This OLED TV from Philips offers really good value for money

Luca Fontana

10/4/2025

Translation: machine translated

Video: Luca Fontana

Pictures: Luca Fontana

Philips' OLED 809 brings Ambilight, strong specs - and LG's OLED panel. But is that enough for the mid-range crown? I put the TV through its paces and tested its nits.

Full Disclosure: The TV, the 65-inch version of the OLED 809, was loaned to me by Philips for testing. However, Philips has no influence on the test result, my evaluation and the test procedure.

Philips televisions and I meet again and again. Sometimes with a happy nod, sometimes with a raised eyebrow. Because in the TV world, Philips is like the creative cousin that doesn't always do everything perfectly - but often has the cooler ideas. The best example: Ambilight. A technology in which colourful LEDs on the back of the TV project the colours of the picture onto the wall.

Sounds like a gimmick? It is. But a damn good one.

The OLED 809 is one of the more recent representatives of this genre - a mid-range model from 2024 that uses the same OLED panel as LG's C4 series. This means: no MLA, i.e. no microscopically small lenses that provide significantly more brightness in LG's flagship models such as the G4. But the Philips also costs much less.

The exciting thing is that Philips combines LG's hardware with its own blend of P5 processor and Ambilight magic. The big question: Is this enough to shine in the OLED mid-range? Or to put it another way: is the Philips OLED 809 just pretty to look at - or is it also technically convincing?

Design: Ambilight meets minimalist metal

When it comes to design, Philips remains true to its line: the OLED 809 looks elegant, tidy and modern. The dark metal frame is pleasantly slim, the front looks almost frameless and the screen appears to float slightly above the matt chrome stand. Speaking of the stand: it is beautifully flat and centred. I can even place my rather bulky Sonos Arc on it without it wobbling and protruding into the picture.

There is a gap of around 7.2 centimetres between the bottom edge of the TV and the piece of furniture. This is slightly more than the Panasonic Z85A and could make a decisive difference depending on the soundbar model. Nevertheless, as always, the infrared sensor is located in a somewhat impractical place. Some acrobatics with the remote control are therefore necessary.

What sets Philips apart from many others, however, is the familiar Ambilight, here in the 3-sided version. On the back are LED strips that dynamically project colours onto the wall to match the picture mood. This not only looks fancy, but also makes the TV appear larger and relieves some of the strain on the eyes when watching - especially in dark rooms. Yes, it's a gimmick. But one of the good ones.

As is typical for OLED, the TV is extremely thin at the top. I measured around 1.1 centimetres at the slimmest points. At the bottom, where the electronics and connections are housed, the Philips is about five centimetres thicker. Not a wall miracle, but perfectly okay for a classic VESA mount (300×300 mm). Speaking of VESA mounts: You can find them here in our shop.

Technical connections and features:

• 4x HDMI (2x HDMI 2.1 with full bandwidth incl. eARC, VRR, ALLM, Dolby Vision Game, FreeSync Premium, G-Sync compatible)
• 2x USB-A
• 1x Toslink (optical audio output)
• 1x LAN (RJ-45)
• 1x CI+ slot
• 1x headphone output
• 1x satellite connection
• WLAN 6, Bluetooth 5.2
• Voice control with Google Assistant or Alexa

All HDMI connections support HLG, HDR10, HDR10+ Adaptive as well as Dolby Vision and low-latency gaming mode. DTS:X is also on board, which stands out positively - many other manufacturers now do without it. Dolby Atmos is of course also channelled through.

A little tip for audio enthusiasts: The TV automatically recognises many signals correctly, but it may be worth switching to «Passthrough» in the sound settings if there are problems with the pass-through.

Numbers, curves, colours: how the Philips OLED 809 performs in the test lab

What comes next goes deep into the subject matter. I measure with professional tools from Portrait Display to get an objective classification of the picture quality. If you are not interested in details and diagrams, you can read the following short version and then scroll to the chapter «The picture: colour variety and detail in comparison».

The most important findings in brief:

• Brightness: At a maximum of 906 nits, the Philips OLED 809 is slightly brighter than Panasonic's Z85A, which uses the same panel, but significantly dimmer than flagship models from Samsung (S95D) and LG (Evo G4).
• Contrast: As is typical for OLEDs, the 809 delivers a perfect contrast ratio. Black is really black here.
• Colour space coverage: The coverage is solid, but not outstanding. Philips achieves good values in the P3 colour space, but lags slightly behind Panasonic's Z85A.
• Colour fidelity: The colour fidelity is decent, but less precise than the competition; deviations can become visible, especially in light grey tones.
• Reflections: The OLED 809 performs well, but conceals light sources somewhat less effectively than Panasonic's Z85A. It is a far cry from Samsung's S95D with its almost magical anti-reflective coating.

About the measurements. I measured all of the TV's screen modes without calibrating it - just as it comes out of the box. I therefore hardly made any changes to the settings:

• Movements: I set smooth transitions to «4» from «10», otherwise the picture often stutters.
• I have switched off all energy-saving sliders and automatic brightness sliders.

The «Dolby Vision Filmmaker Mode» achieved the best measured values for all types of content. I therefore strongly recommend always activating filmmaker mode for both SDR and HDR content. Except for gaming. Regardless of my measurements, you should always use gaming mode. This is due to the low input lags there. Looking for a good TV for gaming? Here you can find my guide article.

The maximum brightness

Okay, hold on: Philips' OLED 809 delivers a peak brightness of 906 nits with very small image sections (2% window). For an upper mid-range panel, this is actually a pretty decent value and even slightly higher than the Panasonic Z85A - here in the test - which was already quite good at 809 nits.

The Philips 809 also shines brightly in terms of overall brightness (100% window). It even beats the Z85A from Panasonic, albeit only just. At the same time, however, it remains well below the OLED flagships: LG's G4 - here in the test - comes in at over 1300 nits in terms of peak brightness with its microlens layer.Samsung's S95D - here in the test - even reaches up to 1500 nits. In short: the upper league is once again playing in a different brightness galaxy.

Nevertheless: That's easily enough for everyday use. HDR highlights such as sun reflections, explosions or laser sword sparkles really pop. At least as long as the entire picture isn't bright. As with all OLEDs, the ABL (Automatic Brightness Limiter) strikes mercilessly at some point. This is a protective mechanism designed to protect the panel from burn-in and overheating. Incidentally, I also noticed this during testing: the values were nice and high on the first run, but suddenly much lower on the second and third. As if the TV was saying: «Boy, I need a break too!»

What does that mean for you? Individual highlights look great. But when the whole picture gets bright, for example snowy landscapes or football pitches in broad daylight, the OLED 809 might visibly run out of steam and darken a little. This is not tragic, you probably won't even notice it. But it's something you should be aware of. Especially if you're watching TV in a very bright room.

White balance, colour space coverage and colour fidelity

Let's take a look at how well the Philips OLED 809 displays white, colour and greyscale - in other words, everything that makes a picture look natural. Three questions will help:

1. EOTF, white balance and colour balance: How accurate are the greyscales?
2. Colour space coverage: How many different colours can the TV display?
3. Colour fidelity: And how close are these colours to the reference original?

Each of the 8.3 million pixels in the Philips OLED 809 consists of a white, red, green and blue sub-pixel. White is created when they all shine at the same time and with the same intensity. Full brightness therefore produces the brightest white. The lowest brightness, on the other hand, produces the darkest white. Or rather: black. In between are shades of grey of varying brightness. This is why the English term "grayscale measurement" is used.

The greater the difference between the brightest and darkest pixels, the better the contrast values. As with all my OLED TV tests, I don't measure contrast because OLED pixels can switch off completely. This means that the contrast ratio tends towards infinity anyway.

Answer 1: EOTF, white balance and colour balance

The grey scale measurement at Philips shows a rather conservative adjustment: from around 50 per cent brightness, the curve is slightly below the target value. Light grey levels therefore appear somewhat darker than they should.

The RGB balance is more exciting. Without luminance, it remains very stable, only blue drops slightly in the brightest areas. The result: a very subtle colour cast - possibly slightly yellowish or greenish - but this should only be noticeable if you look at comparable TVs directly next to it.

Now to the measured colour balance with brightness:

With luminance, it then becomes clear: from around 60 per cent brightness, all three colours drop visibly, particularly noticeably between 70 and 80 per cent. This uniform weakening ensures that there is no colour cast, but that the picture simply appears darker than it should according to the reference.

In short: Philips is playing it safe here. Whether this is to protect the panel or the power consumption? I have no idea. But if you want the most precise gradations in grey areas with bright HDR content, you'll get a little less fine-tuning here than with Panasonic or LG.

Answer 2: Colour space coverage

On the topic of colour gamut coverage, Philips' OLED 809 delivers solid, but not outstanding values:

• Rec. 709: 100%
  • fits, this is the standard for SDR content such as live TV or Blu-rays.
• DCI-P3: 93.7%
  • good, but slightly less than the Z85A (95.03%) and clearly below the top models G4 (96.58%) and S95D (99.95%).
• BT.2020: 68.5 per cent
  • typical for WOLED panels, but a far cry from QD OLEDs such as Samsung's S95D, which achieve almost 90 per cent.

What exactly do these figures mean? For current HDR content, which practically all rely on the DCI-P3 colour space, what Philips' OLED achieves is easily enough. The colours look vivid and rich. Only with particularly colour-intensive content or future formats could the OLED 809 panel reach its limits at some point.

The Z85A is slightly ahead here, even if the difference is difficult to recognise in practice. The flagships clearly deliver more in terms of colour space coverage, but you notice this more in theory than on a cosy Netflix evening.

Answer 3: Colour fidelity

Let's move on to the last discipline: colour fidelity. In other words: How accurately does the TV match the colours that it should actually show according to the signal? The deviation from the TV to the reference value is referred to as DeltaE. The white boxes (see above) show the reference colours sent to the TV by the test image generator, while the black circles show the colours actually measured.

Philips' OLED 809 achieves an average DeltaE (dE) of 4.03. That's okay, but no more than mid-range. A lower value would be better. For comparison:

• Panasonic Z85A: 3.14 dE
• LG G4: 2.95 dE
• Samsung S95D: 2.23 dE
• Sony Bravia 9 (Mini-LED): 4.07 dE

In concrete terms, this means that colours such as blue, red or green usually look harmonious, but can deviate slightly in some scenes. For example, with very finely tuned skin tones or pastel colours. However, you will only notice this if you have a reference device next to you or look extremely closely.

For most people - myself included - these differences are hardly relevant in everyday life. However, if you attach particular importance to accurate colours or even want to use the device for colour grading, LG's G4 or Samsung's S95D are the more precise tools.

Reflections

Reflections on the screen are not measurable per se. Nevertheless, it is important to take them into account when testing. After all, hardly anyone only watches TV in a completely darkened home cinema. In the first comparison, I take the same picture as when testing the Panasonic Z85A. The photos were taken around midday without darkening the windows:

The difference is only noticeable on closer inspection: When the display is switched off, the reflective glass of the Philips OLED 809 appears slightly brighter than that of the Panasonic Z85A. The orange room lamp at the top right shines through a little weaker on the Panasonic. But that's almost splitting hairs. In both cases, the anti-reflective coating is effective - even if it is not quite at the level of a Samsung S95D, which has been specially optimised for bright rooms.

Things get more exciting when the picture is switched on. Here it becomes apparent that Philips' panel conceals somewhat less effectively as soon as bright reflections hit dark scenes. At over 900 nits, the TV is bright enough in small picture sections to outshine most light sources. However, in dark scenes, Panasonic's Z85A diffuses the reflection somewhat softer, the lamp appears less harsh and clearly outlined:

Samsung has demonstrated how to handle reflections perfectly with the slightly matt, but reflection-free display of its OLED flagship, the S95D. Here is the comparison with the TV switched on:

This is not a mistake or a retouch, the image on the right is actually the display of the Samsung S95D photographed in exactly the same way. Reflections? Reflections? Nada. It's really bright in my living room. I'll tell it like it is: I'll probably sorely miss the anti-reflective layer that Samsung has given its OLED TV on any TV that doesn't have something similar.

The picture: colour variety and detail in comparison

Let's move on to the practical test. The centrepiece of every TV review. This time, the Philips OLED 809 is up against two familiar faces: Panasonic's Z85A and LG's G4. This is only fair to a limited extent: the Philips - just like the Panasonic - uses an upper mid-range OLED panel without microlens technology (MLA). The G4, on the other hand, plays in a completely different league technically (and in terms of price) with its MLA layer.

Nevertheless, the comparison is worthwhile. Because all three panels come from LG's OLED factories and show just how much software optimisation and image processing can make the difference. Or not.

If you are interested in the tests of the other TVs, you can find them here:

Colour reproduction

For the colour test, I like to watch «Guardians of the Galaxy, Vol. 2». The scene in Ego's bright red palace is particularly suitable: lots of sunset red, green tones, metallic structures - a real endurance test for OLEDs.

The Philips OLED 809 masters it well. The colours look natural, red and green tones are nicely balanced. However, there is a lack of depth in dark areas, where the picture appears slightly brightened, which takes away some of the dynamics. This is exactly what the measured values show: from approx. 60% brightness, the RGB values drop evenly. This does not result in a colour cast, but visibly less contrast.

In a direct comparison, Panasonic's Z85A has a little more punch in the shadows, while LG's G4 has even richer colours and finer gradations. The Philips therefore scores with naturalness without flagship lustre, but also without any major flaws.

For good measure, I also watched «Avatar: The Way of Water» - a visual feast with dominant blue and green tones. And this is where an interesting difference becomes apparent: Philips' OLED 809 looks significantly warmer than the comparison devices. The jungle in the background shimmers olive green rather than emerald, the Na'vi skin tends towards turquoise instead of the classic Na'vi blue.

This is not surprising: My RGB measurements without luminance differences (see above) already showed that the blue component drops slightly in the brighter areas, which leads to a subtly warmer tint, i.e. a yellow or turquoise cast, depending on the image content. Panasonic's Z85A and, above all, LG's G4 appear cooler and somewhat more precise in the same scenes.

Despite this, the Philips' colour scheme is consistent, more a matter of taste than an objective flaw. But anyone looking for maximum colour fidelity will probably be happier with LG's G4.

The scene from «Skyfall» in which Bond and Q stand in front of an old, rusting warship in a museum is best suited for testing the naturalness of the image - a visual parable of Bond's own condition. Soft light, neutral colours and lots of skin ensure that televisions have to show how naturally they can depict faces, fabrics and shadows.

With the Philips OLED 809, I see something similar to what I saw before with «Avatar»: the picture appears slightly warmer than with the comparison devices, albeit less noticeable. Skin tones in particular tend to be slightly golden, which is pleasant, but not quite as neutral as with Panasonic or LG.

Objectively, the Philips doesn't make a mistake here, the colours look coherent and harmonious. But subjectively, I like Panasonic's Z85A and LG's G4 a little better: more precise, more neutral, a tad more realistic. But ultimately - as always with picture colours - this is also a matter of taste.

Black Crush and Shadow Details

How well does the Philips OLED 809 handle dark film scenes? For this test, I chose the beginning of «Blade Runner 2049». Backlighting, dark silhouettes, small light sources except for the sunlight coming in from outside. In short: the perfect set-up to assess loss of detail in dark areas of the image.

Yep, Philips' OLED 809 swallows up a few more details in the dark areas than Panasonic and LG. This can be seen in K's coat or the structures in the wall. But to be honest: I don't think that's a bad thing - quite the opposite. In this scene in particular, the picture lives from its rich blacks. When televisions start to artificially brighten the shadows here, the picture quickly appears flat and boring, as with some over-ambitious LCD TVs.

In comparison, Panasonic's Z85A shows a few more nuances in the shadows. On the other hand, Philips' picture appears somewhat more dramatic, almost cinematic. LG's G4 once again finds the golden mean: high detail fidelity, strong blacks, no exaggerated brightening. But you also pay significantly more for this.

Brightness gradations

To conclude the picture test, I'll take a look at the detail reproduction in bright areas of the picture. The perfect scene for this is provided - as so often - by «Jurassic World». Pay attention to the sun in the background: a bright spot of light that should show subtle orange tones and delicate vapour trails - without the sphere itself burning out.

In fact, I see virtually no difference between the Philips OLED 809, Panasonic's Z85A and LG's G4. All three televisions display the details around the glistening sun cleanly, without visible overexposure or distracting rings.

Clear proof that even a mid-range OLED like the Philips 809 can be on a par with the top models when it comes to difficult HDR passages. At least when it comes to fine gradations in bright image areas.

The processor: From Judder to upscaling to gaming - everything under control

The processor of a television is the central «brain» - the conductor, so to speak, that coordinates all image information and transforms it into a harmonious display. It smoothes movements, reduces image noise, renders low-resolution content more beautifully and ensures stronger colours and clear contours.

In the Philips OLED 809, this task is performed by the «P5 Intelligent Picture Engine with AI» - a name that sounds like it was spiced up with a few buzzwords at a marketing workshop. According to Philips, the P5 engine processes images « in a similar way to the human brain». Whether it also thinks when I forget to put my popcorn away after a film evening is not known, however.

One thing is clear: the engine analyses the image in real time and is supposed to optimise contrasts, sharpness and colours depending on the scene. Will it work? Let's take a look.

Motion processing and Judder

Time for the infamous judder test - a classic in my review arsenal. Judder refers to a slight judder when the camera pans smoothly, particularly visible in 24p films with slow movements. The perfect candidate for this: «1917» by Sam Mendes, especially the scene in the barn with its distinctive vertical bars.

Here Philips surprised me positively: The OLED 809 shows hardly any visible jitter, the vertical bars glide pleasantly smoothly through the picture. Provided, of course, that you activate the intermediate image calculation. For example, I set «Smooth transitions» to level 4 out of 10. This makes the picture smoother without immediately drifting into soap opera territory.

In comparison, Panasonic's Z85A looks a little less confident here: Despite adjusted settings, fine jerks are visible between the bars. This shows that Philips' P5 processor does a really good job with motion, at least better than Panasonic's HCX processor in this specific scenario.

We continue with another demanding motion processing scene from «1917», this time with the camera travelling around the soldiers in a forest. Hard edges - such as the helmets - against a blurred background of branches and treetops are particularly tricky. This is where the wheat is often separated from the chaff.

What can I say: Philips masters this with aplomb. The camera movement remains fluid, without artefacts or ghosting. There are also no notable dropouts around the edges of the helmet.

A direct comparison with Panasonic and LG shows that all three do a great job. The only differences are in the micro range, and you have to look for these with a magnifying glass. In terms of motion display, Philips' P5 processor is definitely on a par with the big names.

Reaction time of the pixels

Next up is the response time of the pixels. Apple's «For All Mankind» is ideal for testing this - especially the scene at the beginning of Episode 5. When the camera slowly pans across the lunar landscape and text is displayed at the bottom left, you can see whether individual pixels react quickly enough. If they don't, so-called ghosting effects are created, i.e. small streaks that make the image look washed out.

I notice this on the Philips OLED 809: The superimposed text shows slight streaks, especially at the bottom of the screen. This indicates that the pixels are not quite keeping up and are minimally «trailing». However, the ghosting here is not quite as severe as on TCL's C82, an older device that I looked at in an earlier test.

The bottom line is that it remains a minor flaw: not dramatic, but visible. Panasonic and LG solve this a tad more cleanly.

Upscaling

Now to the most subtle test in the whole review: Upscaling. In other words, the question of how well a TV upscales low-quality content to 4K. As always, I use «The Walking Dead», season 7, episode 1. The series was shot on 16 mm film, deliberately grainy and dirty to emphasise the post-apocalyptic mood. Ideal for putting the processor through its paces.

And yes, I'm not looking for the differences with a magnifying glass, but with a microscope. The Philips OLED 809 performs remarkably well. The dark area between the two figures remains pleasantly low-noise, the edges are sharp and the picture appears stable and calm.

But: I still like LG's G4 the best. The Alpha 11 processor smoothes out noise without losing detail and delivers the most harmonious overall picture. Philips is just behind Panasonic, which also manages upscaling cleanly. In short: Philips does it well. Not brilliant, but good.

Gaming: Input lag and game mode

When measuring the colour accuracy in True Game Mode, I achieved an average Delta E of a good 4.19 (see the section «White balance, colours and grey tones» for a detailed explanation). This is only slightly worse than the Delta E of 3.44 that I measured on LG's G4.

On the topic of input lag: With the measuring device from Leo Bodnar, I measured an average input lag of 12.6 milliseconds with a UHD image at 60 frames per second and HDR enabled. This is a very good value and not far off the level of the LG G4 - which achieves 9.8 milliseconds here. The value is also below the 20 milliseconds that a game mode should achieve.

Apart from this, the TV supports all features relevant for gamers:

• 4x HDMI 2.0 connections, two of them with HDMI 2.1 specifications (4K120Hz)
• Auto Low Latency Mode (ALLM)
• Variable frame rates (AMD Freesync Premium and G-Sync)

To this end, Philips, as well as Sony, LG, Panasonic, TCL and Samsung, have entered into a partnership with major gaming studios. The result is the HGiG - the HDR Gaming Interest Group. According to the manufacturer, the aim is to ensure that HDR is displayed as intended by the game developers, for example when playing «Spider-Man 2» on my PlayStation 5.

What the Philips OLED 809 delivers in gaming mode is simply a pleasure. At a smooth 120 frames per second, I rush through the canyons of New York, chase bad guys and swing across the rooftops with Spider-Man - everything feels responsive, direct and seamless. The input lag is so low that I almost feel like the TV is thinking along with me.

The visuals are particularly strong. Bright colours such as the red and blue of Spidey's suit literally pop off the screen, while dark shadows enhance the depth of the picture without losing any detail. Everything remains sharp and clearly recognisable, even during quick turns or explosions. No juddering, no lagging, no streaks.

Google TV: Well integrated and with Chromecast

When it comes to the Smart TV system, Philips doesn't do anything of its own, but instead relies on Google TV like many other manufacturers - and that's a good decision. The user interface is clear, logically structured and offers a huge pool of apps and content. Netflix, Disney+, Apple TV+, Sky Show, Spotify - it's all there, all just a few clicks away.

By the way, the annoying film and series recommendations on the home screen can also be easily switched off:

Particularly pleasant: Navigation runs smoothly. Menus open without delay, operation via remote control or voice input works reliably. Google Assistant is on board, as is Chromecast. In other words, you can send content from your smartphone directly to the TV without an additional device.

In a nutshell

OLED TV with really good value for money

The Philips OLED 809 is a strong mid-range OLED that not only impresses with its solid picture quality, but also has a real unique selling point with Ambilight. Colours look natural, movements are fluid, the picture looks coherent - even if the colour fidelity and brightness can't quite keep up with flagships such as LG's G4 or Samsung's S95D. In return, the Philips OLED 809 costs significantly less.

Compared to Panasonic's Z85A, which uses the same OLED panel, I actually prefer the Philips. Although the measured values are slightly in Panasonic's favour, the difference is hardly noticeable in everyday life. And Philips scores with Ambilight - and the more attractive price. So if you want a lot for your money, you can't go wrong with the 809 from Philips. Nevertheless, the OLED upper class remains firmly in the hands of LG and Samsung - at least until the 2025 generation.

Pro

• Natural, harmonious image
• Ambilight for more atmosphere
• Smooth movements, good motion processing
• Gaming mode with low input lag
• Google TV fast and clear

Contra

• Peak brightness only mid-range
• Slight streaks with very fast movements
• Colour fidelity not quite at reference level

TV

Philips 65OLED809/12

65", OLED, 4K, 2024

13

Luca Fontana

Senior Editor

Luca.Fontana@digitecgalaxus.ch

I'm an outdoorsy guy and enjoy sports that push me to the limit – now that’s what I call comfort zone! But I'm also about curling up in an armchair with books about ugly intrigue and sinister kingkillers. Being an avid cinema-goer, I’ve been known to rave about film scores for hours on end. I’ve always wanted to say: «I am Groot.» more

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