Glorious Overkill of Brightness and Sound

Hisense is taking the TV market by storm this year. After announcing a 136-inch MiniLED TV and a 116-inch RGB TV at CES, the company left its more affordable options for later in the year. This includes the U8QG, which was announced back in March. This is the successor to the U8N series from last year, and it improves in a ton of areas.

When Hisense unveiled the U8QG, they talked up the brightness quite a bit. Which has a peak brightness of 5,000 nits. That’s incredibly bright for a TV, especially at the 65-inch size that we have. I expected that high of a brightness setting would affect picture quality, but that’s not the case. Hisense has now spoiled other TVs for me, thanks to this picture quality and brightness levels.

This isn’t a cheap TV, which is what you might be expecting from Hisense. The U8QG starts at 55-inches for $999. The 65-inch model that we have here is $2,199; however, we have seen it on sale a few times since receiving our unit.

Hisense U8QG Specs

Hisense U8QG Review: Design and build quality

After the Hisense U8QG showed up on my doorstep, I started to unbox it and was quite surprised with the shape of the TV. A lot of TVs are pretty thin, and sometimes tapered to make them look thinner. But Hisense here decided to just make it boxy, with the flat sides and everything. Of course, this is likely needed for the extra cooling that will be needed for those incredible brightness levels. But it was a nice change from the other TVs I’ve reviewed recently.

Another thing that surprised me, actually, was the stand. It’s a center stand, so it isn’t using two feet. That means that the weight is perfectly balanced in this TV. That’s a small thing, but definitely really nice to see. This also means that if your console is a bit on the small side, the TV will still fit, as long as there’s nothing on the left or right side of the console.

The setup was pretty easy, though I will warn you that you should definitely take a look at the directions for the stand. It’s not quite as straightforward as a lot of other TVs.

On the back side is the dual-driver subwoofer. Which we’ll talk more about a bit later, but the sound is very impressive for a TV without a soundbar. On the left side are all of your ports, with the power on the right. These ports include three HDMI 2.1 ports, this is really nice to have, since one is always going to be eARC, and it’s usually the HDMI 2.1 port, making it hard to have a soundbar and a gaming console hooked up. So props to Hisense for making all of the ports HDMI 2.1 and supporting 4K120 gaming. It also has Ethernet, USB-A, headphone, and AV IN ports, and of course, the old coax for plugging in your cable box. That’s one port that I did not use, since I subscribe to YouTube TV.

There is a pretty nice pattern on the back, but that doesn’t really matter because you’ll never really see it. This is a mountable TV; however, since I live in a rental, I cannot mount this TV.

The front of the TV is pretty clean, with a fairly small bezel around the bright display. There is a very small Hisense logo on the front that you really have to look for to see. This is where a lot of TV makers put their logo, so I’m not upset with it, and it really doesn’t affect the viewing experience.

The remote is surprisingly very good

For a lot of TV makers, the remote is typically an after-thought. It’s the cheapest part of the TV, and typically doesn’t change much, and isn’t ergonomic. But, the remote included with the Hisense U8QG is very good. This is a backlit remote, with plenty of buttons, including a shortcut button that you can map to anything you want.

It’s a large remote, which makes it harder to lose in the couch, or elsewhere in your living room. Hisense is also using a brushed metal look here – though it is definitely plastic – which makes it look even more high-end.

It also has dedicated buttons at the top for Netflix, YouTube, Amazon Prime Video, Disney Plus and Tubi. While these ad buttons are annoying, these are mostly apps that most people are going to be using anyways. So it’s not quite so bad.

Hisense U8QG Review: Picture Quality

So the big selling point with this TV is the Mini-LED panel. This panel hits a peak brightness of 5,000 nits, and it also has 5,000 local dimming zones. That is what helps to keep the stunning picture quality while at these high brightness levels.

As I said in the intro, I thought that the peak brightness was going to be a marketing gimmick, or at these high brightness levels, the picture quality would struggle. Neither of which is true, surprisingly. In tests, it was able to hit over 3,000 nits in a 10% HDR white window pattern, which, yes, is still far from the 5,000 nits that’s advertised, but you will never see that many nits in the real world, only in a laboratory.

I watched this TV for weeks at full brightness, set to the Vivid mode. This was in a room with a sliding door that brought in a ton of sunlight, and I had no problem at all watching this TV. Meanwhile, the Sony Bravia 5 in the same spot was incredibly tough to watch, since it is much dimmer. You can easily adjust the picture mode and the brightness settings by hitting the settings button on the remote – weirdly, this is not part of the Google TV settings from the home screen.

Hisense has now spoiled other TVs for me, thanks to this picture quality and brightness levels.

Blooming is also not an issue here, thanks to the incredible amount of dimming zones. This is really evident when you are watching credits after a TV show or movie. Since those credits are in white, typically on a black background. It was incredible to see how crisp the letters were in different credits that I saw. It’s also evident when the TV boots up with the Hisense logo on a black background.

Even watching movies and TV shows that are mostly shot at night or in dark environments, looked incredible on this panel. And that’s despite this not being an OLED panel. It’s honestly, the best looking display on a TV I’ve had in my home. Of course, I haven’t reviewed a ton of TVs, but I’d say it looks better than the Bravia 8 OLED from last year as well.

Anti-glare is a game-changer

I received this TV shortly after going to Samsung’s showcase and getting hands-on with their latest TVs, including the S95D, which is their OLED TV with an anti-glare layer on top. It looked rather incredible, and right on par with what Hisense has here, with their Anti-Reflection Pro. Hisense says that this “incorporates a special coating into the liquid crystal layer of the screen.” And it does make a huge difference.

Reflectivity isn’t completely gone, but it is mostly gone with the U8QG. In my living room, during the day, there are quite a few reflections hitting the TV. You could still see the reflections on this TV, but they were much dimmer compared to other TVs. This is also what helps to make the TV look much brighter than it already is.

A gamer’s paradise

While testing out the Hisense U8QG, I hooked the TV up to my PlayStation 5, and believe it or not, this was the first time I got a chance to play games at 4K120, and it was glorious. Hisense does have 4K 165Hz FreeSync Premium Pro included for those that play PC games on a large TV, as well as ultra-low 9.9ms input lag. On the picture quality front, it also includes Dolby Vision and HDR10+ gaming support.

I spent some time playing EA College Football 25 ahead of the 26 release in a few weeks, and it looks absolutely incredible on this TV. Part of the reason why it looks so great on this TV compared to others is, Hisense is using a 165Hz native refresh rate panel here. While a lot of other TVs are 60Hz, and are increased with software to hit 120Hz, so it’s not a native 120Hz refresh rate. And while my PlayStation 5 does not support 165Hz, PC gaming does. Which makes this a perfect TV for gamers out there.

Hisense U8QG Review: Sound

Hisense has included a 4.1.2-channel, 72W speaker array in the U8QG, which is honestly very impressive for being built into a TV. Typically, TV speakers are pretty terrible, and I usually plug in my Sonos Beam 2 into the TV. But that never happened with the Hisense U8QG.

There is also support for Dolby Atmos and DTS Virtual:X, along with numerous sound presets. The sound quality here is nice and full, plenty of bass, and even crystal clear mids and highs. At higher volumes, the sound doesn’t distort either, which is actually somewhat surprising.

The Hisense U8QG built-in speakers render most soundbars useless.

Hisense also offers a pretty good amount of immersion with these speakers. It made me think that my soundbar was plugged in (and the sub), but it wasn’t. The Hisense U8QG built-in speakers render most soundbars useless. Of course, there are still some very high-end soundbars that will perform better, but the best-selling soundbars are not needed with the U8QG.

Hisense U8QG Review: Software

For the last few years, actually probably close to a decade now, Hisense has been using Android TV and now Google TV on its TV sets (it does have a couple of Fire TV and Roku models too). I’ve reviewed previous Hisense TVs with Android TV built-in, and the experience was not great. My guess is that most of the processing power went to the actual TV, leaving the software with very little. However, that is not the case here.

Google TV on the Hisense U8QG is incredibly snappy. In fact, it might even be more snappy than my Google TV Streamer, which Google sells for $99. I was very impressed with the performance, and it also has a pretty decent amount of storage onboard. There’s 32GB of storage available, and even after installing loads of apps, I still have plenty of storage left, which is really great to see.

Of course, with this having Google TV on board, that also means that loads of your favorite apps are available. These include YouTube, YouTube TV, Pluto TV, The Roku Channel, Netflix, Hulu and many more. All of which I used on this TV, and they performed great as well. Google Assistant and Google Cast are also included, and work just as you’d expect. Hisense has also added AirPlay 2, so if you have an iPhone like me, you can AirPlay content to this TV as well, without needing to get an Apple TV.

All of the settings are pretty easy to navigate, too. There are, weirdly, two settings menus however. If you go over to the right side on the home screen, there’s the Google TV settings. But despite there being a “display” option there, most of your display options are not there. Instead, you need to click on the gear icon on the remote control to jump into those settings specific to the TV. While I would prefer to have all the settings in one area, this is still pretty easy to get used to. And it’s not like you’re going to be changing the display settings all the time (I’ve done it once, after messing with them during the initial setup).

It’s always great to have something like Google TV as the software, instead of some proprietary software on a TV. And Hisense has done a great job integrating it here.

Should you buy the Hisense U8QG?

Hisense, unfortunately, has the brand image of being a “cheap TV maker” but that’s not all that Hisense does. Sure, they do sell quite a few cheaper TVs, but they also make some really incredible higher-end TVs like the U8QG. As mentioned before, this TV starts at $999 for the 55-inch, with our model costing $2,199. But it does go up to 100-inches at $4,999. That’s important to mention, because Hisense is one of the leading TV makers for 100-inch and larger TVs. Though, I really don’t want to see my electric bill from a 100-inch TV at full brightness.

I believe this is one of the best TVs on the market right now, definitely one of the best Google TVs available today. That’s thanks to the stunning picture quality, brightness, anti-glare and of course the included speakers. Now this is quite pricey, so it might not be for everyone. But if you’re looking for an incredible TV, this is the one to buy.

You should buy the Hisense U8QG if:

• You want a bright TV that doesn’t affect the picture quality.
• You want an OLED-like experience at a lower price.
• You want an incredible gaming experience without paying extra for competitors TVs.

You should not buy the Hisense U8QG if:

• You want a cheaper, large TV.
• You want to use a soundbar.

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