Every year, the television category is one of the flashiest at CES, featuring huge video TV walls and innovative features like transparent screens. CES 2026 will undoubtedly see ever-weirder and ever-unobtainable prototypes, but will they end up on a "worst gadgets" roundup? Time will tell.
In previous years, we've seen everything, from battery-powered TVs that stick to a wall to OLEDs that roll up like a treasure map. I'm not a TV designer, and so I could never anticipate the bizarre things companies are cooking up right now. Yet, while these cutting-edge devices grab headlines, our focus will remain on the products that actually matter to you.
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We know that gimmicks aren't what people buy TVs for. Picture quality is the most important aspect of any TV, and I expect we'll see advancements in that area, especially at the affordable end of the market. Alongside computers and phones, TVs have a 12-month shelf life and are updated every year -- usually with picture and feature improvements. Here's what this year promises.
The mini-LED trickle-down
The micro-LED backlit Hisense QD7QF is the best budget TV I have ever reviewed, and I expect to see more of this tech in 2026 Ty Pendlebury/CNET
Two televisions from 2025 point the way forward -- the Hisense QD7 and the TCL QM9. Both models have mini-LED technology, but they're at either extreme of the market -- the Hisense is a budget TV, and the TCL is a flagship. Both were significant for their improvements to picture quality, especially the QD7. The Hisense's mini-LED backlight was a cut above the budget TV competition this year, and I hope it's the start of a new trend. Local dimming has a positive effect on LCD picture quality, and the ability to do it at an affordable price is better for everyone.
Mini-LED is an evolution of traditional LCD TV backlight tech, using thousands of tiny light-emitting diodes to improve picture quality. One of the first mini-LED TVs to become available was the 2019 TCL 8-Series, and it's a technology which has become more widely available with each passing year.
Improvements in display technology can sometimes seem incremental, almost glacial, but this year, mini-LED backlights helped make LCD TVs eye-weepingly bright. This is a good thing. For instance, in 2025, TCL changed its technology to "Halo control," which was designed to reduce LCD bloom, and it worked!
The brightest TV I reviewed last year was the QM9K, and it took full of advantage of this upgrade: It was bright and capable of great contrast. You can expect to see this technology rolled out to more TVs in the company's range. Competitors like Samsung and Hisense will no doubt be taking notes as well.
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