Vizio P-Series Quantum review: Can't afford a 65-inch OLED? Here's the next-best thing

Vizio's P-Series Quantum is something special. It's hands-down Vizio's best TV ever, and one of the best-performing LCD TVs I've ever tested from any brand. It's only available in a 65-inch size, model PQ65-F1. And the list price is expensive for a Vizio at $2,100.

8.3

Vizio P-Series Quantum

The Good

The Vizio P-Series Quantum's overall image quality is as good as any non-OLED TV on the market. It's blindingly bright, offering a superb HDR image and great performance in a bright room. Effective full-array local dimming creates deep black levels and minimizes blooming. Styling is sleek and modern.

The Bad

OLED TVs have a better picture and don't cost that much more than the Quantum's list price. Some banding artifacts in 4K HDR material. Poor remote and smart TV features. Only available in a 65-inch size.

The Bottom Line

If you can't afford an OLED TV, the Vizio P-Series Quantum is the closest you'll get to picture quality perfection.

At that price you're close to 65-inch OLED TV territory. The Quantum isn't as good as LG's cheapest 2018 OLED, the B8 series, nor is it as good as LG's 2017 OLED models, which are still around and cost around the same as the Quantum right now. If you have that kind of money to rub together for a new TV, just bite the bullet and get an OLED.

But discounts are a wonderful thing. Like many other TVs the Quantum will likely get a significant price cut soon for the Black Friday and holiday buying season. In fact it already had one, going down to $1,500 at club stores Sam's Club and Costco in late August through mid-September. I expect a similar sale price to hit in the near future.

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At $1,500 the P-Series Quantum is an absolute steal. It outperforms any non-OLED TV I've reviewed this year. Samsung's flagship Q9 (review coming soon) did beat it in some of my side-by-side tests -- including bright-room performance and HDR punch -- but the PQ was still close. It outperformed the Q9 in other areas. Vizio's TV is super-bright with superb contrast, and makes just about any high-quality video look as good as possible on an LCD TV. And it costs a lot less than the Q9 or Sony's Master Series Z9F.

To get a significantly better picture you'll have to spring for an OLED, and depending on the price difference between the Quantum and LG's B8 OLED, which is due for its own Black Friday discount, it might be worth going for the big "O." But if that's not happening, and you still want a better picture than you'll get from the TCL 6 series, Vizio P-Series, Sony X900F and Samsung Q8s of the world, go for Vizio's "Q."

Good lookin' TV, bad remote and streaming

I called the standard P-Series "the nicest-looking Vizio TV I've ever seen," but the Quantum is even sleeker. Its minimalist frame is all black, interrupted only by the cutest, teensiest little Vizio "V" on the lower right. Glass extends almost all the way to the edge on all four sides.

The only color accent from the front is the chrome of the thin support legs, which disappear when you wall-mount the TV. From the side there's a matching textured strip of chrome. The overall look is classic, clean and all-business. There's nothing cheap-looking about it.

Unfortunately the remote, the same tired wand Vizio has been waving for years, does feel cheap. It also has too many buttons and I kept having to glance down rather than operate it by feel. I prefer the simplicity of TCL's Roku TV remote or Samsung and LG's evolved clickers.

I'm also disappointed by Vizio's SmartCast smart TV system. It's less capable, slower and generally inferior to others, including Roku, Samsung, LG and Sony's Android TV. It does offer the ability to cast apps from your phone, if you're into that, with its built-in Chromecast function. Vizio also adds the ability to sort apps in the order you prefer, but the biggest issues, including a home screen crowded with shows you might not care about, remain.

Vizio's WatchFree service is a new addition aimed at cord cutters who want free TV. It's a partnership with the Pluto TV free service and uses the same grid-style layout as a typical cable box. Most of the channels are from Pluto itself, with names that include Failarmy and Adventure TV. Or they're free feeds from online sources such as Bloomberg and Cheddar. Even the familiar channels, like Fox Sports and something called "NBC News / MSNBC" aren't the same as those channels. There's a lot of free stuff to watch so it's tough to complain, but Roku, with Featured Free and the Roku Channel does a better job in general of delivering free, ad-supported video.

Although it lacks its the built-in voice assistant found on Sony, Samsung and LG TVs, you can control the Vizio to some extent with Google Assistant (details here) and Alexa (here) smart speakers. I didn't test that functionality this time around, but Google Home worked relatively well with the 2017 M-Series.

But if you're getting a Quantum, I'd recommend you skip Vizio's streaming altogether. Do yourself a favor and get an external streamer such as the Roku Streaming Stick Plus. Or, if you want Dolby Vision, get an Apple TV 4K or Amazon Fire TV Stick 4K. 

A Q by any other name

So what makes Quantum different from the "regular" Vizio P-Series, which comes in a larger range of sizes and costs a lot less at 65 inches? Quite a bit.

As you might expect from the name, the Quantum uses quantum dots so it can achieve a wider color gamut. According to my measurements, the dots allow it to cover about 4 percent more of the P3 gamut than the standard Vizio P-Series. The PQ65-F1 matches the gamut coverage of Samsung's quantum dot-equipped QLED sets and LG's OLEDs.

The biggest difference is the PQ's searing light output, which measures well over the 2,000 nits Vizio touts on my review sample. That's more than double the brightness of the standard Vizio P. It competes well against Samsung's Q9 and Q8 sets, and trounces OLED's brightness. The Quantum also boasts more zones of full-array local dimming -- 192 compared to the 65-inch P-Series' 100. 

Zone number is an important spec because it controls how precise the dimming can be. More zones doesn't necessarily mean better picture quality, however, and in comparing the P-Series and PQ I was hard pressed to see any Q advantage that resulted directly from its higher zone count. Check the video below for a cool demo of the zone count differences.

Otherwise the Quantum and P-Series' image quality chops are largely the same. Both have a true 120Hz refresh rate panel, just like Sony and Samsung, and they're better than the 60Hz panels found on cheaper Vizios and TCL sets. Although you should ignore Vizio's "240Hz effective" and "Clear Action 960" claims, Vizio's 120Hz panel does improve video processing and also allows the option to engage MEMC (motion estimation, motion compensation) -- also known as the soap opera effect. Like LG, TCL and Sony, Vizio supports both major types of HDR, HDR10 and Dolby Vision, in the P-Series Quantum.

• Four HDMI inputs (version 2.0, with HDCP 2.2)
  
• One HDMI input (version 1.4, 1080p/120Hz input capable)
  
• One component-composite video input
  
• One USB port
  
• RF antenna tuner input
  
• Ethernet port
  
• Optical digital audio output
  
• Stereo analog audio output
  

Connectivity is identical to the standard P-Series. Four of the inputs can accept all major 4K and HDR sources. A fifth HDMI input can accept neither HDR nor 4K sources. Instead, Input 5 can handle 1080p at 120Hz input, ideal for so-equipped gaming PCs (we didn't test this function). Gamers will also appreciate that Input 5 has lower input lag than the others.

Beyond HDMI, the selection is solid and, unlike some major TV makers, includes an analog (composite/component) video input. And yes, unlike 2017 Vizio TVs the PQ does include an antenna port for the TV's built-in over-the-air TV tuner, just like those of competitors. The tuner has real value to cord cutters and others who don't subscribe to cable or satellite TV.

Picture quality

The PQ is one of the best LCD-based TVs I've tested, and earns the year's first "9" score in this category. It's not as good overall as LG's OLED TVs (which earn the "10"), but it can get brighter and delivers otherwise excellent image quality in nearly every area. The only TVs that match or beat its picture, namely OLEDs and Samsung's Q9, cost a heck of a lot more. TVs that cost less, such as Vizio's standard P-Series and TCL's 6 series, don't perform as well -- especially with the highest-quality 4K and HDR images.

The PQ has superb black levels and contrast for home theater lighting as well as one of the best bright-room images on the market, second only to the Samsung Q9 among TVs I've tested. Video processing and uniformity are top-notch. While the Q9 has more impactful HDR, its shadow detail with standard dynamic range falls short of the PQ. I also noticed some banding in HDR material on the Vizio, but it was rare and certainly didn't ruin an otherwise outstanding performance.

Click the image at the right to see the picture settings used in the review and to read more about how this TV's picture controls worked during calibration.

Dim lighting: To establish a black level baseline I turned first to the super-dark torture test: Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2, Chapter 10, where Voldemort's gang invades Hogwart's.

I was surprised to see the dark areas and letterbox bars of the Vizio PQ weren't quite as deep as the original P-Series or especially the Samsung Q9. But they were still excellent, and deeper than any of the other LCDs. The PQ showed more shadow detail than the Q9, which obscured (or "crushed") a lot of the detail in areas near black, like the robes of the attackers. In these scenes the original P-Series looked a bit better overall than the PQ, although the latter still beat the black levels of the Sony and TCL.

With Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom on standard Blu-ray, the submarine scenes at the very beginning stacked up in a similar way between the sets, with the Q9 delivering the deepest black levels (aside from the LG OLED) and the PQ a hair lighter, with superior shadow detail, and a near-match for the original P-Series. 

As the scenes brightened just a bit to show the sub's searchlights of the surface of the island at night, the differences became less pronounced between all of the sets. But the OLED still looked the best with its superior contrast, and the Sony and TCL letterbox bars still looked a bit brighter -- which in turn hurt their contrast in comparison to the other three LCDs

Between those three -- the PQ, P-Series and Q9 -- black levels were similar in the brighter but still mostly dark scenes from Chapter 1, where the worker tries to evade the rampaging dinosaurs in the storm. The Q9 continued to show a bit less detail in shadows at times but otherwise the contrast of the three looked basically the same.  

Bright lighting: This is one bright TV. In terms of raw light output only the Samsung sets, the Q8 and Q9, beat the Vizio PQ with a standard 10 percent window pattern. With a full-white screen -- think a hockey game or skiing -- the PQ pulled ahead of both slightly. All three can get blindingly bright in their most potent picture modes, Dynamic and Vivid respectively, and exceedingly bright with HDR too.

In Samsung's case that level of brightness is only maintained for a few seconds in Dynamic mode before it dims considerably, while other modes maintained light output consistently. Neither the PQ nor other non-Samsung TVs evinced that kind of abrupt in any mode.

Dynamic and Vivid are terribly inaccurate, as usual, so if you want a bright SDR picture that's actually good, Vizio has the convenience advantage. Its separate "Calibrated" setting puts out a healthy 443 nits in its default settings and climbs to a very impressive 1570 if you turn the local dimming (er, "Xtreme Black Engine Pro") setting to Medium. To get an accurate bright-room SDR image out of the Samsung Q9 you'll have to play around with the picture modes more, for example maxing out the backlight in Movie mode and setting Local Dimming to High (which nets 1600 nits) or adjusting Natural mode by changing its color temperature to Warm 2 (for 1400 nits). I like Vizio's implementation of an accurate bright-room picture mode, and it would be nice if Samsung offered one too.

With HDR sources the Samsungs were brighter in their Dynamic modes but the PQ's Calibrated mode was actually its brightest as well as quite accurate. The Q9's Movie mode was still bright in HDR, however, at just under 2000 nits, while Movie in HDR on the Q8 clocked in at 1200 -- less than half of the PQ's Calibrated.

Where the Samsungs beat the Vizio most handily is in reduction of reflections. The screen of the Q9 and Q8 do the best job I've ever seen of dulling bright spots while simultaneously maintaining deep black levels in a bright room. The PQ is also very good at this, equal to the standard P-Series and the Sony and better than the TCL, but not as good as the LG OLED or especially the Samsungs.

Color accuracy: According to my measurements the PQ delivered excellent accuracy overall before and after calibration, and indeed colors from Jurassic World looked great. The skin tone of Claire (Bryce Dallas Howard) as she ascends the elevator and enters the office looked healthy and not too flush, although the Sony and LG appeared a bit more balanced while on the Samsung she looked a bit pale. Natural colors, like the greens and yellows of the forest in Chapter 3, also came across wh excellent saturation and richness. As usual, however, none of the sets showed a marked difference in color compared to the others, especially if viewed outside a side-by-side comparison.
Video processing: The PQ-Series tested the same in this category as the standard P-Series, and it's very good. Both offer nearly the same nearly the same level of video processing as the Samsung Q8/Q9 and the Sony X900F.

The PQ achieved the maximum 1,200 lines of motion resolution in my test, and was able to do so while maintaining correct 1080p/24 film cadence. To get that result I set Reduce Judder to zero and Reduce Motion Blur to 10 while engaging Clear Action black frame insertion. The latter setting cuts light output significantly, as usual, but unlike on some TVs it doesn't cause massive flicker (as long as Reduce Motion Blur is higher than zero). I still noticed some flicker in the brightest images, however, so I kept it turned off for my tests. With Clear Action disabled, the PQ still managed an acceptable 600 lines of motion resolution as long as Reduce Motion Blur was engaged.

I'm no fan of the soap opera effect, but people who want a little smoothing might appreciate that the PQ's Reduce Judder slider is pleasantly gradual, with barely any smoothing at 1 and slightly more at 2 and 3 before getting into buttery territory at 4 and above.

Unlike most TVs that have a single Game mode to reduce input lag for gaming, the Vizio has a Game Low Latency (GLL) setting that can be applied to any picture mode -- including Game. With 1080p/HD sources, the PQ-Series' lag was very similar to the P-Series and quite good with GLL on, at about 27ms in Calibrated and 31ms in Game mode. With 4K HDR sources the results were similar.

Those numbers were measured on Input 1, but the Input 5 was even better, topping out at a very impressive 14.93 ms (Calibrated, GLL on). As I mentioned above, however, that input is only for 1080p sources, but if you're a twitch gamer going 1080p, Input 5 on the P series among the lowest input lags available.

Uniformity: Brightness across the PQ's screen was quite uniform. With full-field test patterns there were no major bands or bright spots, and only near the edges did I see slight variations in brightness. The Samsung Q9 showed very slightly more banding and backlight structure than PQ, while the P-Series, the Sony and the TCL showed less than the PQ, but the differences between all of them were minor and impossible to discern with real video as opposed to test patterns. The PQ also showed minimal dirty screen effect -- where a moving image reveals minor variations in brightness -- and was very slightly better than my Q9 sample in this area.

From off-angle the Vizio lost black level fidelity and brightness at about the same rate as the other LCD-based sets with the exception of the Q9, which maintained black levels and contrast better than the PQ from seats to either side of the sweet spot right in front of the screen. I tried Vizio's "Enhanced Viewing Angle" setting and it didn't seem to make much difference. It did reduce resolution however, as noted in the item's menu description, so I left it turned off.

Here's where I remind readers that the LG OLED trounced all of the LCD-based TVs in the lineup at just about every aspect of uniformity, with no variations in brightness or color across the screen and very little loss in fidelity from off-angle.

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HDR and 4K video: Only the LG OLED and the Samsung Q9 could match the high dynamic range prowess of the PQ. The others, including the standard P-Series, delivered significantly dimmer highlights, less punch and a duller overall image than those three.

Watching the 4K HDR version of JW: FK, I compared the Samsung Q9 (with the HDR10 version from the 4K Blu-ray) to the Vizio PQ (playing the Dolby Vision version from an Apple TV 4K). The Samsung looked more impactful because it showed the brightest highlights. It also matched the PQ's inky black levels, did a better job of eliminating blooming and, unlike what I saw with SDR, preserved shadow details just as well as the Vizio.

The highlights were the biggest difference between the two. A spot measurement of one of the submarine's lights, for example (1:21), revealed 600 nits on the Q9, 400 on the PQ and LG OLED, and less than 300 on the others. Some of that might have to do with the Samsung's handling of HDR10 but a good portion is attributable to raw LED horsepower.

The HDR10 version on the Vizio PQ looked similar to Dolby Vision, and again less punchy than the Samsung. I also tried playing with the Vizio's local dimming setting, moving from the default Medium to High, but it looked worse since it caused even more blooming and washed out dark areas. Meanwhile, as usual, the LG OLED looked best overall thanks to its perfect black levels, bright-enough highlights and complete lack of blooming, for the most realistic shadows and dark areas.

Thanks to the PQ's quantum dots I measured a 4 percent increase in coverage of the P3 color gamut compared to the standard P-Series, but in JW it was tough to see much, if any, advantage in the Q. Highly saturated areas of the image, like the red-orange lava in the titles logo and the red of the BBC banners in Chapter 2, for example, looked similar on both -- and on the other sets in my comparison. Judging from skin tones the Samsung Q9 and LG OLED looked the most accurate, and my measurements backed that up, but the differences between those and the PQ would be really tough to spot outside of a side-by-side lineup.

One strike against the PQ was a propensity for banding at times, where gradations between light and dark that should show a smooth fade instead reveal distinct stair-step patterns. It was obvious in the very beginning of Chapter 1 (1:18), where the sub's searchlight on the PQ broke into bands while the other TVs did not. The same scene in SDR didn't cause banding, but the banding also showed up in the Dolby Vision version, so it has something to do with the PQ's HDR processing. Even so it was quite uncommon, and most gradations I saw on the PQ in HDR were free of this artifact, so I don't consider it any kind of deal-breaker.