The TCL Q5/Q550G QLED is TCL's lowest-tier Q-series TV in 2023, below the TCL Q6/Q650G QLED and TCL Q7/Q750G QLED. It's a simpler TV than its more expensive siblings, so it's better suited for someone who doesn't need any advanced features or capabilities. The TV comes with three HDMI 2.0 bandwidth ports with variable refresh rate (VRR) support, and the 55-inch and 65-inch models have TCL's Game Accelerator 120 feature for 1440p @ 120Hz gaming, which it achieves through resolution halving. It supports Dolby Vision HDR and HDR10+ advanced video formats and can pass through some Dolby and DTS advanced audio formats. It uses the popular and easy-to-use Google TV operating system. It doesn't have hands-free voice control, but its remote has an integrated microphone through which you can interact with Google Assistant and Amazon Alexa. It has built-in Chromecast, so you can seamlessly stream your videos using your phone. It's available in 4 sizes: 43, 50, 55, and 65 inches. The TV is a Best Buy exclusive in all sizes except for the 43-inch model, a Canadian-only variant available from different retailers.
Our Verdict
The TCL Q5 is a decent TV for mixed usage. Due to its incredibly low input lag, there is no discernible delay between your actions and what is happening on screen, so it's best suited for gaming and as a PC monitor. The TV's contrast is adequate, but since it lacks a local dimming feature to further improve it, blacks aren't dark and inky, so it's not well suited for dark room usage. On top of that, its HDR brightness is only decent, so bright highlights don't pop like they should with HDR content. On the other hand, its SDR brightness is very good, and this TV has decent enough reflection handling to use in a bright room. Unfortunately, the TV has a narrow viewing angle, so it's not a good choice to use in a group setting, as anyone not seated directly in front of the screen will be looking at a degraded image.
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Very good SDR peak brightness.
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Decent reflection handling.
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Narrow viewing angle.
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No local dimming feature.
The TCL Q5 is alright for watching TV shows during the day. The built-in Google TV smart interface comes loaded with a huge selection of streaming apps, so it's quick and easy to find your favorite shows. It has decent reflection handling and good enough peak brightness in SDR to fight off a bit of glare in a bright room. Unfortunately, the TV has a narrow viewing angle, so it's not a good choice for watching shows in a group setting, as anyone not directly in front of the TV has to watch a degraded image. The TV also has middling processing features, so if you watch lower-quality streams or shows on DVD, they aren't as smooth and sharp as they could be.
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Very good SDR peak brightness.
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Decent reflection handling.
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Narrow viewing angle.
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Inadequate low-quality content smoothing.
The TCL Q5 is okay for watching sports during the day. The TV has a very good response time, so fast motion is clear and easy to see, with very little blur around fast-moving balls and players. It also has good peak brightness in SDR and decent enough reflection handling so that visibility isn't an issue in moderately lit rooms. On the other hand, the TV has a narrow viewing angle, so it's not a good choice for watching the game with friends, as anyone seated to the sides of the screen must deal with a degraded image. The built-in speakers are mediocre at best, so you'll want to pair it with a good soundbar or home theater system.
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Very good SDR peak brightness.
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Decent reflection handling.
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Narrow viewing angle.
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Inadequate low-quality content smoothing.
The TCL Q5 is a very good TV for gaming. It has a good enough response time that fast motion in games is clear, with very little blur or ghosting behind quick-moving objects. The TV has incredibly low input lag that provides a very responsive feel, and this model also supports VRR, so there is almost no screen tearing. Unfortunately, the TV has no ports capable of HDMI 2.1 bandwidth, so you can't play in 4k @ 120Hz. It supports 1080p @ 120Hz natively and 1440p through resolution halving on the 55-inch and 65-inch models, though, so you can play at a higher frame rate if you prefer performance over image quality.
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Very good SDR peak brightness.
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VRR support for 1080p @ 120Hz and 1440p @ 120Hz.
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Incredibly low input lag.
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Poor pre-calibration color accuracy.
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No HDMI 2.1 bandwidth.
The TCL Q5 is decent for watching HDR movies in a dark room. It's better for watching high-quality content from Blu-rays, as its low-quality content smoothing is inadequate, so movies from streaming platforms have noticeable compression artifacts. The TV has adequate contrast but lacks a local dimming feature, so blacks aren't deep and inky in a dark room. It gets bright enough for some minor highlights to stand out, but it's not bright enough for specular highlights to pop like they should with HDR content. The PQ EOTF tracking is fantastic and respects the content creator's intent. Unfortunately, the TV's color accuracy is poor without being calibrated, so calibration is needed if you care about accuracy.
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Fantastic PQ EOTF tracking.
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Wide color gamut.
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Dolby Vision and HDR10+ support.
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Poor pre-calibration color accuracy.
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Inadequate low-quality content smoothing.
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No local dimming feature.
The TCL Q5 is very good for HDR gaming. It has decent HDR brightness in Game Mode and good enough contrast for dark room gaming, but since the TV lacks a local dimming feature, blacks aren't dark and inky, and highlights don't pop as much as they could. It has incredibly low input lag, which can be made even lower if you play in 1080p @ 120Hz or 1440p @ 120Hz. The TV also has a good enough response time that you don't have much blur or ghosting around quick-moving objects on the screen.
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Wide color gamut.
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VRR support for 1080p @ 120Hz and 1440p @ 120Hz.
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Incredibly low input lag.
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Dolby Vision gaming @ 60Hz.
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Poor pre-calibration color accuracy.
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No local dimming feature.
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No HDMI 2.1 bandwidth.
The TCL Q5 is a good TV to use as a PC monitor. Due to its incredibly low input lag and very good response time, cursor movements are smooth and responsive, with little motion blur. When set to 'PC' Picture Mode, the TV displays chroma 4:4:4 signals properly, which is essential for clear text from a PC. The TV has very good SDR peak brightness and decent enough reflection handling to fight some glare in brightly lit rooms, but any direct light sources will cause visibility issues. Unfortunately, the TV has a narrow viewing angle, so the sides of the screen aren’t consistent with the middle when you sit close to the TV.
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Very good SDR peak brightness.
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Decent reflection handling.
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Incredibly low input lag.
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Ability to display chroma 4:4:4 for clear text.
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Poor pre-calibration color accuracy.
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Narrow viewing angle.
- 7.2 Mixed Usage
- 6.8 TV Shows
- 6.9 Sports
- 8.0 Video Games
- 7.1 HDR Movies
- 8.0 HDR Gaming
- 7.7 PC Monitor
- Updated Jan 31, 2024: Specified that the TV is a Best Buy exclusive and that the 43-inch model is only available in Canada in the Introduction and Differences Between Sizes and Variants.
- Updated Dec 18, 2023: We reached out to TCL, and they confirmed that the TCL Game Accelerator 120 Feature is limited to the 55-inch and 65-inch models. The text has been changed in the Differences Between Sizes section and throughout the review.
- Updated Dec 08, 2023: Review published.
- Updated Dec 01, 2023: Early access published.
- Updated Nov 23, 2023: Our testers have started testing this product.
- Updated Nov 20, 2023: The product has arrived in our lab, and our testers will start evaluating it soon.
- Updated Nov 13, 2023: We've purchased the product and are waiting for it to arrive in our lab.
Differences Between Sizes And Variants
We bought and tested the 65-inch TCL Q5/Q550G QLED, but these results are also valid for the 55-inch model. The 43-inch and 50-inch sizes perform roughly the same, but they lack TCL's Game Accelerator Feature 120, so you're limited to 60Hz on those sizes. The 50-inch, 55-inch, and 65-inch models are Best Buy exclusives. The 43-inch model is only available in Canada, and you can purchase it from different retailers.
| Size | US Model | Canada Model | Game Accelerator 120 |
|---|---|---|---|
| 43" | - | TCL 43Q550G-CA | No |
| 50" | TCL 50Q550G | TCL 50Q550G-CA | No |
| 55" | TCL 55Q550G | TCL 55Q550G-CA | Yes |
| 65" | TCL 65Q550G | TCL 65Q550G-CA | Yes |
Our unit was manufactured in July 2023; you can see the label here.
Compared To Other TVs
The TCL Q5 is a decent TV and is a solid performer for its price. Its most notable features are its incredibly low input lag and its ability to play games in 1080p @ 120Hz natively or 1440p @ 120Hz with resolution halving on the 55-inch and 65-inch models, so it's a great option for competitive gamers on a budget who care more about performance than image quality. You can easily find other similarly priced TVs with better performance, like the equally-priced Hisense U6K or the slightly more expensive but much better Hisense U7K.
For more options, check out our recommendations for the best budget TVs, the best QLED TVs, and the best 4k gaming TVs.
The TCL Q6/Q650G QLED and the TCL Q5/Q550G QLED are very similar TVs, but the Q6 is slightly better in a few ways. The biggest advantage that the Q6 has is in peak brightness. It gets brighter in SDR, so it can fight off glare better. It also gets a bit brighter in HDR, so highlights will pop a little more, but it's still not bright enough to fully take advantage of HDR content. The Q6 also has slightly better HDR gradient handling and PQ EOTF tracking, so there's less banding, and it's more accurate in HDR compared to the Q5.
The TCL Q5/Q550G QLED is significantly better than the TCL S4/S450G. The Q5 has a much better picture quality overall and looks better in bright rooms thanks to its higher SDR peak brightness. HDR content also has more impact on the Q5 thanks to its higher HDR peak brightness and wide color gamut. Finally, the Q5 is better for gaming thanks to the addition of VRR support, ensuring a nearly tear-free gaming experience.
The TCL Q7/Q750G QLED is better than the TCL Q5/Q550G QLED. As a higher-tier model in the same lineup, the Q7 just does more overall than the Q5. The Q7 has HDMI 2.1 bandwidth, so you can game in 4k @ 120Hz. The Q7 also has local dimming, so its contrast is much better, and blacks are much deeper than on the Q5. On top of that, the Q7 gets much brighter in both SDR and HDR, and it supports more advanced DTS audio formats.
The TCL Q5/Q550G QLED is better than the Samsung CU7000/CU7000D. The TCL gets much brighter in HDR, supports a wider color gamut, and has better color volume, so colors are more vibrant and lifelike, and highlights pop a lot more than on the CU7000. The TCL also gets much brighter in SDR, so it overcomes glare better in a bright room. Finally, the TCL is better for gaming as it supports VRR and has 1440p @ 120Hz support.
The Hisense A6/A65K and TCL Q5/Q550G QLED are similar TVs, although the TCL is slightly better than the Hisense. The TCL is brighter than the Hisense in both SDR and HDR and offers more to gamers with the option of playing in 1080p @ 120Hz natively or 1440p @ 120Hz with resolution halving. However, the Hisense is much more accurate even without being calibrated; it's a TV you can just buy, install, and watch. On the other hand, the TCL requires a fair amount of work to look its best, especially if you care about color accuracy.
The TCL Q5/Q550G QLED is better than the Insignia F30 Series 2022. The TCL has a much higher SDR peak brightness, so it can overcome much more glare in a bright room, and it has a much better contrast ratio, so it looks better in a dark room. The TCL also gets brighter in HDR and supports a wide color gamut, so highlights pop more and colors are more vibrant and lifelike than on the Insignia. The TCL is also the better option for gamers, as it has VRR and can do 120Hz with TCL’s resolution halving feature. However, the Insignia has a wider viewing angle, so it’s the better option if you regularly watch shows or sports in a group setting.
The TCL Q5/Q550G QLED is better than the Roku Select Series. The TCL gets brighter in both SDR and HDR, has better color volume, a wide color gamut, and supports Dolby Vision. The TCL also offers more to gamers with VRR support and the option of playing in 1080p @ 120Hz natively or 1440p @ 120Hz with resolution halving. On top of that, the TCL has better contrast and black uniformity, so it's a better option for dark room viewing.
Video
Test Results
The TCL 65Q550G looks pretty good for a budget TV. It's a simple design, with thin bezels on all three sides and a slightly thicker bezel at the bottom.
The V-shaped feet are very basic. They're set near the ends of the TV, so you'll need a large cabinet for the larger sizes if you're not planning on wall-mounting the TV. Sadly, the feet have no alternative position to accommodate a smaller table. The feet only lift the TV about 2.8", so most soundbars can't fit in front of it without blocking a portion of the screen.
Footprint of the 65" stand: 50.2" x 12.1"
The back of the TV is very plain and looks cheap. The inputs are housed in a larger section on the back, near the center of the TV, so they're difficult to access if the TV is wall-mounted. There are clips on both sides to help with cable management.
The TV has okay build quality. It wobbles a bit on its feet, but it's nothing to worry about. There's a bit of flex in the metallic upper section of the back, with more noticeable flex in the middle section of the back around the VESA mounts, but this is common and won't cause any issues.
Our unit has a minor pinch in the bottom middle of the screen, which is noticeable in dark scenes.
The TV has okay contrast. Its native contrast is great, but it lacks a local dimming feature, so blacks are deep in dim and dark scenes, but they become raised and washed out when bright highlights are on the screen.
The TV doesn't have a local dimming feature, so there's no blooming around bright objects or subtitles during dark scenes.
This TV doesn't have a local dimming feature, so it can't adjust the backlight of individual zones to brighten up highlights without impacting the rest of the image. This means that there's no distracting flicker or brightness changes as bright highlights move between dimming zones.
Switching to Game Mode doesn't result in any noticeable difference in dark scene performance.
The TCL Q5 has decent HDR peak brightness. It gets just bright enough for simple scenes in HDR to stand out, but since the TV lacks a local dimming feature and doesn't get as bright as it needs to for most HDR content, bright specular highlights don't pop.
These measurements are after calibrating the HDR white point with the following settings:
- HDR Picture Mode: Movie
- Brightness: 100
- Contrast: 100
- Color Temperature: Warm
- Gamma: 2.2
The HDR brightness in Game Mode is decent, and there is no noticeable difference in brightness between Movie Mode and Game Mode.
These measurements are after calibrating the HDR white point with the following settings:
- HDR Picture Mode: Game
- Brightness: 100
- Contrast: 100
- Color Temperature: Warm
- Gamma: 2.2
The PQ EOTF tracking on the TV is fantastic. Midtones are a little dimmer than they should be, and blacks are raised, but aside from that, the TV's brightness closely follows the curve and tracks the content creator's intent well. There's a sharp cutoff with content mastered at 600 and 1,000 nits, leading to a loss of bright detail. There is a smoother roll-off with content mastered at 4,000 nits, which preserves more fine details in really bright content.
The TV's SDR peak brightness is very good. It gets bright enough to fight glare in a well-lit room, and there's no variation in brightness across different scenes.
These measurements are after calibration with the following settings:
- Picture Mode: Movie
- Brightness: 100
- Contrast: 100
- Black Level: 50
- Dynamic Contrast: Off
- Black Stretch: Off
- Dynamic Brightness: Off
- Micro Contrast: Off
- Gamma: 2.2
The TV has a very good color gamut. It has fantastic coverage of the commonly used DCI-P3 color space, although its greens and yellows are undersaturated. The TV adequately covers the wider, but not as common, Rec. 2020 color space.
The TV has decent color volume in HDR. Unfortunately, it struggles to represent darker colors and brighter, more heavily saturated greens and yellows.
The TV has poor pre-calibration accuracy. Its white balance is terrible, with significant accuracy errors throughout every range of gray except blacks. The TV's gamma is over-brightened compared to the reference target of 2.2. The TV's color accuracy is decent; saturated colors are accurate, but undersaturated colors show a fair amount of inaccuracy. Thankfully, the TV's color temperature is very close to the 6500K target, so it has neither a warm nor cool tint.
The TV's accuracy after calibration is outstanding. The TV wasn't too hard to calibrate, but adjustments between 85 and 100 were stubborn and would barely do anything to affect the picture compared to adjustments between 1 and 84.
You can see our full calibration settings here.
The TCL Q550G has decent gray uniformity. On a very dark or near-black screen, its uniformity is great. On brighter uniform colors, there's significant vignetting, banding, and dirty screen effect near the center of the screen. This is noticeable in content like hockey with its all-white rink, as the sides and corners of the scene are noticeably darker than the rest.
The TV's black uniformity is incredible, although there's some noticeable backlight bleed near the TV's bottom edge. There's no local dimming feature, so the entire screen is blueish and cloudy when bright highlights are on the screen.
The TV's viewing angle is sub-par and isn't a good choice for wide seating arrangements. There's significant color shifting and brightness loss as you move off-center, and the image looks increasingly washed out as you move further away to the sides.
The TV's reflection handling is decent. It does an excellent job with indirect reflections, like when you have glare from a source that isn't directly facing the screen. With more direct light sources hitting the screen, reflections are very noticeable.
The TV has alright HDR gradient handling. There's noticeable banding in dark reds, dark greens, and dark blues, with especially noticeable banding in dark grays. Other color gradients fare better and have minimal banding.
The TV has inadequate low-quality content smoothing. While its detail preservation is good, there's significant macro-blocking in dark scenes.
The TCL Q5 has mediocre upscaling capabilities. It manages to preserve some details, and text is clear enough, but upscaled content looks a bit muddy overall.
Sharpness processing was calibrated with no over-sharpening for low-resolution or low-bitrate content, with the following setting:
- Sharpness: 15
The TV uses a BGR (Blue-Green-Red) subpixel layout instead of the traditional RGB layout. It doesn't cause any issues for video content, but if you plan to use this TV as a PC monitor, non-RGB subpixel layouts impact text clarity, and text looks slightly blurry. You can read about it here.
The TCL Q5 has a good response time. It does struggle a bit more when coming out of dark states, so there's some black smearing in dark transitions.
The TCL Q5 uses pulse width modulation (PWM) to dim its backlight. It flickers at 150Hz, which is low enough to be noticeable by users who are sensitive to it, especially as it doesn't flicker in time with the TV's refresh rate. Fortunately, the TV is flicker-free at these brightness levels and picture modes:
- Movie, Sports, Vivid, PC, Game, with brightness levels 29-100
- Low Power, with brightness levels 37-100
- Smart HDR, always flicker-free
This TV doesn't have an optional backlight strobing feature, commonly known as black frame insertion (BFI).
The TCL Q5 has a motion interpolation feature to interpolate 30 fps content up to 60 fps. As typical of this feature, it looks fine with slow scenes, but there are noticeable artifacts with fast-moving objects.
Due to this TV's relatively slow response time, it does an alright job with stutter in 24 fps content like movies, but there is still noticeable stutter with slower camera movements. It's fantastic with 60 fps content, though, so there isn't noticeable stutter with higher frame rate content.
The TCL Q5 gives a judder-free experience with 24p sources like a Blu-ray player and from native apps. Unfortunately, it can't remove judder from 60Hz sources like most cable TV boxes and older streaming devices that lack a Match Frame Rate feature.
This TV supports all VRR technologies for a nearly tear-free gaming experience. The TV's VRR range is limited to 4k @ 60Hz but can handle up to 1440p @ 120Hz, which is great for competitive gamers who prefer a higher refresh rate over a higher resolution.
The TV has superbly low input lag in Game Mode. It's equally as good in the TV's 'PC' Picture Mode, which you need to set the TV at to get chroma 4:4:4 support for clear text when using the TV as a PC monitor.
The TCL Q5 supports all common resolutions up to 4k @ 60Hz. Even though the TV has a 60Hz panel, it can do 1080p @ 120Hz natively, and 1440p @ 120Hz with resolution halving through TCL's Game Accelerator 120 feature, but this feature is only supported on the 55-inch and 65-inch models. This impacts image quality as the TV halves the display's 4k vertical resolution to run at 120Hz. Still, it's a great option for competitive gamers who prefer having a higher refresh rate and lower input lag over a higher resolution. Despite 1440p @ 120Hz working without issues, 1440p @ 60Hz isn't supported on AMD GPUs.
The TCL Q5 can't take full advantage of the PS5, as it doesn't have the HDMI 2.1 bandwidth required for 4k @ 120Hz. However, it can do 1440p @ 120Hz with resolution halving on the 55-inch and 65-inch models. Unlike on the Xbox consoles, the TV has no issues playing HDR games in 120Hz on the PS5.
It also supports VRR and Auto Low Latency Mode (ALLM), so the TV automatically switches to Game Mode when it detects the console.
The TV can't take full advantage of the Xbox Series X|S, as it can't do 4k @ 120Hz. However, it can do 1080p @ 120Hz natively and 1440p @ 120Hz with resolution halving on the 55-inch and 65-inch models. Unfortunately, the Xbox consoles only support HDR gaming with 4k content, so you can't play games in HDR if you choose to play in 1080p @ 120Hz or 1440p @ 120Hz. If you want to play in 1440p @ 60Hz, you can go into the console's settings and enable it in the display override section, as applying it directly in the display resolution menu defaults back to 4k @ 60Hz.
The TV also supports VRR and Auto Low Latency Mode (ALLM), so the TV automatically switches to Game Mode when it detects the console.
This TV is limited to HDMI 2.0 bandwidth on its three HDMI ports and supports HDR10+ and Dolby Vision. Unfortunately, the tuner is limited to ATSC 1.0, so you can't stream 4k content over the air.
The TCL Q550G supports eARC, allowing you to pass high-quality, uncompressed audio to a compatible receiver. While the TV can pass DTS 5.1 through ARC and Optical connections, it can't pass the full 7.1 DTS:X or DTS-HD formats through eARC, which is disappointing as many UHD Blu-ray discs use these as their main audio track. However, it can pass Dolby advanced audio formats through eARC.
The TCL Q5 has a disappointing frequency response. TV speakers tend to lack bass, and this TV is no different, as there's no thump and rumble at all. It also can't get very loud, so it's unsuitable for noisy environments. The TV has little pumping or compression artifacts at max volume, but other than that, it doesn't sound great, with inaccurate sound reproduction across the board.
This TV's handling of sound distortion is good. Sound is distorted at max volume, which sounds unpleasant, especially if you're sensitive to it. However, it sounds good at lower volumes, and it's hard to notice any harsh or unexpected frequencies when listening at moderate volume levels.
The TCL Q5 uses version 11 of Google's popular Google TV OS. It's relatively easy to use and runs well, with a large selection of apps.
Like most TVs on the market, this TV has ads throughout the interface, and you can't disable them.
The TV has a great selection of streaming apps, with every popular streaming app being present. The interface is very smooth and pleasant to use.
The TV's remote is medium-sized and has a simple layout. It has a series of dedicated buttons for the most popular streaming apps. The remote has an integrated microphone for voice commands, so you can change inputs, search within apps, and ask for the weather and time.
