Panasonic W70A vs Samsung OLED S95H (S99H) (QD-OLED)

HDR on the Panasonic W70A unfortunately does not impress. Brightness at the level of 250–300 nits is simply too low to feel the true magic of cinematic effects in dynamic, bright scenes. Images that should "explode" with light appear rather flat, and fine details in bright areas often get lost in the average luminance of the panel. On the positive side, the HDR effect is at least stable. The TV does not suffer from excessive brightening nor does it lose details during sudden scene changes. Everything is predictable and calm, though unfortunately not very spectacular. Another issue is the color gamut coverage. The W70A is not equipped with an additional layer of quantum dots (often known as QLED), resulting in colors appearing rather mediocre. There is a lack of depth in reds, saturation in greens, and precision in rendering subtle shades.

When it comes to brightness alone, the S99H is an astronomically bright TV. Its peak brightness in movie scenes can exceed 2800 nits! Regardless of the scene, you can count on powerful HDR effects that practically blind you, and that's exactly what we expect from a top-tier screen. It's inherent to OLED panels that in very bright, full-screen shots they won't sustain as high a brightness as they do with small highlights, but the results are still excellent. In a bright scene from the film The Meg, the sun still exceeded 2200 nits. That means the S99H was able to maintain higher brightness than most Mini LED screens on the market. In terms of brightness, the S99H is currently the best OLED TV we've tested.

Color gamut coverage

The S99H also handles color exceptionally well, which is a direct result of the QD-OLED panel used here. Regardless of the test scenario, whether synthetic test patterns or measurements with film material in the background, the results stayed at a very high level. The S99H easily covers almost 100% of the DCI-P3 gamut, and for the most demanding color space it reaches nearly 90% of BT.2020. That's top-tier performance on the market. These results match what we saw in the new SQD-Mini-LED screens, and in real movie scenes they even outperform RGB Mini LED displays.

The Panasonic W70A was tested in movie mode, which theoretically should guarantee the most natural image reproduction. Unfortunately, as is often the case with budget televisions, the reality proved far from ideal.

In HD (SDR) content, the white balance was severely disrupted by an excess of red and a noticeable drop in blue tones. The result? The image had a distinctly warm, even yellowish tint, which is clearly visible in the comparison photo. In the case of 4K HDR materials, the situation reversed. Here, the image became excessively cold and bluish, causing scenes to lose their naturalness and depth. The differences are visible even to the naked eye, especially in the bright parts of the image. The Colour Checker palette test confirmed our observations. Most color samples did not hit their intended points, "running away" towards warmer shades in SDR and cooler ones in HDR. As for brightness characteristics, both gamma and the EOTF curve showed significant problems. The image tended to excessively brighten certain areas, disrupting the balance and leading to a loss of details in darker and brighter regions.

In summary – the factory color reproduction settings in the Panasonic W70A leave much to be desired. The image is far from neutral, and the errors in white balance and gamma mean that a solid calibration is needed to extract the full potential from this television.

Samsung offers a whole host of picture modes and features, but as usual we recommend choosing Filmmaker Mode, especially if you want the most faithful rendering of the creators' intent. Out of the box the TV is tuned very well, though it has minor shortcomings. This mainly concerns a slight drift in white balance in SDR content and a slightly low gamma. As a result, in a darker room the image can be a bit too bright relative to the reference gamma of 2.4, which is the standard for watching films with the lights off. These are of course small issues, since overall color reproduction remains very good and the errors in ColorChecker measurements are small. However, we know that from a screen of the S99H's class you can and should expect even more, so we had it professionally calibrated.

The Panasonic W70A, despite its limitations, gave us a lot of room to maneuver during calibration. Thanks to well-developed tools, we were able to achieve significantly better white balance in both HD (SDR) and 4K HDR content. The issues with excess red in SDR and overly cool images in HDR have disappeared. The gamma brightness characteristic has also improved, maintaining stability and avoiding excessive brightness or loss of detail in darker areas.

So where is the problem? Unfortunately, there are barriers that even professional calibration cannot overcome. Poor coverage of a wide color gamut means that the TV cannot fully reproduce colors in HDR materials. There is a lack of saturation, and subtle color transitions still appear somewhat "flattened." Another limitation is brightness management, which results from the use of an IPS panel. In the comparative photo featuring the actress's face in colorful clothing, it is clearly visible how some shades are noticeably muted, and colors lose their depth and brightness.

The calibration extracted everything it could from the W70A. The image is now much more natural, and the errors in the factory settings have been effectively corrected. Unfortunately, hardware limitations in the form of poor color gamut coverage and an average panel prevent us from achieving spectacular results, especially in HDR content.

After professional calibration, FILMMAKER mode looks virtually perfect. Because Samsung offers a rich set of advanced calibration features, we were able to tune the colors to an almost perfect level. Most importantly, we were able to even out the white balance and the gamma curve, which resulted in noticeably better contrast and a more natural image dimensionality. With a profile prepared like this, there's really nothing to nitpick or call a flaw. After calibration, the S99H is capable of delivering an essentially reference-quality image.

We checked how the Panasonic W70A performs in improving content of lower quality than 4K, and it must be admitted that the television does quite well in this regard. The "Zeroing Counter" function is responsible for smoothing tonal transitions. The optimal setting turned out to be the Average option, which effectively smooths out color gradation issues while not ruining the film grain. This is the setting we recommend for most users, as it provides a balance between improving the fluidity of transitions and maintaining the naturalness of the image.

As for image scaling, the Panasonic W70A performed really well. The test pattern with the model was positively evaluated – details on her clothing were well reproduced, and the contours of her face retained sharpness. In the background, we noticed slight "jaggies" on thin branches, but these are details that only a very observant eye will catch. However, it is worth noting a certain flaw of this model – the television has a tendency to overscan, which means slight cropping of the image edges. This is not a very intense phenomenon and for most users it will be practically unnoticeable, but if we care about perfect framing, it is worth keeping this in mind.

The proprietary Samsung NQ4 Gen3 processor handles upscaling and digital image processing. It does a very good job scaling lower-resolution material to 4K. The picture is sharp but doesn't look artificial or overly sharpened. The only fairly specific drawback appears with very old footage shot at 480p or lower. In those cases the TV can slightly crop the edges of the image.

The processor also copes quite well with artifacts visible in low-bitrate material, for example heavily compressed YouTube videos. The noise reduction feature effectively smooths the image and reduces posterization, but it works rather aggressively. It can remove not only unwanted artifacts but also some fine details and even natural film grain. We, wanting to preserve maximum fidelity to the source material, chose not to use it. However, if someone values a clean, as-smooth-as-possible image over keeping every detail, it can be useful.

The Panasonic W70A is equipped with a 60 Hz panel, which immediately suggests that the television will perform best when watching movies, series, or everyday TV content. In more dynamic scenes, such as sports broadcasts or games, the panel's limitations become more noticeable. On the positive side, it is worth noting the presence of a motion smoother called "Effect," which offers three levels of adjustment - low, medium, and high.

Each of the settings allows you to adjust motion fluidity to your own preferences, minimizing motion blur and improving clarity in dynamic shots. In practice, the Medium setting seems to be the most versatile - it offers better fluidity without excessive "soap opera effect," which can look artificial in feature films. The High setting may work well for sports broadcasts, but in films, it can disrupt the natural character of movement.

Another major advantage of OLED panels is excellent motion reproduction. Thanks to the pixels' near instant response time, the Samsung S99H practically produces no smearing. Fast-moving objects don't show noticeable halos or trailing artifacts, so the TV performs very well for both watching sports and gaming. One quirk of OLED screens compared with LCDs is how they render low frame rate material. With very slow camera movement the image can appear noticeably more stuttery. This can be quite effectively mitigated using a frame interpolation system. Samsung lets you adjust judder reduction and blur reduction separately, making it easy to find a compromise between smoother motion and preserving the cinematic character of the content.

The Panasonic W70A is a television that will be more suitable for occasional gamers than for avid players. The 60 Hz panel does not allow for full utilization of the potential of new generation consoles, especially in dynamic titles. The lack of HDMI 2.1 somewhat limits its capabilities, but fortunately, we find features such as ALLM, which is automatic switching to game mode, and VRR, which helps minimize screen tearing. It's also worth noting the support for Dolby Vision in games and HGiG, which makes HDR more predictable and looks solid. It's just a pity that the Game Bar is missing. This feature is already standard in many televisions and provides quick access to the most important settings for gamers. The W70A holds up when it comes to gaming, but it has its limitations. It works well with calmer titles, while more demanding players may feel unsatisfied.

Samsung S99H is also an excellent TV for gamers. It offers almost every useful feature... well, maybe except the obvious lack of Dolby Vision for Xbox consoles. It's equipped with four fully functional HDMI 2.1 ports with the full 48 Gbps bandwidth. Thanks to that we can easily use frame-rate synchronization VRR and automatic low-latency mode (ALLM). This year Samsung also has no issues with proper HGiG support, so HDR setup on a console is quick and without unnecessary complications. Samsung is also known for interesting extras in its TVs. In the Game Bar menu you'll find options to add an on-screen crosshair, enlarge the mini-map, or change the aspect ratio of the displayed image (PC).

Particularly noteworthy is Samsung's feature: Game Motion Plus. It's Samsung's proprietary motion-smoothing system that uses interpolation to increase smoothness in games. Input lag then rises to around 40 to 50 ms (depending on the strength of the setting), which is an excellent result compared to the competition. The system makes gameplay noticeably smoother. So if someone has their eye on a demanding game (e.g., GTA 6 😉) that runs at only 30 frames per second on console, the S99H can display it much more smoothly than competing models.