OPINION: As predicted ahead of CES 2025, a lot of the ‘innovation’ surrounding TVs concerned AI plus bigger and brighter displays. Samsung, Hisense, and TCL were at the forefront of those discussions.
Samsung has been the biggest and most successful TV maker for years, but 2024 was the first year that it felt under the cosh with competition from Hisense and TCL.
These two brands have experienced big growth in the last few years, and I think it’ll shock many to learn of the market share they have compared to the likes of Panasonic and Sony. They’re not upstarts anymore, they’re becoming big players in the TV market, and what they’ve all noticed is the growth in big-screen TVs.
TVs larger than 70-inches have increased in popularity and, in response, TV brands have pushed for bigger and bigger sizes, as shown by Hisense’s 116-inch RGB Trichroma TV (just ahead of TCL’s 115-inch X955 Max in size). Big screens are a reality, and the likes of Samsung, Hisense, and TCL are duking it out for supremacy.
Now you might be wondering where LG lands in this conversation, and while the company does offer big-screen TVs like its 97-inch OLED, LG hasn’t made big-screen models its mantra in the way that others have. OLED is its main focus, and, along with Samsung, LG enjoyus dominance in this market.
I also think that Samsung’s rivalry with LG has cooled over the past few years. There’s less chatter about Mini LED and OLED rivalries from both considering that LG Display sells OLED panels to Samsung Electronics for some of its TVs. The near constant baiting of one another in promotional materials has died down completely. Neither one sees the other as the antagonist anymore.
A new TV battleground
Instead, Samsung is looking over its shoulder at both Hisense and TCL, and the smack talk from both the Chinese brands has placed Samsung within their iron sights. Samsung’s biggest problem is that Hisense and TCL aren’t afraid to be less expensive to the consumer. You could get an 85-inch from TCL for less than £2000, while the 75-inch Hisense E7N Pro could be found for just under £1000 in the UK.
That level of affordability is an area where Samsung does not dare to venture into. Profit margins in the TV market have dwindled considerably, it’s the main reason why the bigger TV brands no longer seem interested in their more affordable TVs – there’s little profit to be made as that market has fallen in value. For 2025 Samsung is only bringing out a couple new Crystal UHD models, which is a far cry from a few years ago where it had closer to a dozen.
Big-screen sizes are still relatively new, and therefore they offer wider margins if the price stays high, but both Hisense and TCL want to make an impact in the market and the easiest way to do so is through lowering the price of entry. You’ll make less profit but you’ll gain market share and hopefully repeat purchasers, hence why Hisense and TCL have both been toting their ‘No.1’ position in the market for big-screen sizes at CES 2025.
So both Hisense and TCL represent something of a mortal threat to Samsung’s ambitions of dominating the large-screen market. Samsung’s domination has come from its ability to see trends and latch on to them early – it was the first company to really exploit the potential of gaming on TVs, and app integration has been its thing for ages now but 8K TV hasn’t worked out as well as it presumed it might – another premium TV market the company believed would grow – so I think there’s more riding on large-screen TVs for Samsung than many might think.
Then there are lifestyle TVs, which have increased in popularity with their focus on design. Both TCL and Hisense are ramping up their presence in the market with their A300 PRO Series and Canvas models respectively. I don’t think Samsung will have that segment of the market all to itself.
What Samsung believes in and is counting on, is that the quality of its TVs – the user experience, picture, sound, app integration – is better than anything Hisense and TCL can muster. I think that’s true – Samsung makes better TVs than either Hisense or TCL – but when faced with the option of a less expensive set that does similar things, which one would you choose? The answer to that question could give Samsung sleepless nights for 2025.
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