Samsung QN85A  TV Review

The Samsung QN85A looks sleek. The stand looks a little basic, but the TV has very thin bezels that look great and aren't distracting when watching TV. It has a very thin profile, which is great if you want to wall-mount it.

The brightness of this TV increased considerably between our initial measurements and the second month's measurements due to an automatic firmware update.

The stand is a mix of plastic and metal. It's centered and not too wide, so you can place it on a smaller table to save space. There’s a bit of wobble, but overall it supports the TV well.

Footprint of the stand: 15.4" x 10.4"

The back is plastic with a textured brushed metal finish. There are grooves along the back and a hole in the stand that serve as cable management. Unfortunately, the inputs are inset in the back of the TV, and they're very difficult to access if you decide to wall-mount the TV.

The Samsung QN85A feels well-built overall. It’s mostly plastic, aside from parts of the stand and the borders, which are metal. There’s some flex to the back panel, especially near the inputs and the center, but it's not an issue.

The native contrast ratio on the Samsung QN85 is okay. It’s much worse than previous QLEDs because it uses an ADS panel instead of a VA panel. For consistency with our other reviews, the posted results are with our calibrated settings, in the 'Movie' Picture Mode. Unlike most TVs on the market, the contrast ratio, as measured with a checkerboard pattern, varies considerably depending on the picture mode:

• 'Game' Mode: 20019:1
• 'Dynamic' Picture Mode: 9243:1
• 'PC' Mode: 9409:1

The local dimming feature is far more effective at boosting contrast in real scenes, and blacks are deep and look black in a dark room. The 85 inch variant of this TV uses a VA panel and has a much higher contrast ratio.

The local dimming feature performs about the same in 'Game' Mode, but it behaves a bit differently than out of it. There's a lot less black crush in 'Game' Mode, but uniformity issues are more noticeable, and transitions between lighting zones are much slower, with a visible blooming trail behind bright moving objects.

The peak brightness of the Samsung QN85 in HDR is fantastic. The overall brightness tracks the EOTF extremely well in dark scenes, as anything below 240 cd/m² is displayed at the correct brightness. Bright scenes aren't as accurate though, as the TV rolls off well below its peak brightness. This allows the TV to preserve fine details in bright scenes, but bright areas aren't as bright as the content creator intended. There's very little variation in brightness with different scenes, but large bright areas aren't as bright due to the TV's Automatic Brightness Limiter.

These measurements are in the 'Movie HDR' Picture Mode with Brightness and Contrast at max, Local Dimming set to 'High', and Color Tone set to 'Warm2'.

If you want to make HDR even brighter, as seen in this EOTF, then set Contrast Enhancer to 'High' and ST.2084 to max. These settings result in considerably brighter scenes, but the overall peak brightness of the TV is the same.

Note: The 85 inch model uses a VA panel, and is widely reported to be about 200 cd/m² dimmer than the smaller sizes.

The peak HDR brightness in 'Game' Mode is slightly lower than out of it, but it's still excellent. There's a lot more variation across different content, as it dims scenes with very small and very large areas of brightness. Highlights still pop, but dark areas of scenes appear a bit brighter than they should.

These measurements are in the 'Game' Picture Mode, using the 'Warm2' Color Tone, with Brightness at max, Sharpness set to '0', and Local Dimming set to 'High'.

The Samsung QN85 gets exceptionally bright in SDR. It’s more than enough to overcome glare in bright rooms. Unfortunately, the brightness varies considerably between scenes. Small highlights in dark scenes are dimmed a bit by the TV's local dimming feature, and large, bright scenes are dimmed considerably by the TV's Automatic Brightness Limiter.

These measurements are after calibration, in the 'Movie' Picture Mode with Brightness set to max, Local Dimming on 'High', and the Color Tone set to 'Warm2'. The 'Standard' Picture Mode with the 'Standard' Color Temperature is a bit brighter, but less accurate, reaching a peak of 1277 cd/m².

The Samsung QN85A has a great color gamut. It has fantastic coverage of the DCI-P3 color space used by most current HDR content, including UHD Blu-rays. It has just decent coverage of the wider Rec. 2020 color space, though, so it's not as future-proof, as more and more content will start being mastered in that color space.

The Samsung QN85 has good color volume. Colors are bright and vibrant, and most colors are as bright as pure white. Despite the low native contrast, it can display most dark, saturated colors well. The 85 inch model uses a VA panel, resulting in better colors in dark scenes but lower color volume overall.

The Samsung QN85 has excellent out-of-the-box color accuracy. It's among the most accurate TVs we've tested, which is great if you don't plan on calibrating your TV. Most colors are very close to perfect, and the white balance is fantastic, with no noticeable issues in either. Gamma is very close to the 2.2 target, though darker scenes are slightly too dark and lighter scenes are a bit too bright. The color temperature is very close to the calibration target of 6500K.

After calibration, accuracy is remarkable, with no noticeable issues at all. Gamma follows the target very well, although dark scenes are still very slightly darker than they should be.

You can see our recommended settings here.

The Samsung QN85 has decent gray uniformity. The edges and corners of the screen appear a bit darker, and there's a bit of dirty screen effect in the center, which is distracting when watching sports or using the TV as a PC monitor. Very dark scenes look much better, with no noticeable uniformity issues.

Unfortunately, the Samsung QN85A has mediocre black uniformity. The backlight bleeds through the corners and edges, and there's clouding throughout. With local dimming enabled, it's much better, and contrast improves considerably, but there's still noticeable blooming around bright objects in dark scenes. The 85 inch model uses a VA panel and has better black uniformity overall, with less cloudiness in dark scenes.

The Samsung QN85A has a very good viewing angle. There's very little color and gamma shift as you move off-center, which is great for wider seating arrangements when you want the image to be as accurate as possible from the side.

The 85 inch model uses a VA panel with Samsung's 'Ultra Wide Viewing Angle' technology, so it has a slightly worse viewing angle, similar to the Samsung QN90A QLED.

The Samsung QN85A has superb reflection handling, much better than the Samsung QN85B QLED. The glossy screen coating greatly reduces the intensity of direct reflections, and unlike the QN90A, there's no distracting rainbow effect from indirect light sources.

The Samsung QN85A uses an ADS panel, which is very similar to IPS technology.

The Samsung QN85A has a very good response time, with a short blur trail behind fast-moving objects. Transitions in very dark scenes have noticeable overshoot, resulting in a bright trail behind dark areas.

Update 12/15/2021: We checked the flicker frequency in PC Mode. For this testing, we set the Picture Mode set to 'Graphic' or 'Entertain', and we used 4k @ 60Hz 4:4:4 and 1440p @ 120Hz 4:4: signals, and we enabled local dimming. Using a white background with the backlight at its max of '50', we measured it to be flicker-free. However, it introduced a 120Hz flicker when we opened the settings menu, and when we set the backlight to '41' and below. We also measured the 120Hz flicker with games and Google Chrome in Dark Mode at all backlight levels, but it was flicker-free with the backlight above '41' on all-white backgrounds. Essentially, it's only flicker-free with the backlight set between 42 and 50 and with a white background, but if there's a darker image that pops up, it starts to flicker at 120Hz.

The Samsung QN85A uses pulse width modulation (PWM) to dim its backlight, but since it flickers at such a high frequency, it's not noticeable unless you're very sensitive to flicker. However, the flicker frequency drops to 120Hz in the 'Dynamic', 'Natural', 'Standard', and 'Filmmaker' Picture Modes, or if you enable the Game Mode or Picture Clarity settings, but it flickers again at 960Hz with VRR enabled. This low flicker frequency can cause headaches if you're sensitive to flicker, and it also causes image duplications with 60Hz content.

The Samsung QN85A has an optional backlight strobing feature, commonly known as black frame insertion (BFI) feature to help reduce persistence blur caused by the TV's relatively fast response time. Although it can flicker at either 60Hz or 120Hz, depending on the content, there's still some noticeable image duplication, as the pulse timing is a bit off. Note that our scoring only reflects the range of flicker frequency and not how well the BFI performs.

The Samsung QN85A has a feature to interpolate lower frame rate content up to 120Hz, a feature commonly known as the 'Soap Opera Effect.' For the most part, it works well, but there are some artifacts in very fast-moving scenes.

Because of the TV's fast response time, lower frame rate content appears to stutter as each frame is held on for longer. It's especially noticeable in slow, panning shots. If this bothers you, motion interpolation reduces the appearance of stutter.

The Samsung QN85A automatically removes judder from any source, and there aren't any settings you need to enable. It helps with the appearance of motion in movies as each frame displays for a consistent amount of time.

The Samsung QN85A supports FreeSync variable refresh rate technology, which reduces screen tearing when gaming. With Game Mode on, FreeSync automatically enables, and it works well and has a very wide VRR range. As of firmware version 1066, it also works with recent G-SYNC graphics cards, although it's not officially certified by NVIDIA, so you'll have to manually enable G-SYNC Compatible mode on your PC if you want to use this feature.

The Samsung QN85A has exceptional low input lag, ensuring a responsive gaming or desktop experience. Unfortunately, we couldn't measure the input lag with VRR enabled. It's unclear if it's an issue with our testing or the TV's firmware. To get a low input lag in 'PC' mode, which is necessary for chroma 4:4:4 to be displayed properly, you have to enable Game Mode as well.

Samsung QN85A supports most common resolutions, and chroma 4:4:4 is displayed properly in every resolution except 1440p, which is important for clear text from a PC. For 4:4:4 to be displayed properly, the TV must be in 'PC' mode with Input Signal Plus enabled. Unlike TVs from other brands, including the Sony X90J and the Hisense U8G, Samsung doesn't use the MediaTek chipset for its HDMI 2.1 ports and has no issues displaying 4k @ 120Hz signals.

The Samsung QN85A supports most resolutions for the latest gaming consoles. The TV has an Auto Low Latency Mode (ALLM) as well, which is activated by setting Game Mode to 'Auto' or 'On', or enabling 'CEC'.

Additionally, there's a new feature that you can access on Samsung TVs in 2021. If you hold the Play/Pause button on the remote, it brings up the 'Game Bar' page, which shows you whether VRR is working and other useful gaming info. You can see what it looks like here.

HDMI 4 is the only input that supports HDMI 2.1 bandwidth. It's disappointing if you have both a PS5 and Xbox Series X, as only one of them will support 4k @ 120Hz gaming.

Unfortunately, unlike the Samsung QN90A QLED, the Samsung QN85 doesn't support NextGen TV (ATSC 3.0) for 4k over-the-air broadcasts.

The Samsung QN85A supports eARC, allowing it to pass uncompressed high-quality audio over an HDMI connection. Sadly, it doesn't support any DTS formats, which is disappointing, as many UHD Blu-rays use DTS for their lossless audio tracks.

The Samsung QN85A has an okay frequency response. It has a digital room correction feature that can tune the sound according to your room's acoustics. The mid-range sounds good, with clear dialogue, and the TV gets quite loud, albeit with some pumping at higher volume levels. The bass, however, is pretty bad with almost no punch to it.

The Samsung QN85A's distortion is disappointing. While it's okay at moderate listening levels, it's especially noticeable at higher volume levels. It's very bad in the low to mid-bass range, but the vocal range sounds much better.

Samsung's Tizen OS is very smooth and easy to use. This version feels even quicker and smoother than on models from previous years.

While we couldn't get a photo of ads during testing, Samsung's interface has ads and suggested content on the home page and in the app store. Unfortunately, you can't disable them.

The app store has a large selection of apps available to download. Apps run smoothly for the most part.

The remote is similar to the one found on high-end QLEDs like the Samsung Q900TS 8k QLED. It has shortcut buttons to streaming apps and a voice command button, enabling the Bixby voice assistant. It can change inputs and settings and search YouTube, but it can't search within apps like Netflix. Unlike most other remotes, it doesn't use disposable batteries, and instead, you can charge it through USB-C or the solar panel on the back.

The controls are beneath the Samsung branding on the bottom right side of the TV. There's a single button that lets you power the TV on/off and change channels, volume, and inputs.

• Power cable (not shown)
• Remote control
• User guide