LG UQ9000  TV Review

The LG UQ9000 has a simple design, with thin bezels on three sides. The light gray borders are a bit dated, and it doesn't look as premium as LG's NANO and QNED TV lineups.

The 'V'-shaped feet are wide-set and support the TV well, but you need a large table if you aren't planning to wall-mount the TV. The feet lift the display about 2.5 inches above the table, so some soundbars won't fit under the screen. Different model sizes come with slightly different feet, but the 50, 55, and 65-inch models have the feet you see in the photos. There's also a variant of this TV, known as the LG UQ91 in Europe, which comes with a curved center-mounted stand instead of feet.

Footprint of the 65-inch stand: 46" x 10.7".

The back of the TV is very plain. There are hooks on the back of the TV to help with cable management. Most of the inputs face to the side, but they're inset into the back of the TV, making it difficult to access if the TV is wall-mounted on a fixed stand. The back of the 43-inch model looks a bit different, with the inputs facing out of the TV's right side.

The LG UQ9000 TV has a decent overall build quality. Most of it is plastic, so it's quite light, and the feet support the TV well, with the TV being quite stable. The back panel has a bit of flex, especially near the inputs, but it isn't an issue. However, there are a few quality control issues, like a gap on the top of the display where the panel meets the border.

Unfortunately, the LG TV has inadequate contrast, so blacks look gray and patchy if you're in a dark room, and dark scenes lack shadow detail. There's also no local dimming feature to improve the appearance of dark scenes.

Note: The 50, 60, and 70-inch variants of this model use a VA panel and have much better contrast, so blacks look darker in a dark room.

As the TV doesn't have local dimming, its backlight is always on at the same intensity, which leads to a washed-out image in dark scenes. However, it also means that the TV has no blooming around bright highlights and subtitles.

The TV doesn't have a local dimming feature, so it doesn't have lighting zone transitions. We still show the TV's performance in this regard to compare with TVs with local dimming.

There's no significant difference in contrast and dark details when the TV is set to Game Mode.

Unfortunately, the LG UQ9000 has disappointing peak brightness in HDR. Combined with its low contrast ratio and lack of a local dimming feature, bright highlights in HDR content don't stand out. There's no variation in brightness with most scenes, but very small highlights are dimmed considerably.

These measurements are after calibrating the HDR white point with the following settings:

• HDR Picture Mode: Cinema
• Panel Brightness: Max
• Contrast: Max
• Color Temperature: Warm 50

The 'Vivid' Picture Mode with the 'Cool 50' Color Temperature is a bit brighter, reaching a peak of 372 cd/m² with a 10% window.

There's no noticeable difference in brightness between 'Game' Mode and the most accurate HDR settings.

These measurements are after calibrating the HDR white point with the following settings:

• HDR Picture Mode: Game Optimizer
• Panel Brightness: Max
• Contrast: Max
• Color Temperature: Warm 50

The TV's PQ EOTF tracking is excellent, as most scenes are displayed at the brightness level that the content creator intended, although near-black scenes are a bit too bright due to the TV's low contrast ratio. Content mastered at 600 and 1000 nits hard clips when the TV gets close to its peak brightness, leading to a loss of bright detail. Content mastered at 4000 nits doesn't hard clip as severely as content mastered at 600 and 1000 nits, but the roll-off isn't slow enough to truly preserve bright details.

If you find HDR too dark, setting Auto Dynamic Contrast to 'High' with the Color Tone set to 'Cool 5' increases the brightness of most scenes, as shown in this EOTF, but the overall peak brightness of the display is the same.

The LG UQ9000 has just passable brightness in SDR. It's bright enough to overcome a bit of glare, but it isn't recommended for a bright room. On the other hand, there's no variation in brightness with different scenes, which is great.

These measurements are after calibration with the following settings:

• Picture Mode: Expert (Dark Space, Night)
• Panel Brightness: Max
• Color Temperature: Warm 50

If you want the brightest image possible, switching to the 'Vivid' Picture Mode, with Adjust Contrast at 'Max', Auto Dynamic Contrast on 'High' and the Color Temp set to 'Cool 50' results in a noticeably brighter image, reaching a peak of 356 cd/m² with a 10% window.

Unfortunately, the TV has just an okay color gamut. HDR content looks muted because it can't display a wide color gamut. The tone mapping is also very bad with bright scenes, as the TV sacrifices accuracy to push brighter highlights in HDR. In dimmer scenes, the tone mapping is much better:

• DCI-P3 - 60% Stimulus
• Rec. 2020 - 60% Stimulus

The TV has poor color volume. Its narrow color gamut in HDR limits it. HDR content looks flat and dull overall, as colors aren't as bright as pure white, and it can't display dark saturated colors well due to the low contrast ratio.

The TV has okay pre-calibration accuracy. The white balance is mediocre, but most colors are represented accurately. Cyan is noticeably off, though, and the color temperature is very cool, giving everything a bluish tint. Gamma is close to the target of 2.2 for a moderately lit room, but very dark scenes are a bit too bright.

The TV has fantastic accuracy after calibrating to the D65 white point. The white balance and color accuracy are both fantastic, and gamma is perfect. The TV was relatively easy to calibrate, but sadly the color temperature is still too cool.

You can see our full calibration settings here.

The LG UQ9000 has mediocre gray uniformity. There are noticeable bars across the screen, which is distracting when watching sports or using it as a PC monitor, or any other time you have large areas of uniform color on the screen. The sides of the screen are also darker than the center.

Unfortunately, the TV has mediocre black uniformity. The entire screen appears blue due to the low contrast ratio, and near-dark scenes are patchy. Unfortunately, there's no local dimming feature to improve this.

Note: The 50, 60, and 70-inch variants of this model use a VA panel and have much better contrast, resulting in better black uniformity.

The TV is a decent choice for a wide seating arrangement, as the image remains consistent when viewed at a moderate angle. Beyond about 30°, a noticeable decrease in brightness causes colors to appear washed out.

Note that the 50, 60, and 70-inch variants of this model use a VA panel and have much worse viewing angles. Those sizes look best when viewed directly in front.

The TV has good reflection handling. It can handle a bit of glare as its semi-gloss finish reduces the intensity of reflections, but due to its limited peak brightness, it can't overcome intense glare in a bright room.

The TV has very good HDR gradient handling. There's significant banding in dark grays and noticeable banding in bright greens, but other color gradients look great.

The TV has good low-quality content smoothing. It's particularly good at avoiding any macro-blocking in dark scenes. The detail preservation when smoothing low bitrate content is mediocre, however.

The TV upscales 480p content, like from DVDs, very well.

Most sizes of the LG UQ9000 use an IPS panel. The RGB subpixel layout helps ensure text from a PC is clear and easy to read. The 50, 60, and 70-inch variants use VA panels, which likely have BGR subpixel layouts, which causes text clarity issues when used as a PC monitor.

Sadly, the TV has a poor response time. Most transitions are slow, resulting in a long blur trail behind fast-moving objects. The low-frequency flicker of the backlight also causes a double image to appear, so this isn't ideal for fast-paced action gaming or sports.

The TV uses pulse width modulation (PWM) to dim the backlight, causing it to flicker at 120Hz at all brightness levels. It causes a double image when watching 60fps content and can cause headaches and eye strain in people sensitive to flicker.

The TV doesn't have an optional backlight strobing feature, commonly known as black frame insertion (BFI). The backlight always flickers at 120Hz, reducing the appearance of persistence blur, but introducing a distracting double image.

The TV has an optional motion interpolation feature, but unfortunately, it doesn't work.

Thanks to this TV's slow response time, there's very little stutter when watching low frame rate content, like movies.

The TV can remove judder from any source, which is great. It ensures a clear and smooth movie-watching experience.

Unfortunately, this TV doesn't support advanced gaming features like variable refresh rate technology (VRR), and most sizes are limited to a 60Hz refresh rate. The 70 and 75-inch models have a 120Hz refresh rate but still don't support VRR.

The TV has incredibly low input lag, resulting in a responsive gaming or desktop experience.

The TV supports most common formats, but only at 60Hz on model sizes smaller than 70". Chroma 4:4:4 signals are displayed properly with all supported formats, essential for clear text from a PC, but you must set the input label to 'PC'.

The LG UQ90 can't take full advantage of the PS5. Model sizes below 70" don't support high refresh rate gaming at 120Hz, and none of the sizes support variable refresh rate (VRR). On the other hand, when you start playing a game, it automatically switches to the low latency 'Game' mode, so you don't have to worry about changing settings when gaming.

The LG UQ90 can't fully exploit the Xbox Series X|S. Model sizes below 70" don't support high refresh rate gaming at 120Hz, and none of the sizes support variable refresh rate (VRR). On the other hand, when you start playing a game, it automatically switches to the low latency 'Game' mode, so you don't have to worry about changing settings when gaming.

Sadly, this TV is limited to HDMI 2.0 bandwidth, and unlike LG's higher-end TVs, it doesn't support Dolby Vision or HDR10+, so you're limited to HDR10. It doesn't change much overall, as this TV can't display HDR well anyway.

Unfortunately, this TV doesn't support DTS formats, which is disappointing as many Blu-rays use this format for their main audio track. If you plan on using the TV with a UHD Blu-ray player, connect the audio from your player to your home theater system instead of using eARC.

The TV has an okay frequency response. Like most TVs, the low-frequency extension (LFE) is very high, so it has very little bass and very little thump or rumble. Above the LFE, the frequency response is well-balanced at moderate listening levels, so dialogue is clear and not lost in the background. There's a bit more compression at max volume, especially in the mid and high-treble range.

This TV has decent overall distortion performance. There's relatively little distortion in the mid to treble range, where most people will notice it. Even at max volume, there's very little total distortion.

The TV runs the 2022 version of LG's webOS proprietary smart interface. The interface is fast and easy to use, and it supports user profiles, so you can customize the home page for different users.

Unfortunately, like almost all smart TVs on the market, there are ads throughout the smart interface, and you can't fully disable them.

The TV has a great selection of additional apps, so you're sure to find your favorite content.

This TV comes with the same LG Magic Remote found on high-end LG TVs, like the LG C2 OLED. You can use the remote like a pointer, making it easy to navigate through menus. It also supports voice control, which works well. You can use voice commands to change inputs, open apps, search within apps for content, and even adjust basic settings.

A single button is on the bottom of the TV in the middle. You can turn the TV on or off with it, change inputs or channels, or control the volume.

• Power cable
• Remote (with 2x AA batteries)
• Cable management clips and cable tie
• User manuals