- Panasonic launches new 2026 TV range for UK and Europe
- New OLED and mini LED TVs, including a matte ‘Glare Free Ultra’ screen
- Panasonic’s TV will now be made in collaboration with Skyworth
Panasonic has just unveiled its new TV range for the UK and Europe, and it comes with an interesting new twist: from now on, Panasonic’s TVs will be created in a new joint venture with Skyworth, best known for super budget sets.
The setup sounds extremely similar to what Sony is exploring with TCL – a new company has been formed, bringing in expertise (and staff) from both Panasonic and Skyworth’s respective TV teams. The kits will be manufactured by Skyworth.
However, while Sony and TCL are still confirming whether they will continue with their partnership at all, Panasonic and Skyworth already have a range of TVs ready to launch in April 2026. The same partnership will be used for Panasonic’s US TV business, but we have yet to confirm the models. Even better, I got to see many of the TVs in person at a launch event.
The team were clearly keen to say that the plan is to keep Panasonic’s high-end TVs at the “reference” quality Panasonic has always strived for (I’m quoting their presentation directly regarding the use of “reference”), but to add more scale and be truly competitive in the increasingly crisp world of top-of-the-line TVs, where Hisense and TCL have been redefining what makes an aggressive TV.
So interestingly, the new TV range will still be topped by the same Panasonic Z95B and Z90B OLED TVs that Panasonic currently sells – no change there.
Just below them will be a new, more affordable OLED TV model, called the Panasonic Z86C in the UK. This is the first set confirmed to use LG’s new, cheaper and brighter budget OLED panel, and it also supports 4K 120Hz and variable refresh rate for gaming, both Dolby Vision and HDR10+, Dolby Atmos, and will use Amazon’s Fire TV platform for smart TV skills. (In the rest of Europe, this model will be called the Z85C and will use Google TV instead, but is otherwise identical.) It comes in 55-inch and 65-inch sizes.
There will also be a mini-LED range, and an interesting change here, brought in by the partnership with Skyworth, is a ‘Glare Free’ matte coating, much like that used by Samsung in several of its sets, including the Samsung QN90F mini-LED.
Top of the range in the UK is the Panasonic W94C, available in 55, 65 and 75-inch sizes with 4K 144Hz and VRR support, Dolby Vision HDR and Fire TV.
Below that in the range is the Panasonic W91C, which supports 4K 60Hz with variable refresh rate, Dolby Vision HDR, Roku as its smart platform and is available in 55-inch, 65-inch and 75-inch sizes.
There will also be a number of cheaper QLED and straight LED sets – probably the most notable of these are new 32-inch and 40-inch Full HD TVs with QLED and Fire TV, which promise a slightly more premium picture than most small HD TVs get.
My favorite was a TV that is not in the range
Notably missing from this list is an RGB mini-LED TV that uses a colorful mini-LED backlight, although this has been embraced by the other major TV manufacturers for launches in 2026. It wasn’t entirely absent from the event, though: Panasonic had a demo of an RGB-backlit TV with its Glare Free technology, and this was the set that really stuck with me. You can read our RGB backlight explanation here if you want more information about the technology.
As you’d hope for an RGB TV, the colors looked incredibly vivid and infinitely complex (although Panasonic had included a demo reel specially designed to show this off, of course). But I really couldn’t see any signs of blooming from the light areas to the black background, despite it looking bright and having so much pop – the hard line between the solid colors and the black looked 100% clean.
This was made even more striking by the matte finish, which prevented the black areas from reflecting the bright, chaotic space around me – we were in a large, open room filled with lights and TVs, and I could only see the occasional, very strong reflection from certain angles. Otherwise, the dark tones remained looking black and weren’t obviously lifted from black to deep gray (which can be a problem with matte displays).
Contrast was no doubt helped by the panel’s 10,000+ dimming zones, which is up there with the best mini-LED TVs on offer in a similar size, be it RGB mini-LED or regular mini-LED.
Panasonic explained that they have developed a new processor for this TV to accommodate the large number of controls needed in the thousands of backlight elements, suggesting that it is serious about producing it in the future.
I hope it does, because with Panasonic’s history of putting picture accuracy so high in its priorities, I’d love what it can do with the amazing color depth that RGB TVs promise (all companies claim up to 100% of pro-level BT.2020 color space, when regular mini-LED TVs struggle to reach 80%).
I’m also really intrigued to see more of the Z86C OLED TV, but maybe I just have RGB TVs on the brain – they’re the big TV story of the year and I already thought they’re a real threat to OLED TVs. My first look at Panasonic’s potential set only added to this – assuming they can get it out at a reasonable price at some point.
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