When it comes to buying a Samsung TV, there are many people who have doubts between buying a Crystal UHD or QLED TV. At first glance, it often seems that they are similar but there are quite a few differences.
To help you understand the differences between Samsung Crystal UHD and QLED TVs we have decided to create this article for you to choose the one that best suits your needs. Below, you will learn about the differences between a Crystal UHD vs QLED TV.
What is Crystal UHD?
Crystal UHD is the term Samsung uses to denote its entry-level TVs. These are LED TVs that are more affordably priced but have a wide range of features. By using the term Crystal UHD it makes many people think that this is a new technology compared to conventional 4K UHD TVs.
But actually, Crystal UHD is not any novel technology and is based on an LCD panel with perimeter LED backlighting (Edge LED). The LEDs are located only at the bottom and the panels used are VA type.
According to Samsung the term Crystal UHD comes from using a panel consisting of crystalline inorganic nanoparticles, which do not degrade over time. But to be exact, what is used are a kind of phosphors made of inorganic particles coating the LED bulbs which will help to generate a whiter light.
LEDs are usually blue in televisions and a yellow phosphor is usually added coating them to convert this blue light to white and then use color filters to generate the red, green and blue colors. In the case of the Crystal UHD CU8000 series, these red and green phosphors are added instead of the yellow phosphor. This system is what Samsung calls Dynamic Crystal Color and helps generate a purer light than with the usual system where the LED is coated with a yellow phosphor.
In this 2023 only two new Crystal UHD series have been launched: CU8000 and CU8500, although it is really as if we were talking about a single TV since only the design of the foot changes.
The other series that completes the 2023 Crystal UHD range, the CU7100, does not incorporate Dynamic Crystal Color technology. Therefore, it does not include the crystalline particles with red and green phosphors coating the LED. This is a very basic model and is noticeably inferior in terms of color and brightness. When there is a white background, it is also seen how the CU8000/8500 series delivers a more neutral and pure white with no color contamination.
Although both the CU7100 and CU8000/85000 series employ 16-bit color mapping to enhance the color palette, we recommend buying the CU8000 series. You won’t pay much more for it, but in return you will enjoy a better image, as well as other extras and a slimmer design.
See prices Samsung Crystal UHD series
What is QLED?
Now it is the turn to explain how Samsung’s QLED TVs work. QLED refers to the use of Quantum Dot technology, which are nanoparticles that, depending on their size, are able to modify one wavelength into another.
In the case of Samsung’s QLED TVs, the LEDs also emit blue light, but they are not coated with any phosphors, but the light emitted by the blue LED is allowed to pass through, so the blue color would already be created. To create the red and green color, a film with millions of these nanoparticles in different sizes ranging from 2 nanometers to 10 nanometers is added.
One of the main features of Quantum Dots is that the electrical and optical properties of the material, as well as the colors of the light it emits, can be adjusted by slightly changing the size of the particles.
Samsung QLED TVs Quantum Dot technology – Crystal UHD vs QLED
Thanks to Quantum Dots, purer colors and a wider color palette are achieved. It also improves what is called color volume which measures color at different brightness levels. Samsung’s QLED TVs can reach up to 100% color volume. This means that colors will better maintain saturation at higher brightness levels, rather than becoming whiter as brightness increases. This is especially interesting with new HDR content. Also, the use of this technology slightly improves the viewing angle.
Samsung’s 2023 range of QLED TVs is very broad. Almost all of their TVs already use this technology, with the exception of the CU7100 and CU8000/8500 series, which we have already seen. From the Q60C series onwards, they already use this technology. The high-end Neo QLED TVs also use Mini LED backlighting, which increases brightness and black levels.
Conclusions: Crystal UHD vs QLED Which one to choose?
QLED TVs are better than Crystal UHD as they achieve higher brightness and better color reproduction thanks to the use of Quantum Dot nanoparticles. QLED models can achieve 100% color volume which means that color saturation is maintained regardless of the brightness level of the picture.
Crystal UHD TVs provide a duller picture with colors that are not as vivid and have a narrower viewing angle. In return, they are priced more economically and you can even get them for a 85-inch TV for around 1500$.
So if you want a TV that gives you a good picture quality we recommend you to buy a TV with QLED technology. Below is our list of the QLED TVs that we recommend the most. And if you already want a high-end TV with more advanced features, you have the Neo QLED TVs that use quantum dot technology along with a more advanced backlighting system with 40 times smaller bulbs and a greater number of Local Dimming zones.
Recommended Samsung QLED and Neo QLED TVs
Quantum HDR, Dual LED, Smart TV with Alexa Built
Dolby Atmos Object Tracking Sound Lite, Direct Full Array, Q-Symphony 3.0
Mini LED Quantum HDR 32x, Dolby Atmos, OTS+, Ultra Viewing Angle
Thank you so much for all the great information and the great explanations! Mike