META-PHYSICAL

Philips OLED 910

Surely one of the year’s best TVs, and at a great price too

From £2,199 philips.co.uk

Philips expects you to go big or go home with this successor to the popular OLED 909. While nominally available as a 55in set, the decision has been made not to sell that model in the UK, so if you want one you’ll need to find room for a 65 or 77in TV, which isn’t going to be easy for everyone.

The key change for the new model is the introduction of a multi-layer OLED display – here termed a ‘META OLED’ panel – which brings with it even greater brightness. It’s not tuned with quite such a low black ‘floor’ – but most people will find that’s actually to the new model’s benefit.

Visually, the structure of the set is almost identical to its predecessor, except the soundbar-like speaker section to the bottom edge is a much lighter grey than the darker finish previously. It gives a more distinctive look overall.

There’s a ninth-gen P5 processor powering everything (a step up over the eighth-gen chip in the older TV), otherwise that’s about your lot. There’s still four-sided Ambilight (the real-time edge illumination system that spills colours onto surrounding walls, which is as eye-catching as it is immersive). There are still four HDMI ports, though only two of them are HDMI 2.1 standard (with the eARC being one of those). And there’s still very much to like about the picture quality.