Samsung S85D OLED TV Review

The Samsung S85D has a very basic design that looks good overall. It's a thin TV, but its bezels are a bit thicker than most other OLEDs.

The TV uses two plastic feet that can be adjusted to a wide position (pictured above) or a narrow position. The feet lift the TV about 3.35 inches, so most soundbars fit underneath without blocking the screen.

Footprint of the 65-inch stand in the narrow position: 12.2" x 10.39".

Footprint of the 65-inch stand in the wide position: 37.56" x 10.39".

The back of the TV is made entirely of plastic. It feels a bit loose against the panel, and the entire back of the TV flexes when pressed on. The inputs are located in two recessed cutouts on the bottom right of the TV when facing the front, which makes them hard to access if you have the TV mounted flush to the wall. The comes with two clips that can be attached to the TV's feet for cable management.

The Samsung S85D has good build quality overall. The TV is light, and the two plastic feet don't help much with weighing it down, so there's some wobble when the TV is pushed on. It's mostly made of cheap-feeling plastic, but outside of one dead pixel on the top left of our unit, there are no big concerns with the overall build quality.

The Samsung S85D has remarkable contrast and a nearly infinite contrast ratio. Due to OLED's self-lit pixels, the TV displays bright highlights next to perfect inky blacks, making it very impressive in a dark room.

Since OLEDs don't use local dimming and instead have individual pixels that can be lit up to their maximum brightness next to pixels that are turned off, there's no blooming when bright elements are surrounded by deep blacks.

The TV is an OLED and has no backlight, so its self-lit pixels give it the same performance as a TV with perfect local dimming and no zone transitions. We still film the zone transition video on the TV, so you can see how it compares to a TV with local dimming.

There's no difference in dark scene behavior between the calibrated picture modes and when the TV is set in Game Mode.

The Samsung S85D has decent HDR brightness. In combination with its remarkable contrast, it gets bright enough for some highlights to stand out, but it's not bright enough to properly display very bright highlights. Unfortunately, large bright scenes are significantly dimmer than smaller specular highlights due to the TV's aggressive Automatic Brightness Limiter (ABL).

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

• Picture Mode: Filmmaker
• Brightness: 50 (Max)
• Contrast: 50 (Max)
• Contrast Enhancer: Off
• HDR Tone Mapping: Static
• Color Tone: Warm2
• Color Space Settings: Auto
• Peak Brightness: High

If you want an OLED with better HDR brightness, take a look at the Panasonic Z85A OLED.

The Samsung S85D is noticeably dimmer while in Game Mode compared to the TV's other picture modes. This leads to a less impactful HDR experience while gaming.

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

• HDR Picture Mode: Game Mode
• Game HDR: Basic
• Brightness: 50 (Max)
• Contrast: 50 (Max)
• Contrast Enhancer: Off
• HDR Tone Mapping: Static
• Color Tone: Warm2
• Color Space Settings: Auto
• Peak Brightness: High

The Samsung S85D has fantastic PQ EOTF tracking. Shadows are displayed a little bit darker than intended, but outside of that, the TV follows the curve very closely. With content mastered in 600 or 1000 nits, there's a gradual roll-off to preserve details in highlights that are brighter than the TV. With content mastered in 4000 nits, the roll-off is even more gradual to help preserve details in very bright specular highlights.

The Samsung S85D has good SDR peak brightness and overcomes glare in bright rooms. Its Automatic Brightness Limiter (ABL) is aggressive when bright highlights take up most of the screen or if the entire image is bright, like when watching hockey. Outside of that, there isn't much variation in the TV's SDR peak brightness.

These measurements are after calibration with the following settings:

• Picture Mode: Movie
• Brightness: 50 (Max)
• Peak Brightness: High
• Color Tone: Warm2
• Color Space: Auto

The TV has an excellent color gamut. It covers nearly the entire range of colors in the DCI-P3 color space, but all colors are undersaturated and/or off the mark, with magentas faring the worst. Its coverage of the Rec.2020 color space used mostly in some nature documentaries and animated films is satisfactory, but all colors are undersaturated and inaccurate, with greens and cyans performing the worst.

The TV has very good color volume. Thanks to its high contrast ratio, it can display dark, saturated colors well. On the other hand, it struggles with colors displayed at higher luminance levels since the TV is limited by its relatively low peak brightness.

The Samsung S85D has okay pre-calibration accuracy. Its white balance is disappointing, with greens very overrepresented in most grays, blues overrepresented in mid-grays, and reds underrepresented in brighter grays. The color temperature is excellent, but it's noticeably cooler than our target of 6500K. The color accuracy is very good, but whites lean towards cyans, and there are noticeable inaccuracies with yellows, lighter cyans, lighter blues, and lighter magentas. Gamma is close to our target of 2.2, but almost the entire image is brighter than intended.

The TV has fantastic accuracy after calibration. The white balance and color temperature are close to perfect. Gamma is now closer to our target of 2.2, with only very dark scenes being slightly too dark. Color accuracy is better than before, but there are still some minor inaccuracies with all colors.

You can see our full calibration settings here.

The Samsung S85D has great gray uniformity. If you look closely, there are some very faint vertical lines on the panel, but these are very hard to see from a normal viewing distance.

Because OLEDs can turn off individual pixels, the TV has incredible black uniformity with no blooming or halo effect around bright objects.

The Samsung S85D has an outstanding viewing angle. There's some color shifting when the TV is viewed from an aggressive angle, but it's not too bad, and the image remains mostly consistent. It's a fantastic TV for watching content in a group setting.

The TV has incredible reflection handling. Its glossy screen finish significantly reduces the intensity of indirect reflections, like when you have glare from a ceiling light that isn't directly facing the screen. It also does an outstanding job of reducing the intensity of direct reflections, like a lamp positioned in front of the screen.

The TV has very good HDR native gradient handling. There's some noticeable banding in dark greens and dark blues, but all other colors have minimal banding or no banding at all.

The TV's low-quality content smoothing is decent. It does a very good job of preserving detail, but there is still noticeable macro blocking in dark scenes.

The Samsung S85D does a very good job at upscaling low-resolution content like DVDs or lower-resolution streams. Details are clear enough, but fine details and small hard-coded text are hard to make out.

Sharpness processing was calibrated with no over-sharpening for low-resolution content, with the following settings:

• Sharpness: 5

The Samsung S85D uses a WOLED panel with a RWBG pixel structure where all four pixels are never lit at the same time. Due to its subpixel layout, it has minor issues with displaying text on Windows since ClearType isn't well optimized to non-RGB subpixel layouts, but most users won't be bothered by this.

The Samsung S85D has a nearly instantaneous response time, resulting in incredibly clear motion with almost no blur behind fast-moving objects. Due to the sample-and-hold nature of OLED technology, there's still some persistence blur when gaming at 60Hz, but it's not noticeable at higher refresh rates.

This TV doesn't have a traditional backlight and doesn't use pulse-width modulation (PWM) to dim each pixel, but it's not completely flicker-free. There's a slight dip in brightness that corresponds to the TV's refresh rate. This differs from the PWM flicker on TVs with LED backlights and occurs on every OLED we've tested. It's not noticeable, and most people won't be bothered by this, but it can still bother people who are extra sensitive to flicker.

The TV has an optional black frame insertion (BFI) feature that reduces the appearance of persistence blur caused by the TV's nearly instantaneous response time. It can only insert black frames at a 60Hz refresh rate.

This TV has an optional motion interpolation feature to improve the clarity of motion. It does a good job of smoothing out slower scenes, with only some minor artifacts present. In faster-moving scenes, it can't keep up, and there are distracting artifacts and haloing.

Unfortunately, due to the TV's nearly instantaneous pixel response time, there's stutter with low frame rate content, which is most noticeable during slow panning shots.

The TV automatically removes judder from all sources when watching movies or shows that are in 24p, even if they're in a 60Hz signal, like from a cable box.

Unfortunately, if you're using the BFI feature, you have to enable 'Judder Reduction,' which introduces motion interpolation.

The Samsung S85D supports all three types of variable refresh rate (VRR) technology to reduce screen tearing. It works well across a wide refresh rate range and supports sources with Low-Frame-Compensation (LFC), which ensures your games remain nearly tear-free even when your framerate drops very low.

This TV has incredibly low input lag when set into Game Mode, which ensures a very responsive gaming experience with very little delay between your actions with your controller or mouse and the action on-screen.

The Samsung S85D supports most common resolutions up to 4k @ 120Hz. Chroma 4:4:4 signals are displayed properly with all supported resolutions when the TV's input label is set to 'PC,' which is important for text clarity. Note that for 1440p to work properly from NVIDIA and AMD graphics cards, you must select 1440p @ 120Hz through the advanced Windows display settings. If you select 1440p any other way on your PC, the TV sends a 4k signal with a 1440p window in it.

The TV is fully compatible with everything the PS5 offers, like 1440p @ 120Hz and 4K @ 120Hz, as well as HDMI Forum VRR. It also supports Auto Low Latency Mode, so you don't have to worry about manually switching to Game Mode to get the lowest input lag.

The TV is fully compatible with almost everything the Xbox Series X|S offers, including 1440p @ 120Hz, 4k @ 120Hz, HDMI Forum VRR, and FreeSync Premium Pro. It also supports Auto Low Latency Mode, so you don't have to manually switch to Game Mode to get the lowest input lag. Unfortunately, Dolby Vision isn't supported on the TV, so gaming in Dolby Vision isn't possible.

The Samsung S85D supports the full 48Gbps bandwidth of HDMI 2.1 on all four HDMI ports. This allows you to take full advantage of multiple high-bandwidth devices, like if you own both current-gen consoles and a high-end gaming PC. Unfortunately, Samsung still doesn't support Dolby Vision and supports HDR10+ instead, which is similar but not as widely supported. The TV also has variable analog audio out, so you can change the volume of any plugged-in analog devices, like headphones, using the remote.

Unlike Samsung's OLEDs from 2023, the S85D doesn't support ATSC 3.0 for 4k over-the-air, as Samsung has dropped that feature on their 2024 4k models.

This Samsung S85D supports many audio formats, including all Dolby Digital options. Unfortunately, it doesn't support DTS formats, which is disappointing, as many Blu-rays use DTS for their lossless audio tracks.

The TV has a decent frequency response. The sound profile is well-balanced enough at moderate listening levels that dialogue is clear, but the sound becomes more unbalanced near and at maximum volume. This is disappointing since the TV doesn't get very loud. Its speakers also don't produce meaningful bass, so you'll want to pair it with a good soundbar or surround sound system.

Unfortunately, the TV's distortion performance is disappointing. There's some audible distortion at lower levels, which worsens as you raise the volume.

The Samsung S85D runs the 2024 version of the Tizen OS, which is fast and easy to use. Unfortunately, a reoccurring bug affects the TV's brightness. At times, adjusting the brightness doesn't do anything, and the only way to fix the issue is to reboot the TV.

Like most TVs on the market, it has ads throughout its interface, and although you can disable targeted ads, there's no option to disable them completely.

The Samsung S85D has a great selection of apps, so it's easy to find your favorite content. You can also cast content from your phone onto the TV or play videos from a USB stick.

The remote is identical to the one included with the Samsung S90D/S90DD OLED and the Samsung S95D OLED. It's slim, compact, has quick access buttons for the most popular streaming apps, and is easy to use. The remote has a built-in rechargeable battery with a solar panel on the back of the remote. You can also recharge it via USB-C if it dies unexpectedly.

The TV is compatible with the Bixby and Alexa voice assistants, and its remote has an integrated microphone for voice commands. You can use your voice to launch apps, switch inputs, ask for the weather and time, and adjust certain settings like the TV's brightness.

A single button is at the bottom right of the TV. You can use it to power the TV on/off, change channels, adjust the volume, and switch inputs. You can control the TV hands-free with your voice using the built-in microphone, but you can also turn the microphone off using a small switch on the bottom right of the TV.

• Power cable
• Remote control
• Cable management clips
• User guide