OLED beating micro-LED TV technology looks uncertain as LG and Samsung falter, but hope is not lost
Remember when micro LED was said to be the future of TV, leaving even the best OLED TVs in the dust with its superior brightness and equally good black levels? Unfortunately, that future seems to be a few years away. A new report claims that both LG and Samsung are pulling back on their investment in the technology, as it’s proving to be much harder to produce than expected.
The news is significant because the two companies have arguably been the biggest proponents of micro LED. LG’s first micro LED TV and Samsung’s The Wall were certainly impressive six years ago, and while Samsung is now the largest manufacturer of micro LED TVs, it has also come up with interesting ideas, like transparent micro LED displays, which it showed off at CES 2024. But years after we first saw those beautiful pixels, micro LED suffers from the same problems it did then: It’s too big and too expensive.
What’s the problem with micro LED TVs?
Manufacturers still think that micro-LED is the future. For example, TCL CSOT, which makes panels used in TVs not only from TCL but also from other companies (including Samsung), recently started selling micro-LED TVs in China and has no plans to cut back on investments, as far as we know.
But according to reports in the Korean trade and financial press (via FlatPanelsHD), while LG and Samsung both plan to continue investing in micro-LED, they are scaling back. Samsung has postponed its plans to increase production, while LG has already reduced the size of its micro-LED research and development teams and is considering bringing more micro-LED developers into its established OLED business.
The problem is that the technology isn’t moving very quickly. Prices have fallen significantly since the announcement, but they’re still in the six-figure range, partly because the technology is still limited to enormous panels. And micro-LED has yet to see the vastly improved efficiency and economies of scale that will drive prices down: last year, industry analysts Omdia predicted that panel prices would fall by around 75% by 2027 , but a year later, there’s no sign of that prediction coming true.
Even if Omdia’s prediction were to prove correct, it wouldn’t be enough to satisfy companies like Samsung: according to trade journal ETNewsSamsung just held a meeting with key partners where it told them they need to drastically cut production costs to make micro LED TVs competitive. And by drastically, we mean drastically: Samsung has reportedly told its partners they need to cut costs by 90%.
There’s no doubt that micro LED is the next step in TV panel technology. But it’s a step that’s taking a lot longer than predicted, and we’ve heard from one major manufacturer that it could easily be 5-10 years before micro LED can be considered commercially viable. So don’t expect micro LED TVs to make our best TV list for at least the next few years – but if you’ve got a really big wall and an even bigger budget, you might be tempted.