TCL - 98" Class QM8K Series 4K UHD HDR QD-Mini LED Smart TV with Google TV (2025)

I've been on a quest to complete my living room home theater experience for about 4 years now. After covid I had to turn my movie room into a shared office and migrated all of that technology and experience to my living room. So after the successive upgrades first what is LG 65-in OLED then upgrading to a 77 inch LG OLED, everything was okay but it really wasn't quite cinematic and immersive. The problems weren't the OLED because it was large and beautiful. The problem was the size of the room and with open floor plan how many rooms in needed to service. But, for me to get the OLED need it for that size I would have to spend close to a car payment and that's just simply unacceptable. So my Alternatives were to go with the projector or with a 100 in mini led. Now I've had reservations about the picture quality particularly coming from an OLED experience with mini led. I started out looking at projectors, particularly short throw, but because it's a reflective medium your black level is always going to be limited by the screen that it is landing on. Also my living room and bottom floor has lots of windows so I would always have to keep him shut to be able to manage the ambient light even with an ALR screen. So that led me to a self-emissive alternative meaning a large television. So after looking at lg, samsung, hisense, and TCL, all of my research pointed me bang for the book towards the TCL qm8k as the best alternative to an oled. I caught it during the Thanksgiving break so the pricing was great for the 98 inch TCL. Now I have many years of experience mounting televisions, but the sheer size and weight of this TV would really lend me to recommend you having it professionally installed. The second problem I ran into was finding a proper amount because it is a large you need to have a 600 by 500 VESA pattern. I ordered a mount from amazon, but they failed to deliver in time so I wound up buying multiple mounts at Best Buy which luckily they had in stock as many didn't. Beyond the installation, once it was on the wall once it was configured this is a win. Not only is the picture immersive and matches my Dolby Atmos 7.2.2 soundscape, it is brighter than the sun so we can do with the brightness of the room. I no longer have to have my blinds closed doing certain parts of the day to watch television. The colors pop and the blacks which was my concern is close to oled. Why not Pitch Black like an old they are really really Inky black bars disappear against my black wall leaving it a magical experience at this size. I have done zero calibration out of the box and everything looks Bright contrasty Beautiful. Everything from movies to sports to stream content from YouTube looks amazing and almost three-dimensional at times. Even standard definition content looks amazing. And if watching multiview in my case with YouTube TV, each one of those four squares is equivalent to a 48-in television. The Google TV interface is Snappy and intuitive. I will say that I do not like the ads which is not exclusive to TCL, looks like LG and others have imposed that on to the viewer as well. All that said it is seamless it is rich and intuitive. Oh and one more thing, one of the other concerns when moving away from OLED to a mini LED was off axis viewing. I can tell you definitively haven't watch football for many different angles on Thanksgiving day, this was a negligible issue. If you really looking forward you notice it but it is so slight that again it's a non-issue. TCL has done a magnificent job with this w h v a panel that all the colors all the saturation looks fine even at extreme angles. I have not tested the sound because again I have a home theater sound setup and my humble opinion to have a television like this without at least a multi-channel soundbar is a bit of a waste. With that said I'm offering no judgment this is my own humble opinion, and my understanding is that the sound from the television audio is pretty good.

I have had the 98QM8K TV for a few weeks and can confidently say that the colors, brightness, and black levels are all excellent with HDR material. I have replaced my projector and screen with this 98-inch TV and it has been a huge upgrade. I have only had limited exposure to SDR material or OTA 1080P or less resolution content or TV watching. The TV seems to struggle somewhat with lower resolution content and its upscaling capabilities seem only fair. But, again, I really haven't yet worked on dialing in the settings for that type of content. For UHD movies, the image can be stunning. For streaming HD content, the image can also be stunning. Since that is what I mostly watch, I can give this TV a solid 5-star rating.

After living with the TCL 98QM8K, the biggest takeaway is this: it delivers a genuinely impressive 98-inch experience without feeling like you massively overpaid just to get the size. For movies, sports, and gaming, the sheer scale combined with strong Mini-LED brightness makes it feel closer to a “home theater wall” than just a big TV. Picture quality is where it wins people over. HDR content looks punchy and vibrant, and it holds up well even in rooms with some ambient light. Compared to other 98” TVs around this price, the QM8K simply looks more alive — highlights pop more, colors have more depth, and overall it feels less compromised. With good 4K sources, it can look downright impressive for the money. That said, it’s not perfect. In darker scenes you can notice some blooming around bright objects, especially if you’re sitting off to the side. Motion and upscaling are solid but not class-leading — lower-quality cable or heavily compressed streams won’t look as clean as they do on higher-end Sony or LG sets. And like most TVs this big and thin, the built-in speakers are fine for casual viewing but don’t match the scale of the picture. Where the 98QM8K really lands is value. You’re not getting flagship-level refinement, but you are getting a massive, bright, modern TV that feels far more premium than most alternatives in its price range. If you want a true 98” screen and don’t want to spend top-tier money, this TV makes a strong, practical case — and for a lot of buyers, that’s exactly the balance they’re looking for.

Coming from an OLED LG G4, I was nervous this TV wouldn't get to the level of that TV but I wanted to get a bigger TV. Did purchase the G5 but for the price, decided to go with the 98" QM8K and I'm glad I did. The picture quality is very close to the OLED in black/white levels and color. You will have to play with the settings to get the best picture but once you do, it's game on and WOW! Source does play a role but so much material is high quality so not a big deal. Some people have mentioned the "hum" which I do not have. The only thing I have is the TV is so big and gets so bright, it does get warm. You will not be disappointed in this TV; it's incredible for gaming, sports and TV/movies. For sound, I'd didn't even try bc I use a Sonos Arc.

The TCL QM8K is an excellent TV. It has a 10 bit panel, fantastic brightness and excellent color reproduction. It has nearly OLED blacks, and excellent local dimming control. Check out RTINGS, as it is rated the best 98-100” TV. PS5 pro game play looks good too.