Panasonic W85 vs Hisense U7S / U77SE

Unfortunately, we don't have good news here. The Panasonic W85B is rather dim – its peak brightness does not exceed 300 nits, so it's hard to talk about any true HDR effect. In practice, this means that scenes which on other screens can "shine" and make an impression, here look simply like regular SDR with a slight boost in colors. Our measurements and film tests confirmed this – regardless of the content, the W85B won't extract anything more from HDR. So if someone is looking for a TV specifically for HDR, it's better to look towards other models. As a consolation, the fact remains that in terms of colors, the W85B performs quite well. It's a QLED TV, so its color gamut coverage is wide, and most films and series look natural, without a distinct "washed out" effect. The colors are saturated, so during regular viewing, there is no sense that something is quite wrong.

The Hisense U7S has considerable HDR potential, but it can't use it in every scene. On a test pattern it reaches around 1,100 nits, so the backlight itself is very strong. In our brighter film scenes we measured about 640 to 745 nits. That's still enough for the sun or bright highlights to have a noticeable glow and to show an advantage over SDR material. When the TV needs to illuminate a larger portion of the image, it does quite well.

The problem appears with small lights on a dark background. Each of the 192 zones covers an area much larger than a tiny point on the screen. If the TV were to strongly light such a zone, it would also brighten the surrounding area along with the light. Hisense tries to avoid that and dims the entire zone. Black levels therefore look better, but a small bright object that should draw the eye also loses intensity. That's why in two tougher scenes we recorded only 297 and 154 nits. The difference is large: in one shot HDR can impress, and in the next small lights are noticeably muted. The U7S therefore prioritizes maintaining deep blacks, even at the expense of bright details. With this number of zones that's an understandable compromise, but it's worth remembering — the 1,100-nit peak tells us about the backlight's capability, not how brightly the TV will render every element of a film.

Colors

Hisense calls the U7S ULED, but that's a marketing name; the wider color gamut here comes from a PFS phosphor backlight. In our measurements the TV covered about 91% of DCI-P3 and 71% of BT.2020. Those are good results, although it falls short of the best screens on the market. The biggest shortfall is in green — the TV doesn't even reach the DCI-P3 target there, so the most saturated shades will be less intense than they should be. Most colors in HDR films and series, however, still look suitably rich. A positive is the repeatability of the results. Gamut coverage on test patterns and in film scenes is practically identical.

While testing the Panasonic W85B, we of course started with the Filmmaker mode, as it is the gold standard today for watching content "as the director intended." The problem is that this TV is quite far from those intentions. The biggest issue turned out to be an excess of red – in both SDR and HDR. The picture often looked overly warm, and in some scenes, it appeared almost "blazing." Additionally, there’s the issue of brightness management. When we looked at the gamma and EOTF charts, it was clear as day that in most scenes, the TV brightens the image more than it should. The effect was easy to predict. Details can get lost, leading to flattening and clipping across the entire screen. Of course, we know how to improve this, but it must be said honestly that it requires quite a bit of work in calibration. Out of the box, the W85B does not provide a reference-level picture – it is rather a TV that will always interpret colors and brightness a bit "its own way" without professional adjustments. Unfortunately, this is to the detriment of the viewer.

The out-of-the-box colors on the Hisense U7S are decent, but there are a few things to improve. In SDR there's a red bias in the white balance, which makes the image too warm and in places slightly pink. You can notice this on faces and on bright, neutral surfaces. Gamma also runs below the reference, so the TV brightens the image, especially in darker areas. That makes shadow details easier to see, but the scene loses some of its depth.

In HDR the white balance is a bit more even, but not completely neutral; midtones lack blue, and the brightest areas lack red. A bigger problem is how brightness is reproduced. The EOTF curve shows that a large portion of midtones is being brightened, so the image looks brighter than the source material intends. Color Checker measurements also perform worse than in SDR: many errors are around 3 to 4, and individual ones reach as high as 8. Colors can therefore look attractive, but they are not always faithful to what we should be seeing. There's room for improvement, and we'll check how much can be corrected with calibration.

Fortunately, calibration made a significant difference for the Panasonic W85B, especially in SDR content. Here, the improvement was really noticeable – we managed to balance the white and reasonably tame the TV's tendency to excessively brighten the entire image. The picture became more coherent, and the colors gained a naturalness that was lacking in the factory settings. Admittedly, the results from the Color Checker are not perfect, as the W85B has visible issues with green saturation, but overall, we assess the post-calibration effect in SDR very positively. The situation with HDR is a bit different. Here, we were also able to limit the tendency to warm up the entire scene, so the image turned out much better than in the factory settings. However, the same problem we mentioned earlier is still evident – the TV interprets the image too "in its own way" and brightens the entire frame. The lack of local dimming only exacerbates this effect. In summary, briefly in SDR content, the W85B performs really well after calibration and is perfectly suitable for everyday viewing. However, in HDR, even after adjustments, it is still hard to unequivocally recommend it for serious viewing sessions.

Calibration of the Hisense U7S helped most with SDR content. We managed to even out the white balance, so the previous warm cast is gone and whites and grays look neutral. Gamma is also now very close to the reference, and the TV no longer brightens the image unnecessarily, so darker scenes have regained depth. Color Checker measurements confirm the improvement: most errors fall below 2. That yields a really well-calibrated picture for regular TV and SDR movies. It didn't go as smoothly in HDR. The TV lacks an effective way to correct the EOTF curve, so Hisense still interprets the content's brightness a bit on its own. It brightens parts of the image and can dim the brightest elements depending on the scene and the local dimming behavior. Calibration couldn't eliminate this. It shows up in the Color Checker results as well, where many errors remain around 3–4 and individual ones exceed 7. So in SDR the result is very good, but in HDR we have to accept that the TV adds its own interpretation of brightness to the image.

With native SDR content, the Panasonic W85B performs very well – tonal transitions are smooth and natural, without artificial bands or clear contours. However, the situation looks worse with lower resolution materials. This is where the television has the biggest problem with "beautifying" the image. The lack of any option in the menu that would allow for improving gradation means that with older films or materials from YouTube, one can sometimes notice slight issues with color blending.

Fortunately, upscaling, or increasing the quality of lower resolution content, performs much better. This is definitely a strong point of this model – the image is scaled cleanly and in detail, and the television handles this better than one might expect from such an affordable device. This is thanks to the HCX processor, which Panasonic has been developing for years, and it shows that even in the lower series, it can do a good job.

The handling of lower-quality material on the Hisense U7S is fairly mediocre. The Pentonic 700 chipset used here doesn't cope well with the effects of heavy compression. The menu includes a "Smooth & Gradient" picture option, but its performance leaves much to be desired. At the low setting it's hard to notice any improvement in tonal transitions, although at least the image isn't degraded. The medium and high settings still don't remove visible banding between shades and begin to smear details; in our test clips even parts of characters' faces disappeared. Interestingly, film grain remains untouched at every level. If you use this feature, we'd stick with the low setting. Its current behavior needs refinement, but that's mainly down to the processor used. Upscaling to 4K performs much better. Lower-resolution footage gains clarity, edges are well reconstructed, and fine elements look crisp. That doesn't mean it can recover details that weren't in the recording, but the TV makes good use of what it gets from the source. Another plus is that it doesn't crop the image edges, even with an SD signal.

At first glance, everything looks good – the Panasonic W85B has a 120 Hz panel and even a 144 Hz mode, so it seems that it should handle smooth motion well. The problem begins when we look into the settings. The options for improving fluidity are supposedly present in the menu, but in practice… they change nothing. No matter what we choose, the image looks the same. On top of that, there's a lack of BFI, which is the black frame insertion mode that helps sharpen motion in many TVs. And suddenly, it turns out that despite having a strong panel, the W85B doesn't give us any real tools to adjust that motion to our needs. It only works well when the source itself operates at a higher frequency – for example, games at 120 Hz. But when it comes to movies or sports, we just have to take what the TV shows us, because there's nothing more we can do about it.

Motion handling on the Hisense U7S is pretty good thanks to the 144 Hz refresh rate. For movies we also have a motion smoothing feature that lets you adjust judder and blur reduction. You can therefore keep a more cinematic motion or increase smoothness if abrupt camera shifts bother you. In sports and games the high refresh rate is also useful, but unfortunately it doesn't solve this panel's biggest problem.

The culprit is pixel response time. Fast-moving objects leave long, noticeable trails, as our UFO test shows. It's worst on dark backgrounds, where the trail behind the object is especially pronounced. So motion can be smooth, but the moving object itself loses sharpness, and that difference on the U7S is fairly easy to notice.

On paper, the Panasonic W85B looks really solid. Here we have two full HDMI 2.1 ports, support for ALLM, variable refresh rate, Dolby Vision in games, and of course, a high refresh rate for the panel itself. Additionally, there’s the characteristic Panasonic game bar that allows you to check key parameters with one click and quickly change them if necessary. Sounds great, but the problem arises when we activate HDR. Here, the W85B significantly falters because it lacks proper HGiG implementation – the TV manages brightness poorly, and instead of faithful image rendering, we get scenes that are too bright, sometimes even blown out. The solution? The simplest – turn off HDR in the console settings and leave everything in SDR. And here it gets really interesting, because in this scenario, the W85B shows its better side. Low input lag, high smoothness thanks to 120 Hz – all of this makes gaming look phenomenal. Yes, HDR can be sacrificed, but if responsiveness and smooth gameplay are priorities, the W85B provides a lot of fun.

The Hisense U7S has a lot to offer gamers. You get two HDMI 2.1 ports and support for 120 Hz at Full HD, 1440p, and 4K, so modern consoles’ capabilities are well used. When connected to a PC you can use 144 Hz at 4K or switch the resolution to Full HD and run 240 Hz. So there’s a wide choice, although it’s worth remembering the motion smearing mentioned earlier, which the high refresh rate does not eliminate. VRR and ALLM are also present. The first helps prevent tearing when frame rates in a game change. The second automatically switches the TV into game mode, so you don’t have to dig through the menu each time. VRR works from 48 to 240 Hz, with the highest refresh rate available in Full HD. Xbox users can also play in Dolby Vision, including at 120 Hz. Importantly, this format does not introduce significant input lag here. The Game Bar also looks very good. It’s easy to read, visually appealing, and lets you quickly check what signal the TV is receiving. There are also handy gaming settings at your fingertips, including shadow brightening. If it’s hard to spot an opponent in a dark game, you can improve visibility without digging through the entire menu.

Our biggest complaints concern HGiG. Hisense continues to do its own tone mapping, which makes setting HDR on the console confusing. You adjust a checkerboard test pattern and the TV continuously adapts how it looks. As a result, the moment the pattern disappears does not correctly indicate the screen’s brightness limit, and it’s easy to set the value too high. For this model it’s better to set the target HDR peak brightness on the console to about 900 to 1000 nits, rather than relying on the configurator.