If you want a great TV and you know where to look, you can find some of the best TVs under $1,000. Honestly, most of the TVs I have in my home (and yes, I sadly have more than one in every room) cost under a grand. But I love them all the same as they still offer great performance for the price.
My favorite currently is the Hisense U8N. Not only is it one of the best TVs under $1,000, but it's among the best TVs you can buy, period. (Though, I have to admit, this 48-inch LG B4 OLED that's $699 at Best Buy is giving it a run for its money.)
Over the years, myself and my team at Tom's Guide has tested scores of TVs at this price point like the Hisense U7N, TCL Q7, Samsung QN90C, among dozens of others. While there's no 85-inch TVs to be found here, if you're willing to stick with a 65-inch screen, there are plenty of great options under $1,000 out there.
Ready to get a striking new 4K HDR TV that doesn't break the bank? You've come to the right place.
How to choose the best TV under $1,000
At the end of the day, the most important aspects of any TV are pretty simple. Find a set that fits your budget, has the main features you want, and then check reviews to make sure it doesn't have any performance issues.
For less than a grand, you can still check off most of the must-have features you've envied on more expensive sets, like QLED for better color and brightness, a full-featured smart TV experience, complete with voice control and smart home integration, and features like Dolby Vision HDR and Dolby Atmos sound. You might have to look at last year's sets, but they're still great and offer fantastic value.
Size: You won't have to compromise on screen size, either. Our recommendations above include great options at 55, 65 and even 75-inch sizes, so your budget doesn't have to prevent you from getting a TV that's just as big as you want. Find the screen size that works best for you in our article What size TV should you buy?
HDR: For the best picture, we recommend getting a set that offers high dynamic range (HDR) support. HDR10 is the base standard, while HDR10+ and Dolby Vision are higher-caliber formats; we recommend opting for for one of the latter when you have the choice, or better still both.
Pay attention to ports: We recommend getting a TV with 4 HDMI ports whenever possible. And even though they do cost more, we prefer TVs that have HDMI 2.1 connections. They offer better gaming features and will keep your TV up to date for much longer.
Smart TV features: Pretty much every TV on the market is smart these days, so don't hesitate to get a smart TV. However, make sure that the operating system of the TV in question has the apps you want because not all of them do. And some platforms offer advanced features like smart home controls and voice assistant capability.
From smart functions to port selection, we offer plenty of advice in our TV buying guide, which explains the ins and outs of features like HDR, different types of display, and even extended warranties. And if you still have questions about smart TV features and capabilities, check out Smart TVs: Everything you need to know.
About the author
If you're like me, you love TVs of all shapes and sizes. I've been testing TVs for close to a decade (you might've read my work on TechRadar where I was Senior Editor for a number of years) and now I lead a team of smart, TV-savvy journalists here at Tom's Guide. My accreditations include THX Installation and Calibration training and serving as a Innovation Awards judge for TVs at the largest tech show in the world, CES. It also helps that I get to see dozens of TVs every year at closed-door demos and during big press events. Before my days in journalism, I helped folks just like you at a local Best Buy working in the TV department. Have a question about this guide or any other TV-related guides here on Tom's Guide? Drop me an email or find me on Twitter @PowerstancePino.
Best TV under $1,000
Given that the Hisense U8N is at the top of our lists for both the best TV and best 65-inch TV, it should make complete sense why it's also the best TV under $1,000. This is a no-compromise pick that looks like a TV that costs twice as much.
I spent over three months with this set, and it's still the TV I go back to in between reviewing new models. I find its colors to be perfectly saturated and its contrast incredible. In our lab tests, the Hisense U8N put out over 2,000 nits of peak brightness, and thanks to its Mini-LED backlight, suffered little to no light bleed.
The big compromises you have to make here are its limited HDMI 2.1 ports, of which there are only two. This isn't a big deal if you're not a gamer, but if you plan on buying the next several PlayStation and Xbox consoles, you might want to skip down to our second pick that offers four full-spec HDMI 2.1 ports.
Yes, there are always going to be better TVs if you're willing to pay two or three times as much but, at this price point, there's no better option than the U8N.
Read our full Hisense U8N review.
Under $1,000 Runner-up
The Hisense U8N and the TCL QM8 are two sides of the same coin. The Hisense U8N is newer than last year's QM8 (at least the QM850G model we reviewed) but the latter is truly neck-and-neck with our under-$1,000 TV frontrunner.
So a few things are working in TCL's favor here: The out-of-the-box color accuracy is going to be slightly better for the QM8 and the remote, while very similar, lights up in the dark and feels slightly more premium. The sound system, overall brightness and color vibrancy are all better on the Hisense U8N, but again, it's just winning here by a hair.
There's a newer model, the QM851G, that's entering the market in 2024, but I don't expect it to be available for $1,000 for more than a week at a time. Still, the 2024 model is worth checking out if you want to stick with TCL but get some better performance and a newer processor.
Read our full TCL QM8 (2023) review.
Best Samsung under $1,000
So, this one comes with a caveat: If you don't mind a smaller size TV that's, say, 50 inches or less, than you probably want the Samsung QN90C Neo QLED TV. It's the older brother to the Samsung Q80C and it's better in most every way. Sadly, however, you can't get a 55- or 65-inch version of that TV for under $1,000.
That leaves us with the Samsung Q80C.
In our tests, the Samsung Q80C put up a great fight against the Hisense U8N and TCL QM8. It scored lower in overall brightness and color vibrancy, but it did better in color accuracy and had the lowest input latency. (That last bit is important for gamers as it's the time it takes for a signal to be processed from an external device like a game console or PC.)
It's more mid-range than high-end, but the Samsung Q80C reminds us why Samsung is still the king of Quantum Dot technology.
Read our full Samsung Q80C QLED TV review.
Best Roku TV under $1,000
The Roku Plus Series 4K QLED TV marks the streaming giant’s first foray into sets after long focusing on software and set-top and plug-in devices — and the move is a successful one. In addition to delivering a ton of screen for its starting price of $499, these TVs also give you surprisingly good picture quality and sound, two things that are usually the first to go with budget sets.
Despite its price, the Plus Series does not look cheap: A gray, metal bezel surrounds the screen on all sides, measuring less than an eighth-inch on the left, right, and top, and about two-thirds inch on the bottom to allow for a front-and-center chrome Roku logo.
The Plus Series uses quantum-dot LED technology to produce more and more vivid colors and increased brightness. And in everything we watched, we found that the TV lived up to Roku’s claims. Picture vibrancy does start fading as you move away from the center of the screen, but it took a fair distance for the display to look unbearable.
All in all, the Plus Series is well-suited to watching just about anything except super-fast action such as sports, thanks to the panel’s limited 60Hz refresh rate.
Read our full Roku Plus Series 4K QLED TV review.
Best Big-Screen TV
Obviously OLED is going to be the best pick for gamers given its native 120Hz refresh rates, low input latency and beautiful black levels, but if you're a gamer who want to maximize screen size, then the TCL Q7 QLED is a great second choice.
In terms of test results, the Q7 scored right in the middle of the pack with a peak brightness of 592 nits, UHDA-P3 color gamut coverage of 93.38% and a Delta E color accuracy of 2.3594. That last bit is lower than a lot of the competition (including the Hisense U6K!) and overall it performs pretty well when fed HDR content. Audio performance is this TV's big weakness with most shows and movies sounding just OK during our testing process and its off-axis viewing made it hard for folks sitting on the perimeter of the room to see the full range of colors.
Where it really shines, though, is gaming. Not only does it sport multiple HDMI 2.1 ports, but one of those ports can even accept a 144Hz input from a gaming PC. Gamers will also appreciate this TV coming with Variable Refresh Rate (VRR) up to 240Hz when you drop in resolution and Auto Low-Latency Mode (ALLM).
If you want a 75-inch gaming TV for under $900, you won't find one any better.
Read our full TCL Q7 QLED TV review.
How we test TVs
You can read a full explanation of our TV-testing process, but in a nutshell every single TV review with a score has undergone in-depth, scientific testing and real-world use. We believe that gathering data about a TV's performance is just as important as spending time with it in our own living rooms.
We keep track of how well TVs perform in areas like color saturation, peak brightness in a 10% window, input latency, and more, and then we can compare TVs against one another in an apples-to-apples way.
By using a hybrid approach that blends real-world use with lab tests, we're able to better understand what TVs look like in your home, both the good and the bad, while using empirical data to back up our observations.
FAQs
What features are worth paying more for?
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While you can get most of what you want in a smart TV for $1,000 or less, there are a few exceptions.
Bigger screens: If you want to get a really big screen, today's largest TVs go bigger than 75 inches, and as a general rule, anything over the 75-inch mark will be more expensive, and almost always costs more than $1,000. Sometimes a lot more.
OLED: Then there's OLED. As the uncontested premium display technology, OLED screens don't come cheap, and even the most affordable OLED TVs have a regular price that exceeds the $1,000 budget. However, if you watch out for sales, you can sometimes score a deal that will get you the 55-inch Vizio OLED TV (OLED55-H1) for just under the limit, so don't write it off completely.
8K resolution: Even as 8K TVs become more common and start to climb down from the astronomical prices they debuted at, there's still nothing on the market that can be considered affordable. With the cheapest 8K sets still selling for thousands, there's just no way to get that sort of resolution for under $1,000. (The good news? Even if you wanted to spend more, we still wouldn't recommend an 8K TV, so don't sweat it.)
Whether any of these features are important to you comes down to your own expectations and needs, but if you've got your heart set on these premium features, get ready to go beyond the $1,000 mark, because they don't come cheap.
If you've narrowed down your TV shopping by brand, price range or screen size, check out our picks for the best TVs in each.
Best TVs | Best 4K TVs | Best smart TVs for streaming | Best TVs for gaming
The best TVs under $1000 | The best TVs under $500
Best TV brands | Best Samsung TVs | Best TCL TVs | Best LG TVs | Best Roku TVs | Best Google TVs | Best OLED TVs | Best QLED TVs | Best 8K TVs | Best HDMI 2.1 TV | Best TVs with ATSC 3.0 | Best TVs with Chromecast
The smallest smart TVs | Best 43-inch TVs | Best 50-inch TVs | Best 55-inch TVs | Best 65-inch TVs | Best 70-inch TVs | Best 75-inch TVs | Best 85-inch TVs
And don't forget to watch out for the latest TV reviews.
