Samsung announced its 8K TVs' pricing and launch date and you aren't going to like at least one of them

Massive screens with twice the definition of 4K don't come as cheap as you might think

Samsung Q900R QLED
Duncan Bell
By
published
in News

One of the biggest buzzes of CES 2019 was Samsung's new wave of 8K TVs. Sure, they were only really smaller versions of last year's Q900R, but that QLED set remains the most cutting-edge TV you can buy, at least in terms of screen resolution.

A lot of the really fancy TVs at CES don't arrive in shops until months later, and sometimes not at all. For instance, LG still has no official word on pricing for its rollable OLED TV – although we can tell you now it won't be cheap. Samsung is not messing about when it comes to its forays into 8K and it's already announced pricing and on-sale dates. And I will reveal them to you right after you have seen these exciting further reading opportunities…

Samsung already has 8K TVs in 65-inch and 75-inch screen sizes (pricing is below), but it's now rounding out the range with 75-inch, 82-inch and 98-inch (!) screens.

According to Samsung's own site, US pricing will be as follows: 

• 82-inch Samsung 8K QLED TV, out March 22, $9,999 (£7,700)

• 85-inch Samsung 8K QLED TV, out February 8, $14,999 (about £11,500)

• The 98-inch model is TBC in terms of both price and launch date. 

An 8K TV has a resolution of 7,680 x 4,320 pixels, which is 16x the resolution of full HD. As you'd imagine, there are all the usual bells and whistles of a high-end TV in 2019, with advanced HDR for better colour and contrast, a cutting edge smart TV platform, voice control and built-in AI. Apple AirPlay, iTunes video and music and HomeKit should also be added to Samsung's boxes of tricks in 2019.

The one thing that's lacking at present is 8K, as there is only one 8K broadcast channel in the entire world, and only a small smattering of demo videos available to stream. Samsung gets around this minor inconvenience by upscaling lower-resolution video to full 8K. As you'd imagine, this works somewhat better with 4K Netflix movies or UHD Blu-ray than it does with a standard-def clip sent from your mobile.

Via Sammobile

Duncan Bell
Duncan Bell

Duncan is the former lifestyle editor of T3 and has been writing about tech for almost 15 years. He has covered everything from smartphones to headphones, TV to AC and air fryers to the movies of James Bond and obscure anime. His current brief is everything to do with the home and kitchen, which is good because he is an excellent cook, if he says so himself. He also covers cycling and ebikes – like over-using italics, this is another passion of his. In his long and varied lifestyle-tech career he is one of the few people to have been a fitness editor despite being unfit and a cars editor for not one but two websites, despite being unable to drive. He also has about 400 vacuum cleaners, and is possibly the UK's leading expert on cordless vacuum cleaners, despite being decidedly messy. A cricket fan for over 30 years, he also recently become T3's cricket editor, writing about how to stream obscure T20 tournaments, and turning out some typically no-nonsense opinions on the world's top teams and players.

Before T3, Duncan was a music and film reviewer, worked for a magazine about gambling that employed a surprisingly large number of convicted criminals, and then a magazine called Bizarre that was essentially like a cross between Reddit and DeviantArt, before the invention of the internet. There was also a lengthy period where he essentially wrote all of T3 magazine every month for about 3 years. 

A broadcaster, raconteur and public speaker, Duncan used to be on telly loads, but an unfortunate incident put a stop to that, so he now largely contents himself with telling people, "I used to be on the TV, you know."

Latest