairly thrilling. The accuracy of shows throughout value ranges and manufactures is nearer than it’s ever been, and we’re persevering with to get new improvements like RGB LED. That crowded market means it’s exhausting to suit RGB LED TVs someplace that is smart. They carry out higher than common mini-LED TVs and can completely overtake them (OLED is nonetheless out of attain), nevertheless it received’t be till 2027 on the earliest.

For now, I’d nonetheless simply purchase an OLED. But the way forward for RGB LED TVs is wanting vivid.

Photography by John Higgins / The Verge