The Vizio M7 Series Quantum 2019 (M437 / M507 / M557 / M657) is a great 4k TV with good picture quality. It delivers deep uniform blacks in a dark room and has an exceptional color gamut, great gradient handling, and decent HDR peak brightness. It has a fast response time that leaves a little longer blur trail behind fast-moving content but, on the upside, it creates very little stutter in movies. There's no motion interpolation feature and the TV uses PWM to dim its backlight. The M7 has a very low input lag which is great for gaming but unfortunately, like most TVs with VA panels, the image loses accuracy when viewed from the side and it has noticeable uniformity issues in darker scenes.
Our Verdict
The M7 Series Quantum 2019 is a great TV for mixed use. It can get fairly bright for an average-lit room and can display deep blacks, which is great for watching movies when in a dark room. Unfortunately, the viewing angles are disappointing and do not favor watching TV from the side, but the TV has an excellent wide color gamut for HDR content and a very low input lag that offers a great gaming experience.
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Excellent low input lag.
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Great color accuracy.
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Excellent color gamut.
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Image degrades at an angle.
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Local dimming performance is just decent.
This a good TV for watching movies. It displays deep, uniform blacks in a dark room thanks to the high native contrast ratio and decent local dimming support. 1080p content looks almost as good as 4k. The TV displays little stutter in movies and can remove 24p judder from most sources. It has a great pre-calibration color accuracy but unfortunately, there's no motion interpolation feature to please the soap opera effect fans.
This is a good TV for watching TV shows. It gets bright enough and can handle reflections well, so it's suitable for most rooms. Unfortunately, this TV has disappointing viewing angles so it's not a good choice if you like to move around while watching your favorite TV show. Also, Vizio's upscaling of lower resolution content is slightly worse than most brands. Finally, its smart interface has a good selection of apps, but you can't add any new ones in case your favorite show moves to a new app.
The M7 Series is a good TV for watching sports. It can get bright enough for most rooms and can handle the reflections of a few extra lights well. Unfortunately, the viewing angles are disappointing and don't favor watching the big game with a group of friends. Also, some demanding sports fans might be disappointed by the amount of dirty screen effect this TV has on darker scenes.
The M657-G0 is an excellent TV for playing video games. It has a remarkably low input lag and a fast response time that delivers responsive gaming experiences with crisp motion. It displays 1080p and 4k resolution well but unfortunately, there are no advanced gaming features like a variable refresh rate or an auto low latency feature like the higher-end models have.
This is a great TV for watching HDR movies. It has a high native contrast ratio, impressive black uniformity, and decent local dimming. It can display deep uniform blacks in a dark room that enhances your HDR movie watching experience. It has a wide color gamut and displays rich, saturated colors but its HDR peak brightness is not always enough to display the latest HDR content with bright highlights as its creator intended it to be.
This TV is excellent for playing HDR video games. It has a fast response time and displays fast-moving content with little blur. When in HDR, the TV has a very low input lag and delivers vivid HDR content with rich, saturated colors thanks to its excellent wide color gamut. In a dark room, where HDR is meant to be watched, blacks are deep and HDR peak brightness is good enough for most HDR games.
This is an impressive TV for use as a PC monitor. It has a very low input lag and feels very responsive. It has a fast response time and displays a fast-moving mouse with just a little blur trail. It has a VA panel and is immune to the burn-in risk and can display chroma 4:4:4 properly so text looks clear. Unfortunately, the image isn't accurate at the sides if you sit up close due to the disappointing viewing angles.
- 7.7 Mixed Usage
- 8.2 Movies
- 7.4 TV Shows
- 7.3 Sports
- 7.7 Video Games
- 7.9 HDR Movies
- 7.6 HDR Gaming
- 7.4 PC Monitor
- Updated May 21, 2020: Converted to Test Bench 1.5.
- Updated Feb 21, 2020: Converted to Test Bench 1.4.
- Updated Dec 05, 2019: Review published.
- Updated Dec 02, 2019: Our testers have started testing this product.
- Updated Dec 02, 2019: Early access published.
- Updated Nov 21, 2019: The product has arrived in our lab, and our testers will start evaluating it soon.
- Updated Nov 04, 2019: We've purchased the product and are waiting for it to arrive in our lab.
Differences Between Sizes And Variants
We tested the 65" M7 Series Quantum 2019, version M657-G0, and we expect our results to be valid for the 43" (M437-G1), 50" (M507-G1), 55" (M557-G0), and 65" (M657-G0).
If someone comes across a different type of panel or if their M7 Series Quantum 2019 doesn't correspond to our review, let us know and we will update the review. Note that some tests, such as the gray uniformity, may vary between individual units.
Vizio has split their M-Series lineup into three tiers (M6, M7, and M8). Check the table below to see any differences for the specific model you're interested in.
| Size | Model | Series | Peak Brightness | Dimming Zones |
| 43" | M437-G1 | M7 | 400 | 12 |
| 50" | M507-G1 | M7 | 400 | 16 |
| 55" | M556-G4 | M6 | 400 | 10 |
| 55" | M557-G0 | M7 | 400 | 16 |
| 55" | M558-G1 | M8 | 600 | 90 |
| 65" | M656-G4 | M6 | 400 | 12 |
| 65" | M657-G0 | M7 | 400 | 20 |
| 65" | M658-G1 | M8 | 600 | 90 |
| 70" | M706-G3 | M6 | 400 | 12 |
Note: We have received a few reports of 43" models with IPS panels. These models would have worse contrast, but better viewing angles.
We don't know the manufacturing date of our M657, but the label is available here.
Compared To Other TVs
The M7 Series Quantum 2019 is a great TV and outperforms many similarly-priced models. See our recommendations for the best TVs, the best 4k TVs, the best 4k gaming TVs.
The Vizio M Series Quantum 2019 is slightly better than the Vizio M7 Series Quantum 2019. The M Series (M8) has more local dimming zones and slightly better contrast ratio and delivers deeper blacks in a dark room, which is important when watching movies or HDR movies. The M7 has just slightly better reflection handling which is important in brighter rooms with many lights.
The Hisense H9F is a bit better than the Vizio M7 Series Quantum 2019 for most uses. The H9F is significantly brighter and it has a faster response time, which is great for gaming or watching sports. The H9F has also a motion interpolation feature to please the soap opera effect fans. The M7 Series has a more versatile black frame insertion feature, which helps make motion crisper but causes duplications.
The Vizio M7 Series Quantum 2019 is slightly better than the Samsung RU8000. The Vizio has a local dimming feature that improves dark room performance and can handle the reflections a bit better than the Samsung. On the other hand, the Samsung has a faster response time that delivers a crisper image in sports and video games, has a motion interpolation feature, and is equipped with FreeSync support for nearly tear-free gaming.
The TCL 6 Series/R625 2019 is a bit better than the Vizio M7 Series Quantum 2019. The TCL can get brighter and can fight the glare of a brighter room with ease. The M7 Series, on the other hand, handles the reflections of a few more lights better, so depending on your room's condition one might be better than the other. The TCL also has an optional motion interpolation feature to please the soap opera effect fans.
Video
Test Results
The Vizio M7 Series Quantum is a mid-range 4k Vizio TV, and along with the Vizio M Series Quantum 2019 replaces the Vizio M Series 2018. There's also a Black Friday variant known as the M6. The M7 Series Quantum's main competitors are the Samsung RU8000, Hisense H9F, and the TCL 6 Series R625 2019.
The Vizio M7 Series Quantum's design is decent and resembles the other Vizio M Series Quantum 2019. It has a small stand that supports the TV well but can't prevent all wobble. The borders are thin and not distracting, while the overall build quality is decent.
The stand is minimalist and can't prevent wobbling. It's very wide and requires a large table.
Footprint of the 65" stand: 50.6" x 10.9"
The back of the TV is almost identical to the Vizio M Series Quantum 2019. Most inputs are facing sideways which is great if you wall-mount the TV, but unfortunately, there's no provision for cable management.
The borders of the M657 are thin and won't distract your viewing experience.
The TV is relatively thin and won't stick out much if you wall-mount it.
The build quality of the M7 Series Quantum is decent. It resembles last year's M Series a lot. There are no gaps or loose ends and we had no issues with our TV during testing.
Unfortunately, a power outage that happened after we finished testing must have affected the TV, as we can no longer turn it on.
The M657 we tested has an excellent contrast ratio and the TV can deliver very deep blacks when in a dark room. Local dimming helps improve performance but not significantly.
The local dimming of the M7 Series Quantum is decent. This is one of the most critical differences between this variant and the M Series Quantum 2019. The M7 has a smaller number of zones and this creates visible blooming in dark scenes when in a dark room. This is especially noticeable when displaying subtitles. There are only two vertical local dimming zones and most subtitles span both. When subtitles are displayed, there's a horizontal blooming strip from one edge of the screen to the other. If you can watch movies without them you're better off.
We recommend you set local dimming to 'High' as it gives you the best results.
The Vizio M657-G0 has good peak brightness, but not as good as the M658-G1. Brightness varies a little depending on content but it's not very noticeable, and the TV is more suitable for an average-lit room.
We measured the peak brightness after calibration, with the 'Calibrated Dark' Picture Mode, Local Dimming set to 'High', backlight set to 'Max', and Gamma set to '2.1'. These were also the settings that produced the brightest image.
The peak HDR brightness of the M657-G0 is mediocre, worse than last year's M Series 2018, and just slightly worse than the M8 (M Series Quantum 2019) variant. Depending on the scene, the TV might not always deliver very bright HDR highlights as it should.
We tested the HDR peak brightness with no calibration settings, using the 'Calibrated Dark' Picture Mode, with the Local Dimming set to 'High' and Gamma set to '2.1'.
For those who don't care for accuracy, we were able to reach 485 cd/m² on the 10% window, in the 'Vivid' Picture Mode with Backlight set to '100', Color Temperature set to 'Cool', Gamma set to '2.1', and Local dimming on 'High'.
The M657 has decent gray uniformity both in darker and brighter scenes. With our unit, the darker scenes have slightly more noticeable dirty screen effect, but this is panel-specific and might not be the case with yours.
The viewing angles of the M657 are disappointing. The image degrades quickly as you move off-center, making the TV not a good choice for wide seating arrangements. If you want a TV with wide viewing angles, check out the LG UM7300.
The black uniformity in our Vizio M657 is great. In the picture above, where local dimming is enabled, you can see the horizontal blooming strip mentioned in the Local Dimming box.
The M7 Series Quantum 2019 has impressive reflection handling. Unless you place the TV across from a large bright window, you should have no issues with reflections. It delivers much better performance than the TCL R625.
The pre-calibration accuracy of the M657-G0 is impressive. Most colors and gray inaccuracies won't be noticeable to the untrained eye. However, the gamma doesn't follow the curve very well and most scenes are darker than they should be.
Excellent accuracy for the M657-G0 after calibration. We changed the Gamma setting to 2.1 and now Gamma follows the target very closely except for the very dark scenes that are still crushed. Any remaining inaccuracies in the colors and the grays are unnoticeable and the color temperature is very close to the 6500 K target.
You can see our recommended settings here.
The M7 has the same upscaling issues as all recent Vizio TVs we've tested. 480p content, like DVDs, isn't upscaled as well as most TVs. Although this might not bother you, it's noticeable.
720p content, like from cable boxes, looks a bit worse than most other brands. It still looks decent, though, and should be okay for most people.
1080p content like Blu-rays looks great, almost as good as native 4k content.
Native 4k content such as UHD Blu-rays or high-quality streaming content is displayed without any issues.
The Vizio M7 Series Quantum 2019 has an excellent color gamut, among the widest we've ever measured. Unfortunately, the EOTF (Electro-Optical Transfer Function) doesn't follow the PQ curve closely. Although darker scenes are displayed fairly accurate (just slightly brighter), the roll-off towards the TV's highest brightness starts too early and all scenes above around 100 cd/m² appear darker than they should be. The 'Game' mode EOTF is rather similar in behavior as shown here, but the darker scenes are slightly brighter as the backlight defaults to '100'.
If you find HDR too dim, check in the settings page how to make HDR brighter.
The M7 Series has a very good color volume. It can display saturated colors at most brightness levels and can also display dark shades well, thanks to its excellent contrast ratio.
The M657 has impressive gradient handling. Most colors have some noticeable banding, but nothing serious. Unfortunately, if banding bothers you, there's no feature to help improve it.
There are no signs of temporary image retention on the M7 Series Quantum 2019, even immediately after displaying our high-contrast static test image for 10 minutes.
We don't expect VA panels to experience permanent image retention, as the VA panel in our long-term test appears immune.
The M657 uses PWM to dim its backlight. The flicker frequency is at 480Hz, identical to the M658-G1. There are some duplications in motion as you can see in the response time photo but shouldn't be an issue for most people.
The M657 has an optional black frame insertion (BFI) feature to help improve the appearance of motion. It can lower its flicker frequency to 60Hz, which makes motion appear crisper but at the same time, there are more noticeable duplications in motion. The setting that controls BFI is called Clear Action.
The M7 Series Quantum 2019, just like the M Series Quantum 2019, doesn't have a motion interpolation feature.
Thanks to the not-so-fast response time, the M657 has only little stutter in movies or other 24p content. However, in slow panning shots, some stutter is noticeable.
The M657-G0 can remove judder from 24p sources and from the native apps, provided you enable the Film Mode. However, 24p judder sent through a 60p/i source, like a cable box, can't be removed by the TV.
This TV has a 60Hz panel and offers no support for any advanced variable refresh rate features, like FreeSync or HDMI Forum's VRR feature.
The M7 Series Quantum 2019 has excellent low input lag when in 'Game' mode. This isn't a picture mode but rather a menu choice called Game Low Latency that has to be enabled for low input lag.
See our recommended settings for gaming here.
This TV supports 1080p and 4k at 60Hz. There's no support for 120Hz since it's a 60Hz panel and no support for 1440p. When used as a PC monitor text looks clear as the TV can display chroma 4:4:4 properly in all supported resolutions. To do this you must set the Picture Mode to 'Computer' and enable the Full UHD Color setting for the port in use.
See our recommended settings for PC gaming here.
For DTS to work over optical, the Digital Audio Out setting must be set to 'Bitstream'.
The M657 has a disappointing frequency response. The high Low-Frequency Extension (LFE) results in limited bass with very little punch and no thump or rumble. Above the LFE the response is good resulting in clear dialogue but unfortunately, lacks airiness. The TV can get loud enough for most environments but some compression is present at higher volumes.
The M7 Series Quantum 2019 has decent distortion performance. Below 80db SPL, the total amount of harmonic distortion (THD) produced is good, but it increases significantly at maximum volume.
The interface is well-organized, easy to use, and works well. Unfortunately, it's not very smooth and not very fast.
We didn't see any ads on this TV. However, we did see suggested content and we weren't able to disable it.
There's several preloaded apps on the M657-G0 but there's no way to add any new ones.
The M7 Series has a very basic remote. It's identical to the remote included with other Vizio TVs. A few dedicated buttons help quick navigation to the most popular streaming features, but there are no advanced features like voice control.
