Philips OLED820 vs LG OLED C6 (WOLED)

When it comes to HDR quality, the Philips OLED820 uses the same class of WOLED panel found in its biggest rivals – the LG C5 and the Samsung S90F. This means we can expect really solid results. This year, mid-range OLED panels can exceed the threshold of a thousand nits, and the tested model reaches around 1300 nits in some films. This is an outstanding result, allowing the director's vision to be conveyed with incredible precision, as this is the brightness range in which modern productions are mastered. Of course, there are situations where even the OLED820 has to compromise. Full-screen scenes flooded with white, like those in the film The Meg, can drop brightness to 400–500 nits, which clearly diminishes the effect. This is a characteristic of OLED technology that has not yet been fully eliminated. Despite this limitation, it's hard not to appreciate the HDR in this model – high luminance and a wide coverage of the DCI-P3 colour palette at 99% make the image look simply fantastic.

The HDR performance of the LG C6 is really very good. LG Display’s new WOLED panel has mainly brought a significant increase in brightness. In our unit we measured around 1500 nits and, importantly, the TV can show similar values in many normal movie scenes as well. That gives HDR real punch. Bright highlights, lamps and sunlight can be genuinely intense, and most HDR movies simply look very impressive. Of course it’s still an OLED, so brightness falls in scenes with a lot of white. The fifth scene from the movie The Meg illustrates this well, where the C6 reached around 600 to 700 nits. That’s still a very good result, but it also shows the new panel hasn’t shed all the limitations typical of OLEDs.

Colours

When it comes to colours, it’s also hard to raise major objections. The C6 covers about 99% of the DCI-P3 gamut and roughly 75% of BT.2020. In practice colours are very saturated and, importantly, stable regardless of the scene. That’s worth emphasising, because not every TV behaves the same in this respect. In some RGB Mini LED models colour saturation can depend more strongly on image brightness. A wider colour gamut today is mainly offered by QD-OLED TVs and new SQD models with a new generation of quantum dots. However, the C6 still performs very strongly here and is able to produce suitably saturated colours in most movie scenes.

The colour reproduction in the factory settings really surprised us, and in a positive way. The Philips OLED820, switched to Filmmaker mode, immediately showed that it was quite well tuned in terms of colour. The white balance was relatively accurate, although there was a slight deficiency in the blue hue, which sometimes gave the image a slightly yellowish tint. However, this is not a drawback that particularly interferes with everyday viewing. A bigger problem arose with the brightness characteristics. The gamma chart clearly deviated from the ideal, as the line was below the expected values, causing the image to be excessively brightened, and the colours looked as if they were covered with a light milky filter. This effect was also noticeable in tests using the Colour Checker pattern, where more pronounced errors appeared.

Right out of the box the LG C6 is quite well set up, especially if you choose the Filmmaker mode. In SDR material the white balance is decent, although as brightness increases there is a slight lack of red. The image becomes a bit cooler, but not enough for it to be very noticeable during normal viewing. More is happening in the brightness characteristic. Gamma is a little low and instead of holding at 2.4, for a large part of the range it sits closer to 2.1–2.2. In practice the C6 slightly brightens midtones. Shadows are therefore more readable, but the image loses some depth compared with how it should look in a darkened room.

In HDR the situation is a bit more interesting. The start of the greyscale looks very good, but from about 20–30% brightness the white balance starts to drift increasingly. As brightness rises there is more red and a noticeable lack of blue. In the brightest sections the difference is already significant and also affects the reproduction of some colours. The EOTF curve itself is followed quite well through most of the range. The C6 only tends to slightly brighten the image, which we also saw in our film comparisons. The largest deviation appears around the brightest parts, where the TV starts adapting the signal to the panel's capabilities.

The factory Filmmaker setting in HDR is therefore not perfect, but overall performs well. The biggest area for improvement is the white balance, especially at high brightness.

After calibration, both the Filmmaker mode and the gaming mode improved quite a bit. A slight adjustment of the white balance and enhancement of the brightness characteristics yielded excellent results with SDR content – the image looked nearly perfect, natural, and very close to the reference. For HDR material, the situation was similar; the colours looked fantastic, and it was hard to find fault with anything. However, we did notice a certain characteristic, which we had already pointed out when comparing scenes from the film Billy Lynn. The analysis of the EOTF curve showed that the TV has a slight tendency to dim details in the blacks, meaning that the darkest parts are not always displayed exactly as the director intended. Nevertheless, the effect after calibration is superb, and the OLED820 is emerging as one of the more interesting screens in its class. A little bit of fine-tuning is all that’s needed, and there’s really nothing to worry about.

LG TVs have long responded very well to calibration, and the C6 is no exception. After adjustments we managed to set the white balance practically perfectly, and most colour errors fell below 3, often down to around 2. In practice this means very accurate colour reproduction in both SDR and HDR. An interesting detail only appeared with the HDR brightness response. On a classic EOTF chart everything looks almost perfect and at first glance it would be hard to find fault. Only when we measured the TV’s behaviour using filters based on real film scenes did it become clear that the C6 has a slight tendency to artificially boost image brightness.

It’s not a huge difference and many viewers may even see it as a positive, because HDR looks a bit more striking as a result. From the point of view of fidelity to the source material, however, it’s not ideal — some scenes are simply a touch brighter than the filmmaker intended. Interestingly, this is rather unusual for LG. In previous generations the brand’s TVs typically held very closely to the reference picture curve after calibration. The C6 is still very close to the standard, but that subtle brightness 'boost' can indeed be noticed in films and TV series.

Fortunately, the earlier effects of the mentioned posterisation can be quite effectively mitigated. The "distortion reduction" feature set to medium handles unwanted colour banding well, improving the smoothness of tonal transitions. It does sometimes work a bit too aggressively and smooths out some details – such as the minor imperfections of the actors’ skin – but despite that, it can be considered worth using without major compromises. The upscaling in the OLED820 also performs well. The test image with the model is exceptionally soft, sometimes perhaps too much, although this can be remedied with a slight increase in sharpness in the picture menu – that's a matter of individual preference. The absence of overscan issues with very low-resolution content is also commendable, allowing us to not worry about the image being unnecessarily cropped.

Here the LG C6 has taken a really big step forward. The TV uses the same processor found in the flagship G6, and in terms of image processing the two models are very close. That's a big plus, because in this area LG's processor this year performs excellently. The "Smooth Gradation" function works particularly well. With heavily compressed material it can effectively hide ugly tonal banding and artefacts that often appear, for example, in lower-quality streaming. It's best to leave it on the "Low" setting. Then the improvement is clear, and the TV doesn't yet start blurring fine detail. Higher levels smooth the image more aggressively, but can already remove some of the natural texture of objects on screen. Upscaling itself also performs very well. Lower-resolution content is properly sharpened, edges look clean, and the processor quite effectively reconstructs fine details. In that respect the C6 is really close to LG's best TVs and the differences compared with the G6 are small.

Motion fluidity is an area where OLEDs always shine, and the Philips OLED820 confirms this rule. The panel itself offers a refresh rate of 144 Hz, which will mainly benefit PC gamers, but even with standard TV sources or consoles, where it operates at 120 Hz, motion is fast, sharp, and simultaneously smooth, without any signs of smearing. This is thanks to the remarkable response time between pixels, which ensures the image maintains clarity in every dynamic scene. The manufacturer has also added their own smoothness enhancer called "Motion Style." In the menu, we find two sliders – the first, responsible for smoothness, allows for the adjustment of the number of artificially added frames in films. This way, we can choose a raw, cinematic character with clearly visible film frames or a more theatrical image with smooth motion. The second slider is for motion blur reduction, particularly useful in sports broadcasts. Here, we definitely recommend setting it to the maximum value, as the effect is truly excellent.

The LG C6 features a panel with a maximum refresh rate of 165 Hz, which is great news especially for gamers using a powerful PC. For movies, sport and consoles we’ll of course be limited to 120 Hz at most, but even then it’s hard to fault the motion clarity. As you’d expect from an OLED, the panel’s response time is near-instant. Moving objects therefore don’t leave the characteristic smearing you still see on LCD TVs. This is especially noticeable in sport and fast-paced games, where the picture remains very clean even during dynamic movement.

For movies and TV, LG has also included a motion smoothing system called TruMotion. In the user settings you’ll find two separate sliders. De-Judder is primarily for low-frame-rate material, namely movies and TV series at 24 fps. You can use it to slightly reduce the characteristic judder or increase it if you prefer a much smoother picture. De-Blur, on the other hand, is useful for higher-frame-rate content, mainly sports broadcasts and 50/60 fps TV.

The Philips OLED820 is one of the most comprehensive TVs for gamers. Onboard, we find practically everything one could expect: two HDMI 2.1 ports with full bandwidth of 48 Gbps (shame there aren't four), Variable Refresh Rate (VRR), Auto Low Latency Mode (ALLM), support for Dolby Vision in games, and a good implementation of the HGiG mode. The TV also handles lower resolutions at 120 Hz without issue, so you can count on great flexibility when choosing different picture modes on your console. Philips also adds a Game Bar – a panel that allows you to change picture modes, add a crosshair, or preview parameters. Although it looks a bit clunky and is less refined than its competitors, it gets the job done. In practice, therefore, the OLED820, in addition to a full set of four HDMI 2.1 connections, offers almost everything a gamer could need.

LG has long focused heavily on gamers, and the C6 essentially lacks nothing important. The TV supports 4K at 120 Hz from consoles, and when connected to a PC it can even run at 165 Hz. On top of that there’s VRR from 40 to 165 Hz, ALLM and a properly functioning HGiG. Another big plus is support for Dolby Vision in games, so the Xbox Series X can use that format without giving up game mode. The package is rounded out by the Game Bar, which lets you quickly check key signal parameters and change settings without leaving your game. In terms of features alone, the C6 is one of those TVs it’s really hard to fault. Whether you play on PlayStation, Xbox or PC, practically everything you could expect from a modern gaming TV is available here.