Our TV Picture Quality Tests: HDR Brightness: Main Discussion
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- 21010
I see that Apple Ipad Pro and Pro Display XDR monitor have 1000 nits 100% sustained brightness ? But some of the best OLED HDR TVs have it around 200-300 nits (some QLEDs have above 650). Also the weightage for 100% sustained brightness, in your tests, is very low.
Wanted to understand why would some displays aim for high 100% sustained brightness if its not that imp ?
- 21010
I see that Apple Ipad Pro and Pro Display XDR monitor have 1000 nits 100% sustained brightness ? But some of the best OLED HDR TVs have it around 200-300 nits (some QLEDs have above 650). Also the weightage for 100% sustained brightness, in your tests, is very low. Wanted to understand why would some displays aim for high 100% sustained brightness if its not that imp ?
The difference is due to how and where those types of displays are used . With something like an iPad, high brightness is needed to overcome glare, as you’re often moving around with it and won’t always be in a place where you can control the ambient light. You might even be outdoors, so the ability to crank up the peak brightness is essential for a device like that.
With the XDR monitor, well that mainly targets content creators. When mastering video you want to be able to see the full range of brightness in the content you’re mastering, so it’s important to have a display that exceeds the maximum brightness you want to encode.
With TVs, however, the usage is a bit different. In HDR, for example, the vast majority of content is under 300 nits. Small specular highlights often get significantly brighter than that, but these are usually very small areas of the screen. So you don’t need a TV that can sustain 1000+ nits on the entire screen, as the content won’t need that, anyway, and it would be very uncomfortable to watch something like that.
- 21010
In the HR Peak Window tests, the good value rating goes:
Metric Good value: Peak 2% Window 1000 cd/m² Peak 10% Window 1000 cd/m² Peak 25% Window 800 cd/m² Peak 50% Window 700 cd/m² Peak 100% Window 1000 cd/m² I can see the logic behind the good value decreasing as you fill a greater % of the screen, where becomes more difficult for the display to sustain high brightness levels. So why then, is the good value for Peak 100% not lower than the good value for Peak 50%?
This seems counterintuitive. I also note that even the TCL QM851G - seemingly the TV with the highest ever score in this metric - is not hitting the good value threshold, sitting at 967 cd/m² in HDR Brightness.
Is this a typo? Or is there some more technical reasoning behind this inconsistency?
Thanks!
- 21010
In the HR Peak Window tests, the good value rating goes: | Metric | Good value: | |—————–|—————-| | Peak 2% Window | 1000 cd/m² | | Peak 10% Window | 1000 cd/m² | | Peak 25% Window | 800 cd/m² | | Peak 50% Window | 700 cd/m² | | Peak 100% Window | 1000 cd/m² | I can see the logic behind the good value decreasing as you fill a greater % of the screen, where becomes more difficult for the display to sustain high brightness levels. So why then, is the good value for Peak 100% not lower than the good value for Peak 50%? This seems counterintuitive. I also note that even the TCL QM851G - seemingly the TV with the highest ever score in this metric - is not hitting the good value threshold, sitting at 967 cd/m² in HDR Brightness. Is this a typo? Or is there some more technical reasoning behind this inconsistency? Thanks!
Hey there! I’m not sure where you’re getting those numbers, but that’s not what the good value is set at for the 100% window. The threshold for a good value is the same for 50% and 100%, it’s 700 nits on both. This does tend to change with test methodology updates, so those numbers apply to anything tested on 2.0 and 2.0.1 only.
- 21010
Hey there! I’m not sure where you’re getting those numbers, but that’s not what the good value is set at for the 100% window. The threshold for a good value is the same for 50% and 100%, it’s 700 nits on both. This does tend to change with test methodology updates, so those numbers apply to anything tested on 2.0 and 2.0.1 only.
Hi thanks for your response! I feel like I’m going crazy because at the time of posting my comment I had checked many different TV review pages and they all stated that the good value for Peak 100% Window was 1,000cd/m². Not sure what caused this other than me reading the data incorrectly. Either way you’re right! I can see it shows 700cd/m², which clears my confusion. Thanks a lot.