TCL's Huge 115-inch TV Is Among the Biggest, Brightest Screens I've Seen
This monster goes on sale later this year for around $20,000.
- Although still awaiting his Oscar for Best Picture Reviewer, David does hold certifications from the Imaging Science Foundation and the National Institutes of Standards and Technology on display calibration and evaluation.
The 115-inch TCL 115QM891G is a whole lot of bling.
When I walked into TCL's private suite at the MGM Grand at CES 2024, I was hoping for something big. Namely, a 115-inch TV called the 115QM891G. The company had unveiled the existence of this huge TV a few weeks earlier, but seeing it in person was another thing entirely. I've been reviewing TVs for two decades, and I've experienced some massive, searingly bright televisions. This is one is right up there.
The screen is eight and a half feet wide and nearly five feet tall. On its stand, which TCL told me isn't the final design, the whole thing stood almost as tall as me, and I'm 6 feet 3 inches tall. It weighs nearly 200 pounds. TCL had set it up in a modest size room, with the couch maybe seven feet away, and from that seating distance it filled my field of view like an IMAX theater.
The thing about a mini-LED-powered TV, however, is that it can get much, much brighter than any projector. TCL claims a peak brightness of 5,000 nits, among the brightest TVs on the market, and its 20,000 local dimming zones should deliver precise lighting even on such a large screen. In my brief time watching, I didn't notice overt blooming or stray illumination -- my main impression was of extreme brightness and really impressive contrast.
That's not surprising to me since the "baby" version of this TV, the 65-inch QM8 I reviewed in 2023, showed superb image quality using similar technology (on a much smaller scale). Of course, the 115QM891G includes all the other extras I'd expect, such as quantum dot color, a 120Hz panel, a tricked-out 6.2.2 channel Dolby Atmos sound system and a NextGen TV tuner. It's not an 8K screen, but I didn't notice any lack of sharpness.
Bigger TVs have graced the halls of CES, such as Samsung's 292-inch Wall, but none were mass-market models. In other words, they all cost a lot more than this one. TCL is charging "under $20,000" for the 115QM891G when it goes on sale (my bet: $19,999), likely toward late spring or early summer 2024. It's worth noting that rival Hisense has a 100-inch TV that costs a lot less (around $5,000), and don't be surprised if other TV makers break the triple digit barrier soon. Ninety-eight-inch TVs are soooo 2023.
TCL also announced a range of smaller, much more affordable TVs at CES 2024.