Your TV is no longer just an appliance like a microwave or a dishwasher. While it’s true that any TV you buy these days will be able to handle everything from Netflix to cable broadcasts to a PlayStation 5, you can have a radically different experience depending on a TV’s specs. The gap between watching The Shining on a 32-inch, 720p SDR TV versus a 70-inch 4K set with Dolby Vision might feel similar to watching it on a VHS tape versus watching it in the theater.
There are a variety of specs you need to pay attention to. Something that even a lot of home theater enthusiasts forget, however, is the concept of response times. They don’t necessarily have to be your priority — but as TVs become far more than a way of watching movies and shows, they should certainly be on your radar, and they’re one of the primary advantages of OLED. I’m sure it won’t take long to see what I mean.
What is response time, and why does it matter on a TV?
Keeping up with all your devices, not just the cable box
Let’s cut to the chase, here. Response time is how quickly individual pixels are able to transition from one color to another, measured in milliseconds (ms). That might sound remarkably close to the notion of refresh rate, but the latter is a metric of how fast the entire display is able to cycle, measured in hertz. I’d say refresh rates are ultimately more important, but I’ll talk…