The TCL S551G is TCL's entry-level 4k model in 2024, replacing the TCL S4/S450G. It sits above lower-tier S Class models carried over from previous years, like the TCL S350G, and below Q Class models, like the TCL Q651G. Despite being part of the budget S Class, the S551G is the most advanced S Class model yet, offering features like VRR and Dolby Vision support. It can also pass through all common audio formats, including DTS. However, this is still a budget 60Hz model, so it lacks a local dimming feature to improve contrast and is limited to HDMI 2.0. It runs version 12 of Google TV and comes in sizes ranging from 43 to 85 inches.
Our Verdict
The TCL S5 is sub-par for mixed usage. It doesn't look very good in reference conditions, since it lacks local dimming to deepen blacks. Highlights don't stand out as they should in HDR content, and the TV lacks the color vibrancy to truly take advantage of the format, so it doesn't provide an impactful HDR experience. You don't lose much image quality in a bright room, but the TV is too dim to handle glare in anything other than a dimly lit room. The biggest upside of the TV is that it offers some gaming features for those on a budget, but it still doesn't support 4k @ 120Hz like many modern TVs do. Finally, the TV has a narrow viewing angle, so it's not suitable for wide seating arrangements.
Black levels and colors are barely affected in a bright room.
No local dimming to improve contrast.
Poor HDR brightness leads to a lackluster experience.
Too dim in SDR to overcome glare in a well-lit room.
Unsuitable for wide seating arrangements due to its narrow viewing angle.
The TCL S5 is sub-par for use in a home theater. It doesn't have local dimming, so blacks look gray anytime highlights are also on the screen, making the TV unimpressive in a dark room. Colors look alright overall, but the TV can't display very bright or very dark colors, which affects the impact of HDR content. Speaking of HDR, the TV is too dim to make highlights stand out as they should, so HDR content is lackluster. The TV's image processing is unremarkable; low-resolution and low-quality content doesn't look very good at all, so it's best to stick with high-quality sources.
Removes judder from all sources.
Supports all HDR formats.
Good PQ EOTF tracking.
Inadequate upscaling.
Mediocre low-quality content smoothing leads to visible artifacts.
No local dimming to improve contrast.
Poor HDR brightness leads to a lackluster experience.
The TCL S5 is mediocre for use in a bright room. Only low-luminance colors lose some saturation in a well-lit room, and blacks are mostly unaffected by ambient lighting. Unfortunately, the TV doesn't have the brightness or good enough reflection handling to handle glare in a bright room, so it's best suited for dimly lit rooms with just a couple of overhead lights on.
Black levels and colors are barely affected in a bright room.
Too dim in SDR to overcome glare in a well-lit room.
The TCL S5 is unremarkable for watching sports. The TV is just too dim and doesn't have the reflection handling needed for use in a bright room without glare being an issue, so it's not suitable for sunny afternoon games with the curtains open. Since the TV has unremarkable processing, low-resolution feeds look a bit soft, and low-quality feeds are full of artifacts, so it's not great if you're watching the game on cable. Colors are good enough that the image doesn't look dull, but dark colors lack some richness, while bright colors lack vibrancy. Sadly, the TV's narrow viewing angle means it's not a good choice for wide seating arrangements.
Inadequate upscaling.
Mediocre low-quality content smoothing leads to visible artifacts.
Too dim in SDR to overcome glare in a well-lit room.
Unsuitable for wide seating arrangements due to its narrow viewing angle.
Noticeable uniformity issues in brighter content.
The TCL S5 is a mediocre gaming TV. It's limited to HDMI 2.0 bandwidth, so you're limited to 4k @ 60Hz. However, it does support 1080p and 1440p @ 120Hz, so you have options if you prefer more frames than a higher resolution. You also get VRR support, so screen tearing is kept to a minimum. The TV's input lag is low enough for a responsive feel, but the TV's slower pixel response time leads to blurry motion, especially in fast-paced games. Although it has a decent selection of gaming features, the TV's inadequate black levels, poor HDR brightness, and unimpressive colors lead to lackluster image quality.
Low enough input lag for a responsive feel.
Supports all VRR technologies.
Gives you the option to game in up to 1440p @ 120Hz.
No local dimming to improve contrast.
Poor HDR brightness leads to a lackluster experience.
The TCL S5 has poor brightness overall. It's too dim in SDR to combat much glare at all in a well-lit room, so it's really only suitable for dimmer rooms. Sadly, HDR content lacks impact since the TV is just too dim to make highlights stand out at all.
Poor HDR brightness leads to a lackluster experience.
Too dim in SDR to overcome glare in a well-lit room.
The TCL S5 has inadequate black levels overall. Its native contrast ratio is decent, so blacks look deep enough in purely dark scenes. However, since it doesn't have local dimming, blacks are raised and look gray when highlights are also on the screen. Fortunately, the TV's black uniformity is fantastic, so blacks are displayed evenly during dark scenes.
Fantastic black uniformity.
No local dimming to improve contrast.
The TCL S5 has alright colors overall. Its SDR color volume is adequate for most SDR content, but colors lack some vibrancy if you like to use picture modes that oversaturate colors. SDR color accuracy is mediocre out of the box; you won't notice any massive inaccuracies, but colors stray from the content creator's intent. The TV's HDR color volume isn't bad, but it can't display very dark colors or very bright ones. The TV has decent HDR color accuracy, which is fine for most people, but color enthusiasts will likely want a more accurate image.
Note: We're in the process of improving our tests related to image processing, but this score should give you a general idea of how a TV performs overall with its image processing capabilities.
The TCL S5 has unremarkable processing. It does a good job following the EOTF, so most scenes in HDR are displayed at the proper brightness level. There's some visible banding in dark greens, and some other colors have minor banding, but its gradient handling is adequate overall. Sadly, the TV has inadequate upscaling, so low-resolution content looks soft and lacks detail. Finally, its low-quality content smoothing is mediocre, so there's still visible artifacts present in heavily compressed feeds.
Good PQ EOTF tracking.
Inadequate upscaling.
Mediocre low-quality content smoothing leads to visible artifacts.
The TCL S5 has decent responsiveness in its dedicated gaming mode. The TV only has HDMI 2.0 bandwidth, so you're limited to 4k @ 60Hz. However, it supports up to 1440p @ 120Hz with a full VRR range, making it decent for gamers on a tight budget. Input lag is low enough for gaming to feel responsive, but there's visible motion blur behind quickly moving objects due to the TV's slower pixel transitions.
Low enough input lag for a responsive feel.
Gives you the option to game in up to 1440p @ 120Hz.
We're in the process of fixing the way we evaluate a TV's overall motion handling. This section is currently broken, and the score isn't indicative of how well a TV handles motion overall.
Performance Usages
Changelog
- Updated Sep 24, 2025: Converted to Test Bench 2.0.1. We did this to fix an issue with our scoring in the Supported Resolutions section, since TVs with a refresh rate higher than 144Hz were being penalized for not supporting 144Hz.
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Updated Sep 24, 2025:
We wrote text for the new tests and rewrote text throughout the review after updating pre-existing tests and scores for Test Bench 2.0.
- Updated Sep 24, 2025: We converted the review to Test Bench 2.0. With this new methodology, we've added new tests to expand the scope of our testing, adjusted our scoring to better align with current market conditions, and added performance usages that group related tests together to give more insight into specific aspects of a TV's performance. You can find a full list of changes in the TV 2.0 changelog.
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Updated Nov 28, 2024:
We mentioned the newly reviewed TCL Q5/Q550F QLED in the HDR Brightness section of this review.
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Differences Between Sizes And Variants
We bought and tested the 75-inch TCL S551G, which is also available in 43-, 50-, 55-, 65-, and 85-inch sizes. Only the 55-inch and larger sizes support TCL's Game Accelerator 120, so keep that in mind if you plan on using the TV for gaming. Other than that, our results are valid for the other sizes. There's also a massive 98-inch variant called the TCL S550G, but it features a different 120Hz panel, so the results here don't apply to that model.
| Size | US Model | Game Accelerator 120 |
|---|---|---|
| 43" | 43S551G | No |
| 50" | 50S551G | No |
| 55" | 55S551G | Yes |
| 65" | 65S551G | Yes |
| 75" | 75S551G | Yes |
| 85" | 85S551G | Yes |
Our unit was manufactured in April 2024.
Popular TV Comparisons
The TCL S5 is a fairly basic budget TV. While it lacks more advanced features like local dimming, it's cheap, comes in a wide range of sizes, and fits the bill for those who just want a simple 4k TV at a reasonable price. Its picture quality is nothing to write home about, especially for HDR content, but it's a decent value option. It even includes some features found on pricier models, like VRR and Dolby Vision/HDR10+ support. If you're looking for a TV that provides better image quality and has modern gaming features like HDMI 2.1 bandwidth and 4k @ 144Hz, you can get the Hisense QD7QF for just a bit more money.
For more options, check out our recommendations for the best budget TVs, the best TVs under $500, or the best LED TVs. To learn more about the testing process that informs our scores and recommendations, check out our article on how we test TVs.
The TCL S551G and the TCL Q651G are similar overall, but the Q6 is better, mostly due to it being the brighter model. The Q6 displays brighter highlights in HDR content, so it delivers a more impactful HDR experience, even though it's still not great. The Q6 also has the better SDR brightness, meaning it fights a bit more glare in a room with the lights on. Regarding color accuracy, the Q6 has better SDR pre-calibration results, so it doesn't require calibration if you care about accurate colors.
The TCL S551G is better than the TCL S4/S450G. While both have a somewhat limited contrast ratio and no local dimming, the S5 gets noticeably brighter, resulting in better overall picture quality, especially in brighter rooms. It also has a better viewing angle and wider color gamut, as well as offering more gaming features, like VRR and 1080p or 1440p @ 120Hz.
The TCL Q550G and the TCL S551G are similar TVs, but the Q550G is better overall. Thanks to its superior contrast, the Q550G displays deeper blacks, delivering a better dark room experience. Highlights pop out more in HDR content on the Q550G due to its higher HDR peak brightness, and its superior SDR brightness means it's more suitable for rooms with the lights on. Additionally, the Q550G has a slight edge with upscaling low-resolution content.
The TCL Q750G is far better than the TCL S551G. While the cheaper S551G has some advantages, namely slightly better accuracy, the Q750G is a higher-tier product, and it shows: far brighter, better contrast, more colorful, and improved image processing. It also has many more gaming features. Overall, unless you want to save some money, the Q750G is the pick.
We buy and test dozens of TVs yearly, taking an objective, data-driven approach to deliver results you can trust. Our testing process is complex, with hundreds of individual tests that take over a week to complete. Most of our tests are done with specially designed test patterns that mimic real content, but we also use the same sources you have at home to ensure our results match the real-world experience. We use two main tools for our testing: a Colorimetry Research CR-100 colorimeter and a CR-250 spectroradiometer.
Test Results
The TV has poor HDR brightness. It simply isn't bright enough to make specular highlights pop. Combined with its unimpressive contrast, it makes for a lackluster HDR viewing experience. If you're looking for a similar but brighter TV, consider the TCL Q550F instead.
These measurements are after calibrating the HDR white point with the following settings:
- HDR Picture Mode: Movie
- Brightness: 100
- Contrast: 100
- Gamma: 2.2
- Micro Contrast: Off
- Color Temperature: Warm -5
- Dynamic Tone Mapping: Off
Results with 'Dynamic Tone Mapping' set to 'Detail Priority':
- Hallway Lights: 280 cd/m²
- Yellow Skyscraper: 206 cd/m²
- Landscape Pool: 109 cd/m²
Results with 'Dynamic Tone Mapping' set to 'Balance':
- Hallway Lights: 287 cd/m²
- Yellow Skyscraper: 208 cd/m²
- Landscape Pool: 135 cd/m²
Results with 'Dynamic Tone Mapping' set to 'Brightness Priority':
- Hallway Lights: 295 cd/m²
- Yellow Skyscraper: 212 cd/m²
- Landscape Pool: 156 cd/m²
The TV's HDR brightness isn't noticeably different when set to Game Mode.
These measurements are after calibrating the HDR white point with the following settings:
- HDR Picture Mode: Game
- Game Master: On
- Brightness: 100
- Contrast: 100
- Gamma: 2.2
- Micro Contrast: Off
- Color Temperature: Warm -5
- Dynamic Tone Mapping: Off
Results with 'Dynamic Tone Mapping' set to 'Detail Priority':
- Hallway Lights: 285 cd/m²
- Yellow Skyscraper: 209 cd/m²
- Landscape Pool: 122 cd/m²
Results with 'Dynamic Tone Mapping' set to 'Balance':
- Hallway Lights: 290 cd/m²
- Yellow Skyscraper: 212 cd/m²
- Landscape Pool: 136 cd/m²
Results with 'Dynamic Tone Mapping' set to 'Brightness Priority':
- Hallway Lights: 294 cd/m²
- Yellow Skyscraper: 213 cd/m²
- Landscape Pool: 156 cd/m²
The TV's SDR brightness is sub-par. It's suitable for dimly lit rooms but doesn't get bright enough to overcome glare in a very bright room.
These measurements are after calibration with the following settings:
- Picture Mode: Movie
- Brightness: 100
- Contrast: 99
- Black Level: 50
- Dynamic Contrast: Off
- Black Stretch: Off
- Dynamic Brightness: Off
- Micro Contrast: Off
- Gamma: 2.2
The TCL S551G has better contrast than the cheaper TCL S350G. It's good enough to display dark scenes well, but there's no local dimming feature, so blacks are raised in scenes with bright highlights.
The TV doesn't have a local dimming feature, so there's no haloing around bright objects or subtitles during dark scenes. That said, the TV can't brighten highlights without impacting the rest of the image, so dark scenes look washed out.
This TV doesn't have a local dimming feature, so it can't adjust the backlight of individual zones to brighten up highlights without impacting the rest of the image. That means that there are no distracting flickers or brightness changes as bright highlights move across the screen.
Switching to Game Mode doesn't result in any noticeable difference in dark scene performance.
The TV has fantastic black uniformity, displaying blacks evenly across the entire screen.
The TCL S551G has adequate SDR color volume. Like pretty much any TV from the last few years, it covers the entirety of the BT.709 color space used in most SDR content. It also covers the vast majority of the DCI-P3 color space, but it struggles a bit as colors get lighter. Unfortunately, the TV has inadequate coverage of the widest BT.2020 color space, and only covers just over half of the space.
| Volume ΔE³ | DCI-P3 Coverage |
BT.2020 Coverage |
|---|---|---|
| L10 | 91.95% | 66.18% |
| L20 | 91.95% | 64.95% |
| L30 | 90.58% | 63.69% |
| L40 | 88.74% | 64.18% |
| L50 | 86.84% | 64.02% |
| L60 | 84.08% | 60.87% |
| L70 | 80.01% | 51.56% |
| L80 | 78.90% | 48.65% |
| L90 | 78.75% | 48.38% |
| L100 | 82.66% | 53.85% |
| Total | 83.72% | 56.80% |
The TV's HDR color volume isn't bad overall, but most colors aren't displayed very brightly, and the TV struggles with dark saturated colors as a result of its poor contrast.
The TCL S5 has mediocre SDR pre-calibration accuracy. Colors aren't too off the mark, but less saturated colors tend to be more inaccurate. Its white balance is also very off, as most shades of gray and white have too much red in them. The TV's color temperature also falls a bit on the warmer side, but it's still quite close to our 6500K target. The gamma is also close to 2.2, but brighter scenes are too bright.
After calibration, the TV's accuracy is significantly improved. There are no longer any issues with white balance, and colors are even more on point. The color temperature and gamma are also right on target.
See our full calibration settings.
The TV has decent HDR color accuracy before calibration. The white balance is satisfactory overall, but there's too much blue in most shades of gray. This contributes to the TV's cold color temperature. Color accuracy is good overall, but there's mapping errors throughout that will bother those who want the most accurate colors possible.
After calibration, the TV has outstanding HDR color accuracy. The white balance is now excellent overall, and the color temperature is much closer to 6500K. Color accuracy is fantastic, with mostly minor mapping errors that aren't noticeable.
The TCL S551G has good PQ EOTF tracking. While blacks and near blacks are raised, everything else is displayed very close to its intended brightness in content mastered at all nit levels. There's a gradual roll-off at the TV's peak brightness to preserve some detail in very bright specular highlights.
This TCL S Class TV does a mediocre job of smoothing out macro-blocking and pixelization in content from low-quality sources. There's some noticeable loss of fine detail, as well.
The TV does an inadequate at upscaling low-resolution content like DVDs or low-res streams. A lot of finer details are lost or hard to make out, including small hard-coded text.
Sharpness processing was calibrated with no over-sharpening for low-resolution content with the following settings:
- Sharpness: 20
The TV's gradient handling is adequate, but there's noticeable banding in dark greens, reds, and blues, as well as darker grays. Banding is less apparent with lighter shades, however.
The TV's input lag is low when set to Game Mode, ensuring a very responsive gaming experience.
The TV supports all common resolutions up to 4k @ 60Hz. It displays chroma 4:4:4 properly when set to PC or Game Mode. It also supports up to 1440p @ 120Hz.
The TCL S5 supports all three types of variable refresh rate (VRR) technology to reduce screen tearing. It has a very narrow VRR range in 4k but has a much wider range in 1080p and 1440p @ 120Hz.
The TV has unremarkable pixel transitions at its maximum refresh rate of 60Hz. Pixels change RGB values pretty slowly, which leads to visible motion blur. Response times are extra slow when the TV exits a dark state, which also leads to some black smearing.
This TV doesn't support 120Hz at its 4k native resolution.
The TV has unremarkable pixel transitions at its maximum refresh rate of 60Hz. Pixels change RGB values pretty slowly, which leads to visible motion blur. Response times are extra slow when the TV exits a dark state, which also leads to some black smearing.
Since it's limited to a 60Hz refresh rate, the TCL S5 can't take full advantage of the PS5, but it does support 1080p and 1440p @ 120Hz with resolution halving. It also has no issues with HDR games on the PS5 and supports VRR and Auto Low Latency Mode (ALLM) with 'Game Master' set to 'Auto,' so it'll automatically switch to Game Mode when it detects a console.
Likewise, the TV can't take full advantage of the Xbox Series S or X. As with the PS5, though, it can do 1080p and 1440p @ 120Hz, and it supports VRR and HDR, including Dolby Vision. It also supports ALLM with 'Game Master' set to 'Auto,' so you don't have to worry about manually switching to Game Mode for the lowest latency.
Due to the TV's response time, there's some minor stutter when watching movies or TV shows. It's most noticeable during slow panning shots.
With Nature Cinema enabled, the TV automatically removes 24p judder from all sources.
The TV's cinematic response time is decent, so there's minimal blur behind fast-moving objects in most content. That said, you do notice some blur behind fast motion in sports.
This TV uses pulse width modulation (PWM) to dim its backlight. It flickers at 150Hz, which is low enough to be noticeable by users who are sensitive to it, especially since it doesn't flicker in time with the TV's refresh rate. Unfortunately, there's flicker in every picture mode, but the TV is flicker-free when the brightness is set to 29 or above.
This TV doesn't have an optional backlight strobing feature, commonly known as black frame insertion (BFI), to help reduce persistence blur.
The motion interpolation feature on this TCL S5 TV is underwhelming. There are noticeable artifacts with faster moving objects, and it doesn't smooth out slower scenes well.
The TV has mediocre handling of direct reflections, so you do see your lamp, wall light, or window on the screen when watching content or playing video games in a bright room if you have a light source placed opposite the screen.
This TCL S5 Series TV has fantastic black levels in a well-lit room. Black levels barely go up in a bright room, so blacks stay deep and punchy.
The total reflected light of this TV is mediocre. Even indirect reflections are noticeable during dark scenes, and direct reflections are very visible on the screen. Furthermore, direct reflections cause visible lighting banding.
The TV has alright perceived color volume in a bright room. Low-luminance colors are noticeably less saturated in a well-lit room, but other colors barely lose any saturation. Since the TV's colors are only okay to begin with, they're not very vibrant.
This TCL S Class model has an okay viewing angle, but the image washes out significantly as you move off-center, so it isn't the best option for wide seating arrangements.
The TV's gray uniformity is mediocre. The edges of the screen are darker, with some noticeable dirty screen effect in the middle. Still, with very dark or near-dark content, there are no noticeable uniformity issues.
The TV uses a BGR (Blue-Green-Red) subpixel layout instead of the traditional RGB layout. This doesn't cause any issues for video or gaming content, but it can be a problem for PC monitor use, as it impacts text clarity, although not everyone will notice this.
The TV uses a KSF phosphor coating to produce red light, and it has good color purity, helping it display a wide color gamut.
This TV is limited to HDMI 2.0 bandwidth on all three HDMI ports. Unfortunately, its tuner is limited to ATSC 1.0, so you can't stream 4k content over the air.
This TV supports eARC for passthrough of high-quality, uncompressed audio formats via HDMI. It supports all major audio formats, so you don't have to worry about compatibility with external sources.
The TCL S5 Series looks very similar to the TCL Q651G. It has thin bezels around the top and sides, with a slightly thicker brushed silver bezel on the bottom. Overall, it looks fairly premium for a budget model.
The TV uses simple V-shaped feet that you can set in either a narrow or wide configuration, depending on the size of your stand.
The wide configuration, pictured above, has a footprint of 50.4" x 13.5", while the narrow configuration has a footprint of 28.3" x 13.5". The screen sits about 3.7" above the table, which is enough clearance for most soundbars.
The back of the TV is made of plastic, with a grid-like pattern similar to other TCL models released in 2024. There's a recessed cutout on the left side for the inputs and a smaller recess on the right side for the power cable. The TV doesn't come with any cable management accessories.
The TCL 75S551G is far from premium, but it feels decently well-built overall. It's made mostly of plastic, and there's a fair bit of flex on the back, especially around the VESA mounting holes, but that's typical. The feet support the TV well overall.
The TCL S5 uses version 12 of the popular Google TV operating system. The interface is very smooth and easy to use.
Unfortunately, like almost all TVs on the market, the smart interface contains ads, and you can't disable them.
There's a single button on the bottom center of the TV that can be used to switch inputs, adjust the volume, change channels, and power the TV on/off.
The built-in speakers on the TCL S5 don't sound especially accurate. They don't get very loud and can't produce that boomy bass that elevates cinematic content and action. Otherwise, dialogue and other middle frequencies are reasonably clear at moderate volume levels, but the sound profile becomes more imbalanced as it gets louder.