How to choose the best TV for watching sports | digital trends (2023)

I get a lot of questions like "What is the best sports TV?" and "What should I look for when buying a TV if I mostly watch sports?" and "Hey Caleb, I'm in the TV business right now and I want to buy this TV. Am I wrong here?"

Let's talk about what makes one TV better than another for watching sports, what to look for and what to ignore when buyingnew television, and why someone who says "buying a TV just for sports is bullshit" probably means well, but is also completely wrong.

When sports look bad

I think we've all been at a sports bar or maybe at a friend's house watching a game and thought, 'You know? That... doesn't look good.” Or maybe you were sitting at home watching the game and thinking the same thing? If you've had this thought before, it's possible the image was blurry, or the image looked washed out or blotchy, or the colors just didn't look right. Of course you don't want that on your new TV.

You don't have to be a video buff to realize that the screen looks dirty or that your team's colors look wrong. Bad just looks bad!

Let's see how to find a TV that can do thisit is nothaving one of these four bad qualities. Let's start with one of the most obvious and obvious things: blur.

Motion blur i 120 Hz

There are three things that can cause an image to appear blurry or out of focus when watching fast-paced sports events. One is the slow pixel response time, where the pixels simply don't respond quickly enough to the TV's changing instructions. Another reason is the mismatch between the number of frames per second of the content and the refresh rate of the TV - that is, how many times per second the image is drawn on the screen. And the third reason is poor motion processing – the TV's brain just isn't that sharp.

However, often a blurry image is caused by all three things happening at the same time. And the most common reason for this is that the TV is... well, cheap. And by that I don't just mean it's cheap - a very relative concept - I mean it's generally of poor build quality, flimsy and comes with cheaply made parts.

To be clear, you can get a quality TV for a low price. For example, Hisense U6H. It's a pretty solid TV and handles sports well. The 65-inch model costs only $550. For a 65-inch TV, the value for money is extremely good. However, if you're spending less than $400 on a 65-inch TV, it's going to look cheaper, and you probably won't be happy with how it looks while you're working out.

Let's continue to take the Hisense U6H as an example: it does sports well thanks to good pixel response time and good build. Two out of three, right? While it doesn't have a 120Hz panel, it copes well with the 60Hz panel it does have, thanks to decent build quality.

Which brings me to my next point: you don'thaveI need a TV with a 120Hz refresh rate - which is a common recommendation and I'll repeat it - but having a 120Hz panel as a basic requirement isn't a bad idea.

I put a lot of emphasis on the application because it is one of the biggest problems in following sports.

I don't want to go too deep into the technology here, but I want to let you know that 120 Hz panels are not suitable for cheap TVs. TVs with 120 Hz panels require more expensive hardware to support them. In other words, that 120Hz spec is an indicator of quality and can provide some assurance that the TV it's built into will be pretty good.

But here's the catch: it has to be 120 Hzdomesticplate. I mention this difference because there are TV brands that try to mislead you. If you see a clear 120Hz motion rate or 240Hz motion current or similar nonsense, it's an attempt by the TV manufacturer to find a quick fix. Look at the spec sheet and make sure it says "120Hz panel" because a better panel is an indication that the TV is better. Yes, it's worth looking at the datasheet. If you go up to the clerk upstairs and ask him if the TV you're watching has a native 120hz panel and he'll look at the box to check? That means they don't know and don't rely on the same marketing language as you. So go online and search. It's worth spending about 30 seconds on this.

The last thing I want to say about motion - and I appreciate motion because it's one of the biggest problems with watching sports - is motion blur, otherwise known as the "soap effect". It's frame interpolation - what the marketers call Motion Flow or Smooth Motion or whatever. If that's okay with you, it's okay. You can use it and you won't get a blurry picture.

Note that some people claim that things look fake or 2D - something like that is almost always on on the TV in your hotel room, and there are waysSoap opera-Opera-Watch dazu.If you're comfortable with that, almost any decent TV, when turned on, can display fast-paced sports events crisply and clearly. But if you hate that look and don't want it, buy a TV with a 120Hz panel just to be safe.

Bright and beautiful

Okay, enough of the exercise, what else do you need to pay attention to? Let's talk visibility. You want the image to be sharp and clear. Buy the most TVs on the market todaybright enough. You should be aware of how reflective the screen can be. If there is a lot of light coming through the windows or if you are watching television with a light source behind you, there is a high probability that your television is reflecting too much and that the bright light is blurring your picture - a nuisance. Again, this is only a problem in certain viewing situations, but I mention it because it's really the only factor that OLED TVs can doit is notbe the best option.

Now let's get to it. The best TV for watching sports is almost always oneYOU ARE TV. They have instant pixel response times, they all have 120Hz panels and they're all quality TVs, so motion processing and upscaling are about the best you can get from any TV. In sports, OLEDs are the standard. Unless super bright light is entering your room at an angle that makes your OLED TV's shiny screen look like a mirror. Otherwise OLED all day, every day.

For the others, watchLED/LCD- for QLED-tv– There are a few things to keep in mind when it comes to television, and then I want to talk about how to watch the game and how it can make a difference.

To avoid the dirty screen effect

The next thing to check is the flatness of the screen. What you don't want is a smudged screen. And unfortunately, you won't know if your screen is smudged until you take the TV home. Yes, sometimes it can be difficult to find the best TV for you and I'm sorry for that. But you bring the TV home, plug it in - you don't want to set everything up or mount it on the wall yet - connect it to the internet so you can stream YouTube and then stream a test clip for screen uniformity.

If you see really bad places? I mean, if it looks like someone spilled grease on your new white or gray t-shirt? Then this TV has big screen uniformity issues and you see those spots when you watch football, golf, hockey, or anything else with big, wide areas with even colors. If you want to know more about the dirty screen effect, you canSee my articleo.

The best color

And finally: color. It's easy to see bad colors on TV when watching sports programs. Fortunately, the only way to correct bad colors on a TV is to not use the Vivid or Sports modes. I know it sounds crazy because I know you want your TV to look vibrant and watch sports - why not use these picture modes?

The answer is that they are hot garbage when it comes to color. They generally sacrifice everything in terms of picture quality to make sure the picture is as clear as possible - and frankly, a big reason brands do this is to stand out from the crowd of TVs that have a lot of fluorescent lights. under the ceiling.

Choose a standard picture mode if needed, or use something like ISF Bright or the Cinema or Movie presets, then boost the backlight. This will give you a brighter image while maintaining color accuracy and I think you'll be happier in the long run.

So that's a cheat sheet for finding good sports TV. A 120 Hz board is a good place to start. Make sure the screen has an adequate anti-glare or glare coating when viewing in bright environments. When you bring him homeCheck if the screen is dirtyand replace it if you get a bad picture - which really doesn't happen that often - and if you do set it, avoid Vivid or Sport picture modes.

That's what you look like

Now what about how you follow the game? Are streaming apps better than cable? How about an antenna?

In my experience, one of the most common ways to watch sports is also one of the worst in terms of picture quality: cable or satellite. So if you can only watch TV via cable or satellite, watch it this way. But if you canLive broadcastIf you are broadcasting a game or match over the Internet, you can choose this option for several reasons. If the game is broadcast on a major network such as ABC, NBC, CBS or Fox, you should also try to reach one of your local stations with an antenna. The reason why one of these options probably looks better than cable or satellite depends on a number of factors.

The main problem is compression. Cable and satellite operators have to run a lot of signals through a fairly small tube. Even if you have high-bandwidth fiber optic cable, cable operators usually still send the same aggregated signal along that line. It's heavily compressed to fit, and the lower bitrate and bit depth means less pixel and color information. Don't get me wrong, cable/satellite can look really good. But streaming can look even better if you have a strong connection and good bandwidth.

As for streaming, if you want to use a live TV streaming app, here's my experienceYouTube-TVreliably proved to be solid in terms of image quality. However, it would be better to use the broadcaster's own streaming app, such as the Fox Sports app. In fact, sometimes you get an HDR signal this way. ButDon't expect 4K- and if you get 4K, know that it's upscaled to 1080p at best. It's honestly better than the 720p or 1080i signal you usually get.

ImmediatelyAntenna, as old-fashioned as it sounds, can also be a good move to achieve better image quality. It's also less compressed than cable - and it's free! Additionally, if you happen to live in a market whereATSC 3.0 broadcastsit can look even better live. I haven't experienced it here in Portland, Oregon, but your market may be different.

I pray! That's my advice on what's most important to you when watching sports. And the bonus is that a TV that's great for sports is usually great for pretty much anything you like to watch.

Editor's recommendations

• 9 Best Soundbars of 2023: Get great sound from your TV
• Best Buy TV deals: Save on QLED TVs, OLED TVs and 8K TVs
• Best TV deals: Save on LG, Samsung, Sony and Vizio
• LG announces pricing for 2023 OLED TVs: evo G3 starts at $2,500, pre-orders start March 6
• The best deals on 65-inch TVs: Save on QLED and OLED at the Super Bowl