Hisense 116UX 116-Inch RGB-MiniLED TV

Until recently, LED TVs were backlit solely by white or blue lights, with those components only controlling brightness while the LCD panel determines the color. At CES in January, Hisense and Samsung showed off TVs with backlights that use red, green, and blue (RGB) LEDs together to expand the range of color they can show. Hisense is the first manufacturer to actually release a TV with this system, the 116UX, a massive 116-inch RGB-MiniLED TV offering the widest color gamut and brightest picture I've ever measured. It's also one of the most expensive TVs I've tested at $29,999. Its picture quality is incredible, though, and a built-in 6.2.2-channel spatial audio system sweetens the deal. That said, if the price is too much for you, the Hisense U8QG is an excellent LED TV with a 4.1.2-channel sound system, and you can get it in 100 inches for $4,999 as of this writing.

Design: Big Enough to Cover a Wall

The 116UX is, as you can imagine, massive. The 116-inch diagonal screen can almost completely swallow up a wall with its sheer size. Like the U8QG, it doesn't have the typical nearly bezel-less design, instead sporting narrow side bezels that transition into large, rounded speaker grilles running the length of the sides. The top edge of the TV doesn't have a visible speaker array, but it does have its own thin bezel, and a slightly wider bezel runs along the bottom edge. Every part of the TV's frame visible from the front is metallic gray, with standard black plastic across the back panel.

It sits on two long, square metal feet with the same brushed gunmetal color as the bezel. The TV is also wall-mountable, assuming you have a wall and a mount that can handle it.

Almost all of the 116UX's connections sit in a recess on the left side of the back of the TV, facing left. They include three 4K165 HDMI ports (one eARC); two USB-A ports (one USB 2, one USB 3); 3.5mm ports for composite video input, headphone output, and serial control; an optical audio output; an Ethernet port; and an RF antenna/cable connector. 

Most TVs have four HDMI ports, so the 116UX's three might be a bit limiting depending on what you want to connect to it. This seems to be a trade-off to accommodate the TV's more unique connector: a USB-C port that supports DisplayPort mounted on the left edge of the screen. This is the same gambit the U8QG makes, and on one hand, it does provide a very easy and simple way to connect your phone, tablet, or computer to the TV directly and avoid the significant lag you can experience with wireless screen casting. On the other hand, you might find yourself wishing there was a fourth port if you have multiple game consoles and a gaming PC, especially if you don't want a wire constantly running out of the side of the screen.

The remote is a long, slim wand with a notable gimmick we've only seen on high-end Samsung TV remotes before: a solar cell. You can keep the remote's built-in battery charged with sunlight, or charge it directly through the USB-C port on the bottom. It's a great feature to see on any remote, since you don't have to worry about swapping out batteries. The controls on the remote are extensive, and include a large, circular navigation pad, volume and channel rockers, playback controls, a number pad, and dedicated service buttons for Amazon Prime Video, Disney+, Haystack News, Kidoodle TV, Netflix, and YouTube. The remote also has a pinhole microphone for Google Assistant, if you don't want to use the TV's far-field microphone.

Audio: 6.2.2-Channel Dolby Atmos Sound System

Hisense's biggest screen comes with the company's biggest speaker setup: a 110-watt, 6.2.2-channel built-in spatial audio sound system with Dolby Atmos. I was unable to test the speakers during my time with the TV, but on paper, it's the most powerful built-in audio setup I've seen in nearly a decade of reviewing TVs , with more channels and output than the 102-watt, 4.2.2-channel UX 110UX.

The only TV I've ever reviewed with more power was the Bang & Olufsen Beovision Eclipse from 2017, a much smaller (55- or 65-inch) OLED TV with a 450W speaker array that completely lacked any surround sound or spatial audio and only had left, right, and center channels. The Hisense U8QG, for contrast, has a 4.1.2-channel speaker system with peak output levels of 66, 72, or 82 watts, depending on the screen size. 

Features: Hands-Free Google TV

Like most of Hisense's other TVs, the 116UX uses the Google TV smart TV platform . It's a robust interface that covers all major streaming services, including Amazon Prime Video, Apple TV, Crunchyroll, Disney+, Netflix, Twitch, and YouTube, and supports local streaming from your Android device or Chrome tab with Google Cast. It also has Apple AirPlay if you want to mirror what's on your iPhone, iPad, or Mac. Hands-free Google Assistant is built in, so you can use your voice to search for content, control the TV or any compatible smart home devices on your home network, get the weather, check your calendar, and perform other tasks. If you don't want Google Assistant to always be listening for the wake word, you can disable the microphone array on the TV and give voice commands through the remote by pressing the mic button on it.

Performance: The Power of RGB LEDs

The 116UX is the first TV I've tested that uses an RGB mini-LED backlight system instead of solely white or blue LEDs, and I'm very impressed by this initial implementation of the technology. Most LED TVs with dimmable backlight arrays can adjust the brightness of each light zone but rely entirely on the LCD panel to control color. Each light zone on the 116UX contains red, green, and blue LEDs that can be individually tweaked to push colors even further than what the LCD panel can do. 

I test TVs with a Klein K-10A colorimeter , a Murideo SIX-G signal generator , and Portrait Displays' Calman software . The above charts show the 116UX's color levels with an SDR signal in Theater Day mode compared against Rec.709 broadcast color standards and with a Dolby Vision signal in Dolby Vision IQ mode compared against DCI-P3 digital cinema standards. SDR colors are nearly perfect, which is now a pretty easy task for TVs. Dolby Vision colors are similarly near-perfect, hitting DCI-P3 pretty much spot-on. 

HDR10 color is where the 116UX really gets impressive. With an HDR10 signal, whites and colors are almost entirely free of skewing, just like with SDR and Dolby Vision, but actually exceed the DCI-P3 color space significantly. The charts above show the HDR10 color levels in HDR Theater mode compared against DCI-P3 on the left and against the even wider Rec.2020 color space on the right. Rec.2020 is the current holy grail of TV color gamuts, and so far, no screen I've evaluated has ever hit it. The 116UX comes as close as I've ever seen on a TV. It's technically incredible.

Besides color performance, the 116UX is also the brightest TV I've tested yet. With an HDR10 signal in HDR Theater mode, the TV shows a peak brightness of 1,143 nits with a full-screen white field and 4,012 nits with an 18% white field. That beats the previous recordholder, the TCL QM851G (3,308 nits, 18% field), by over 700 nits. I compare peak brightness across TVs using 18% white fields to be consistent, but I've also been testing OLED panels and very bright mini-LED TVs with smaller 10% white fields as well, and with that, the 116UX shows a blindingly bright 5,889 nits. It's truly impressive, though returns diminish the higher the peak brightness gets. The human eye perceives changes in light level based on a curve, and the difference between 600 and 1,000 nits is much more noticeable than the difference between 3,000 and 4,000 nits. Basically, any TV that can go above 2,500 nits counts as really, really bright. But the 116UX is definitely the brightest I've seen so far.

Outside of the record-breaking color and brightness, the 116UX has all of the standard hallmarks of a high-end TV. It's 4K with a 165Hz native refresh rate. It supports high dynamic range ( HDR ) content in Dolby Vision, HDR10, HDR10+, and hybrid log gamma (HLG). It has Wi-Fi 6E (802.11ax) for wireless connectivity and an ATSC 3.0 tuner for 1080p and 4K over-the-air broadcasts. Basically, it's as well-equipped as a TV can get.

The blues of water and sky and the greens of plants in BBC's Planet Earth II are rich and varied on the 116UX. Fine details like fur and bark can be clearly seen in both sunlight and shade. Flowing magma shows vibrant reds and oranges, and contrasts strongly against deep blacks in some shots. 

The party scenes in The Great Gatsby show off the 116UX's strong contrast, with black suits looking dark while their cuts, contours, and textures remain clear. White lights, balloons, and shirts stand out nicely against darker elements in the same scene. The film's letterboxing also appears almost perfectly black, with little to no light bloom even in brightly lit frames. Skin tones also appear natural in all shots.

Demonstration footage on the Spears & Munsil Ultra HD benchmark disc looks excellent on the 116UX. A time-lapse of a landscape from early morning to midday transitions smoothly from very dark to very bright, with no awkward splotchiness as it moves between extremes. Snowy scenes show plenty of highlight details against all of the white, with clouds and snowflakes easily discernible against similar backgrounds. Sunsets and sunrises are vibrant and colorful, while shadow details of dark landscapes below the horizon are preserved.

The benchmark disc's shots of bright, colorful objects like honey dippers and flowers against completely black backgrounds serve as torture tests for LED TVs in terms of light bloom. Here, a very slight haze can be seen next to bright edges when viewing the 116UX directly from the front, but it's minimal. That haze expands to a significant aura when looking at the object from more than 30 degrees off-angle, and because the screen is so big, you'll hit that range before you go past the edge of the TV if the object is in the center. It's primarily apparent in these torture test shots, and isn't nearly as noticeable when viewing most normal content.

Gaming: Responsive and Feature-Filled

For gaming, the 116UX has a 165Hz native refresh rate with variable refresh rate (VRR), plus AMD FreeSync Premium Pro and Nvidia G-Sync. It also has an input lag of less than one frame in Game mode, with latencies of 14.6 milliseconds with a 4K60 signal and 6.1ms with a 1080p120 signal (single frames at 60Hz and 120Hz are 16.7ms and 8.3ms, respectively). Coming in under the one-frame threshold means we consider the TV to be good for gaming .