This year, Samsung finally released its own competitor to the best OLED TVs: the Samsung S95B, which uses a state-of-the-art "QD-OLED" display. Combining the Quantum Dot color technology that Samsung's QLEDs are famous for with the pixel-precise contrast of OLED, it produces images that we called "groundbreaking" and "stunning" in our five-star review.
The only downside is that QD-OLED doesn't come cheap (next-gen tech never is) and is currently only available in 55-inch and 65-inch sizes.
But it looks like Samsung Display has plans that can fix both problems, ready for next year's models. According to a report by The Elec (opens in a new tab), Samsung Display has already increased the rate of return to 85% and plans to increase the number of QD-OLED panels it produces by 30% by the end of the year.
"Performance rate" refers to the number of Samsung Display TV screens that perform well enough to be used in a final product. In 2021, QD-OLED's return rate was only 50%, meaning half of the displays it was trying to make went to waste. A low efficiency ratio increases the price of the display, because you have to factor the cost of all that waste and energy into the price of high performance displays. So this increase in efficiency means you can charge less for QD-OLED panels.
And increasing the number of screens made by 30% can also mean cheaper screens, as economies of scale improve (i.e. the more something is made, the cheaper each individual becomes to produce).
At the same time, investing in these new production facilities would mean that Samsung could also produce 49-inch and 77-inch QD-OLED screens. It's not as exciting as you might expect for fans of midsize TVs, though: The Elec's story suggests the 49-inch panel will be destined to be a monitor rather than a TV. the 34-inch Alienware QD-OLED ultrawide monitor than a 4K TV, according to The Elec. We've seen this kind of thing before (without OLED) - the Samsung Odyssey Neo G9 and the Philips Brilliance 499P9H, for example.
There's a catch, though: Samsung Display is waiting to invest in these new production facilities until it finds out if Samsung Electronics (the part of the company that actually puts screens into TVs and monitors) will commit to launching more QD-OLED products.
It's hard to predict right now, but given that Samsung and LG haven't been able to agree on a price for Samsung to use regular (non-QD) OLED screens for its TVs, it makes sense that Samsung is pushing harder with its own version of OLED as an alternative.
And the price could fall even more after 2024
There's a second report in The Elec which is also good news for QD-OLED prices going forward, but it seems more distant. The report reveals that Samsung Display has been working on a new, slimmer way of building QD-OLED displays with a company called ETRI, as confirmed at a display conference in South Korea.
We don't really care about thinness for aesthetic reasons (have you seen today's OLED TVs? Thickness isn't an issue!), but the way Samsung and ETRI plan to achieve that is to remove a layer of lamination that's included in the current . screens. This would simplify production, making the whole process more efficient and therefore cheaper per panel in the long run.
However, the report says commercialization of this technology is unlikely before "after 2024."
It's no surprise that Samsung is considering more advanced display designs: Samsung Display is one of the leading research centers for OLED products and has also been investigating ways to improve the efficiency of the blue OLED pixels that QD-OLED screens rest on. to generate its light, which would also help bring down the price of QD-OLED, but also seems several years away.
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