The best TCL TVs offer value with exceptional performance, particularly when it comes to gaming features, pushing the bounds on what can be possible in a TV at certain price points. Like Hisense, it's a main driver in Mini-LED and QLED TV designs, which offer incredible picture quality and brightness often at unbeatable prices.
Take its latest TCL QM6K Mini-LED TV as evidence, a 2025 Mini-LED model unveiled at CES with a slew of gaming features starting at just $749. That's hard to beat, even as some OLED TVs get cheaper thanks to Sansui and LG's budget offerings. Its newest QM6K isn't alone as the QM8 Mini-LED, a tp-notch display from 2024 that sports loads of features and incredible performance, comes in at just $1,000 ($900 on sale) for its 65-inch model.
With our many years of knowledge across TV reviews and testing, we know just what makes a display tick, most especially when it comes to the best TCL TVs. I myself started my journey in TV reviews with TCL Mini-LEDs, which prove some of the most exciting in the market, made all the better now thanks to its new QD-Mini-LED technology.
It makes TCL displays hard to beat (and harder still given its brand affiliations with the likes of the NFL, Call of Duty, and more). Whether you're a gamer looking to get serious frames in PC and console gaming, or a movie lover looking to catch exceptional HDR experiences with minimal interference, these following models among the best TCL TVs are your ticket to stardom.
The best TCL TVs you can buy
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Get yourself one of the best TCL TVs in the QM8 QLED, a stunning entry that makes itself known as a top contender among among the best gaming TVs. Like many other TCL offerings, it's also an icon that screams quality without the exorbitant MSRP, coming in at just $799 for its 65-inch model.
Of course, it's no OLED but TCL's making strides in Mini-LED performance. Last year it launched a new tech stack called QD-Mini-LED, which aims to take on the OLED market — and it's proving to be quite advantageous. These internal changes are what makes the QM8 stand out as one serious new entry from 2024. It's also one of the few displays from last year with an ATSC 3.0 tuner, netting you access to NextGenTV and 4K broadcasts.
Emulating many of its Hisense rivals, the TCL QM8 has incredible brightness metrics. I'm talking eye-searing, with 3,220 nits in SDR workloads and as much as 5,085 in HDR content. That's truly hard to beat for most TV makers and you won't see that on most OLED TVs.
An 80W speaker built on a 2.1.2-channel system is ideal for a ton of folks who want quality sound and performance at the right price. I personally love the QM8's slew of gaming chops,, putting it in line against heavy contenders like Sony and LG. It comes with 4K/120 support but also has a neat feature that lets you run games at 1080p/240, which is most suitable for users running the best gaming PCs.
Read our full TCL QM8 QLED TV review.
Meet TCL's middle-of-the-road Mini-LED TV from 2024, a true stunner with tons of promise built, like many of its offerings, on Google TV. It covers a wide selection of features for a variety of different use cases, including almost every HDR format in Dolby Vision, HDR10, HDR10+, and HLG, plus a set of four HDMI 2.1 ports for gamers with several different current-gen connected devices.
Thanks to its 144Hz refresh rate, the TCL QM7 Mini-LED TV can handle fast-paced gaming with ease. It does have a somewhat high input latency that sits at 13.2ms, which isn't awful but we do like to see that number under 10ms. It's one of the main reasons why I derided Sony TVs in my recent op-ed, but at least the QM7 far surpasses those sets in terms of its gaming prowess.
But it's not all about gaming, after all. The TCL QM7 does come equipped with enough firepower to make movies and shows look fantastic thanks to its ample cover coverage and HDR support. We measured the QM7 at 1,732 nits in HDR brightness in a 10% window, making it particularly suitable for users with a more ambient-lit environment. And thanks to Google TV it's an absolute breeze finding shows and movies, especially free content that's readily available on the platform.
For a middle-of-the-road Mini-LED display, it also has a remarkable sound system. It comes in at 50W or output on a 2.1 speaker system with a subwoofer built by Onkyo. That's more than enough oomph for most people and ensures you won't need to nab one of the best soundbars for good audio. That's some serious savings on a Mini-LED TV that starts at $500.
Read our full TCL QM7 Mini-LED TV review.
Taking things a touch further down in price is the TCL Q6 QLED TV, which retails for around $500 for its 65-inch model. But don't let that price fool you, as it's still quite the contender in the industry and proves itself as among the best TCL TVs for its value.
Hulu's brand new period piece "Shogun" will look phenomenal on the Q6 QLED thanks to the TV's powerful color volume. On the Rec709 gamut, it measures around 97.42 percent, while on the UHDA-P3 gamut it can hit 94.51 percent. Gaming will also be a breeze, especially fast-paced games like FromSoftware's "Armored Core VI" or even "Modern Warfare 3" thanks to its 8.9ms of input lag — though, you are slightly stunted due to its limiting 60Hz of refresh rate.
Still, with HDR technologies that include Dolby Vision, HDR10+, and HLG, you're in particularly good hands. It's marked primarily as one of the best TCL TVs as being the perfect secondary display for those looking to nab a quality option that's not too expensive. I mean, how could you pass up one of the best 85-inch TVs at just under $1,000?
Read our full TCL Q6 QLED TV review.
There's no shame in wanting the cheapest TV in the TCL lineup, as long as you know what you're getting. The TCL S4 offers basic 4K performance and three HDMI 2.0 ports. That's good enough for folks just making the leap from Full HD TVs, and its low input lag makes it great for gamers still rocking an older PS4 or Xbox One.
Unfortunately, however, because it doesn't use a 120Hz panel, gamers using modern consoles won't get maximum frame rates, and its low brightness output and poor black levels mean that contrast can be a huge issue here.
This isn't the TV that will be the pride of your living room, but if you just want a standard 4K TV without all the bells and whistles, the S4 fits the bill and your budget.
Read our full TCL S4 S-Class 4K TV review.
What is QLED?
Some of the best TCL TVs leverage QLED panels, but what does that mean exactly? Well, QLED is shorthand for TVs that use quantum-dots and LED backlighting to produce brighter and richer colors. Essentially the technology uses nano-scale crystals that react to light by glowing at different wavelengths, literally creating brighter colors in response to a TV's backlight.
Originally popularized by Samsung, QLED TVs offer major improvements in glare mitigation, brightness, and more over traditional LCD panels. When paired with a backlight array that has local dimming zones, the same displays offer even better contrast and HDR performance, edging closer to the sort of pixel-perfect lighting you'll get with more premium OLED TVs.
Not all TCL TVs have this QLED enhancement, but it's a feature that's worth paying a little more to get, since it delivers noticeably better picture quality often at a budget price.
What is Mini-LED?
Mini-LED refers to the type of LEDs used in a TV's backlight. With mini-LEDs measuring about one-fifth the size of a standard LED – measuring just 0.008-inch (200 microns) across – the dimming zones that modern TVs use to provide a more dynamic picture and better contrast get shrunk down.
Along with color and contrast, brightness makes a huge difference in how well a TV can display an image. Instead of a single LED backlighting zone illuminating several square inches of a screen, Mini-LEDs are limited to a mere handful of pixels, providing tighter lighting control to eliminate haloing and provide better brightness where it's needed.
Back in 2019, TCL introduced the first Mini-LED TV, a move that would make rival manufacturers emulate by 2021. (You can find out more about the technology in our article Year of the mini-LED TV: Samsung, LG and TCL getting this huge upgrade.)
It's one of the most advantageous innovations out of the TV market and has exploded in popularity over the past few years. If you are on the lookout for a new display but don't want the hefty premium that comes on most OLEDs, we often recommend opting for a Mini-LED TV.
How to choose the best TCL TV for you
When it comes to TCL TVs, shoppers can feel safe buying most newer models on the market. Though relatively new to the North American TV market, TCL has earned a reputation for offering high-quality TVs that punch above their weight in terms of picture quality, features and affordability.
But the different models in the TCL lineup are also clearly differentiated with specific features and capabilities that make it easier to see not only what makes one better than another, but also how those differences factor into the price-to-value ratio that each set offers.
In the end, a TCL TV delivers incredible picture performance at a great price, and the only real question is what features you are willing to pay for at any particular price point. As our testing and reviews have shown, you'll get great quality at an unmatched price on any of its models.
If you're still trying to narrow down your TV shopping by brand, price range or screen size, check out our picks for the best TVs in each.
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