Samsung Q60/Q60T QLED TV Review

The Samsung Q60T is Samsung's entry-level QLED for 2020. It replaces the Samsung Q60/Q60R QLED in name, but because Samsung shifted their lineup in 2020, the Q60T performs worse and has fewer features. Its main competitors are the Sony X900H, Hisense H8G, and the TCL 6 Series/R635 2020 QLED.

The Samsung Q60T has an excellent style. It has a borderless design on the sides and at the top, with a thicker bottom bezel. The stand has been redesigned compared to the Samsung Q60/Q60R QLED and is no longer screwed on, but is instead inserted into the TV itself, which makes the setup process much simpler. The overall aesthetic is sleek and minimalist, and it comes with clips for cable management.

The Samsung Q60T features a new stand, which is inserted into the body of the TV instead of being screwed on. This makes the setup process easier, but the feet aren't reversible. The stand supports the TV well, though there's still a bit of wobble.

Footprint of the 55" stand: 40.2" x 9.6".

The back of the TV is made of plastic and has an etched horizontal dotted pattern. There are clips included for cable management, and they clip onto the back of the stand to guide the cables; however, ours have been misplaced and aren't shown in the picture. Some of the inputs are back-facing, so they may be harder to reach if you plan on wall-mounting the TV.

The borders are very thin and aren't distracting.

This TV shouldn't stick out much when wall-mounted unless you use the back-facing ports.

The build quality is decent. It feels well-built and there are no obvious gaps in the construction. The stand supports the TV well, but it still wobbles a bit when nudged.

The Samsung Q60T has an outstanding contrast ratio, which is expected from a VA panel. It displays extremely deep blacks, but it doesn't have a local dimming feature to improve the contrast. Note that contrast may vary between units.

The Samsung Q60T doesn't have a local dimming feature, the video above is provided for reference only. If a local dimming feature is important to you, check out the Hisense H8G.

This TV has a great SDR peak brightness. It gets bright enough to combat glare in most well-lit environments. It remains consistently bright for the most part, but small areas are noticeably dimmer due to the aggressive frame dimming.

We measured peak brightness after calibration in the 'Movie' Picture Mode with Gamma set to '2.2', Contrast Enhancer off, and Brightness at its max. We got the TV the brightest possible with these settings.

The Samsung Q60T has mediocre peak brightness in HDR, and it doesn't get much brighter than in SDR. Once again, small highlights don't get as bright, so some vivid colors may not pop the way the creator intended.

We measured the HDR peak brightness in the 'Movie' Picture Mode with Contrast and Brightness at their max and ST.2084 set to '0'. We got the TV the brightest possible using these settings.

Our unit of the Samsung Q60T has good gray uniformity, but this may vary between units. The edges are noticeably darker, but there's very little dirty screen effect in the center, which is good for sports fans. The screen is much more uniform in near-dark scenes.

Like most VA panels, viewing angles are poor. The image looks washed out when viewing from the sides. IPS TVs, like the Sony X800H or the LG NANO81, have much better viewing angles.

Our unit of the Samsung Q60T has remarkable black uniformity, but this may vary between units. There's hardly any blooming around the center cross and there's no noticeable clouding.

The reflection handling is decent. It shouldn't be an issue for moderate or well-lit rooms, but it may be harder to see the image if the TV is placed directly across from a window.

Out of the box, the Samsung Q60T has impressive color accuracy, but this may vary between units. There are some inaccuracies with shades of gray and some colors, though they're difficult to spot. Gamma doesn't follow the curve at all, and most scenes appear brighter than they should. With Color Temperature set to 'Warm 2', it's a bit warmer than our target of 6500K, resulting in a slightly reddish tint.

Update 09/29/2020: We listed Auto-Calibration Function as 'Undetermined' because 2020 Samsung TVs aren't officially listed as compatible with CalMAN Auto Cal.

After calibration, color accuracy is outstanding. Any remaining inaccuracies shouldn't be noticeable to the naked eye. White point is virtually perfect and gamma follows the curve well, so most scenes appear at the correct brightness. There are still some inaccuracies with blue, though that's typical of LED TVs.

You can see our recommended settings here.

480p content like DVDs is upscaled without any issues or artifacts.

720p content like cable TV is displayed properly, with no signs of artifacts.

1080p content looks almost as good as native 4k content.

Native 4k content is displayed without any obvious issues.

This TV doesn't support an 8k signal.

The Samsung Q60T has a good color gamut. It displays a wide color gamut needed for HDR content thanks to its QLED technology. It has excellent coverage of the commonly-used DCI P3 color space and okay coverage of the wider Rec. 2020.

The EOTF follows the target curve very well until it rolls off at its peak brightness. In 'Game' mode, the image is a bit darker as you can see in this EOTF.

If you find HDR too dim, set Contrast Enhancer to 'High' and ST.2084 to '+3'. This results in a noticeably brighter image, as you can see in this EOTF.

The Samsung Q60T has an okay color volume. It can produce dark, saturated colors due to its high contrast ratio.

The gradient handling is decent. There's banding in almost all colors, with blue being slightly better. Setting Noise Reduction to 'Auto' helps a bit, but it can't completely smooth out banding.

Like most VA panels, there are no signs of image retention, but this may vary between units.

We don't expect VA panels to experience permanent image retention, as the VA panel in our long-term test appears immune.

The Samsung Q60T has a mediocre response time. There's some blur trail in fast-moving scenes, and the overshoot in the 0-20% transition can cause some artifacts in dark scenes. The Samsung TU8000 has a much better response time.

This TV uses Pulse-Width Modulation (PWM) to dim the backlight and it has a very high frequency, so it shouldn't be noticeable for most people. However, the frequency drops to 120Hz if the Picture Mode is set to Game, Dynamic, Standard, or Natural. Enabling Picture Clarity also changes the flicker frequency to 120Hz, even if you don't adjust the Judder Reduction slider.

The TV exhibits strange behavior when displaying a single uniform color with the backlight flicker at 600Hz, causing a rolling effect from the bottom to the top of the screen, which you can see here.

Update 09/15/2020:We've updated the TV to the newest firmware (1301) and retested the BFI. It now lowers the backlight flickering frequency to 60Hz when in 'Game' mode.

The Samsung Q60T has an optional Black Frame Insertion feature, which can be enabled by setting LED Clear Motion to 'On'. Unfortunately, the flickering is always at 60Hz and its timing is quite off, resulting in duplication of the image, similar to the Samsung RU7100.

There's a motion interpolation feature on this TV to make lower frame rate content look smoother. When enabled, it causes the backlight flickering frequency to drop to 120Hz, which results in noticeable image duplication. Like most TVs, it sometimes struggles to keep up and stops interpolating altogether, and in medium-to-fast scenes, there are visible artifacts.

Due to the slow response time, lower-frame rate content doesn't stutter.