65 Inch TCL QM8 Full Review: Amazing QLED TV

vemuda.com - Whats going on guys. So within the last couple of years, TVs have gotten really really good and really really affordable, and I don’t think there’s any better example of that than TCL’s new QM8 class. This is the 65” TCL QM850G. Its a 4K Mini-LED, QLED HDR Smart TV with Google built right in, and I personally believe it’s one of the brightest, most colorful and most feature-packed televisions you can buy right now for well under $2,000 dollars.

Source: digitaltrends.com

Actually, at the time making this post, the 65-inch QM8 is discounted an additional $500 bucks, so while the full retail price is technically $1699, you can snag one right now for under $1200 dollars from Amazon, Best Buy, Wal-Mart - and at that price especially, I think it’s even harder to pass up.

Now TCL actually has 3 other size options for their QM8 series. The 65-inch is the smallest, there’s a 75-inch, 85-inch and massive 98-inch model. In my personal opinion, for as good of a deal as this 65-inch is right now, the 75” is also discounted quite a bit - to the original price of the 65-inch - and might be the best overall value in the entire lineup. But of course, it all depends on how much space you have to work with.

So what makes the QM8 Series so good?

Well, this is TCL’s flagship lineup for 2023, and they really combined a little bit of everything: the best elements of the newer Mini LED technology for an impressive viewing experience, an easy to use Google-centric OS with all your favorite streamings apps available out of the box, and a clean & minimal physical design that allows for easy setup and a distraction-free look.

The QM8 is barely an inch thick, and that includes its tapered edge and slight bubble design with the plastic housing. The extra little bulge holds a 20w sub woofer and for that I can’t complain at all.

From the side you really get a sense of just how thin it is, and overall I do like the sort of gray brushed metal finish of the frame. The QM8 sits on a pedestal-design stand, the base is a big hunk of metal paired to a thick plastic arm thats secured to the TV with 4 long mounting screws. And you set it at either a low height or high height if you want to squeeze a very short soundbar underneath it.

All together, the 55-pound TV and stand are fairly sturdy and I like this setup and overall look vs. the 4 pointy feet of other TV models, the whole package here just gives off a more premium vibe.

Around back, the QM8 hides two different input panels behind removable plastic covers. The left side is where your power port will live and on the right you’ll find all your various media inputs. You’ve got ethernet, 4 HDMI ports including support for 144hz and eARC, USB A, audio in & out and optical audio.

My only real complaint here is that the panels that hide these inputs are a very thin and bendable plastic but it’s nice to have the cable covered and allow for some cable management with everything headed in on direction.

The remote you get with the QM8 aside from being very very tall is a pretty nice one. Its plastic housing is the same finish as the TV itself and you’ll see six dedicated buttons for different streaming services, apps and TCL’s cable channel - and I think this is really convenient.

The QM8 is Google TV-based and after a quick initial setup, you’ll be presented with a handful of familiar apps and streaming services with the ability to install countless mor if you want.

Since it’s all based around your Google account, you’ll get plenty of app, video and show recommendations that’ll be custom-tailored continuously. And I think the user interface and controls with the remote are super straightforward, responsive and plenty quick in getting you in and out of any given app.

The remote also has a built in mic for voice commands, so saying the magic words - Hey Google - can allow you to find or jump to any specific app, show or video you want as well display sports scores, weather reports, control compatible smart home devices, display live feeds from doorbells and home security cameras, and more. And the QM8 also works with Alexa and Apple HomeKit, and you can wirelessly cast videos to using Chromecast and AirPlay 2.

Overall, I’ve always been a fan of the Google TV experience and I still think its one of the best user interfaces for the app-based streaming-service centered television setup most of us have now.

So now let’s talk picture quality. The QM8 is a 4K QLED TV with a mini-LED backlight that allows for an incredibly bright and evenly lit display, nearly true and uniform deep blacks, punchy colors and a sharp resolution for pretty much all forms of content.

Out of everything, brightness is really its strong suit. Out of the box this thing is almost too bright at its default settings and I think a vast majority of people will manually set the brightness level to 40 or under unless you’re in a really brightly lit room or a space with a ton of windows.

But if you have a hard time blocking out the light around you, the QM8 is absolutely going to deliver just about the brightness viewing experience possible and relatively minimal glare, you do have an anti-glare coating across the front that helps out a bit too unless you’re really looking at the TV off axis or shining a light directly on it.

When it comes to the color and contrast, in general the QM8 delivers some of the deepest darkest blacks I’ve personally seen from a non-OLED display, and the color reproduction is quite stellar with tons of contrasts and a punchy and vivid look.

Now depending on the content and your image setting adjustments, I think you can have both the perfect picture and instances where TCL’s own picture adjustments miss the mark a little.

Out of the box, the default image profile for standard content is very bright and very saturated. And with additional options like Dynamic Color enabled, I think it tends to lean a little too saturated and inaccurate.

However, it definitely gives you that wow factor, the first time I powered this TV on I was blown away by just how bright and colorful it seemed, though I could tell it maybe was a bit too saturated.

I found that the movie profile with a minor decrease in brightness produces the most universallybaccurate image for my purposes, but within the preferences pane, there’s so many tweaks and opportunities for customization that you’re likely to find the perfect profile for you liking.

The QM8 also supports the Dolby Vision IQ, HDR10+, and HLG high dynamic range formats, and for certain content I think these really enhance the overall viewing experience. Especially jumping between the Dolby Vision bright and Dolby vision dark picture modes.

Obviously these formats are best viewed in the darkest room possible but I think the picture format coupled with the hardware - the mini-LED backlight - allows for comfortably viewable dark HDR and Dolby Vision content. The only area where the QM8 falls a little short is with motion blur on some 24fps content.

On the one hand, the QM8’s native 120Hz panel and support for 4K 120Hz input on two of its HDMI ports is pretty impressive, and you can even get 144hz out of one of the HMDI ports for gaming, and though I’m not a gamer myself, FreeSync Premium Pro is also supported and the TV’s Game Accelerator feature allows for up to 240Hz VRR gaming at 1080 resolution. But with certain 24p content, you get an obvious sense of jittery joltiness that is a bit distracting.

TCL has a handful of motion settings you can play around with to combat this and I found the bast combination is enabling Motion Smoothing, setting the judder and blur to 0 and turnin on VRR.

For me though, I realized I don’t watch a ton of content that’s affected, but if you sat down to watch a full season of Ozark for example, the motion cutters would be pretty apparent.

I think if you aren’t a hardcore TV enthusiast, the TCL QM8 is going to be one of the best big, bright colorful TVs you can buy right now, and its super user-friendly Google TV interface is the icing on the cake that’ll make it the best entertainment hub for like 90% of people.

It’s absolutely the brightest TV I’ve personally tried myself, and if you take the time to play around with the picture settings, you can get the right combination that might just rival something that would otherwise cost 2 or 3 times as much.

TCL has quickly become one of my go-to recommendations when it comes to affordable TV’s and I think with the QM8, they’ve now elevated that value proposition to be both affordable andbreally good, and I’m really happy with QM8 now being the center piece for my living room setup.

So there you go, those are my thoughts on TCL’s 65-inch QM8 TV. What do you guys think? Is this the best bang for your buck TV on the market right now?

Let me know in the comments down below and hit me with your movie or TV show recommendations a well, I’m always looking for new things to watch.

But hopefully you guys enjoyed this post, thanks for reading.