- Samsung has reportedly ordered new “polarizer-free” OLED TV panels
- This appears to be the new brighter and cheaper ‘OLED SE’ panel we’ve been hearing about
- These panels will be more reflective – and Samsung’s lack of Dolby Vision is still relevant
We recently wrote about the arrival of LG Display’s new budget-friendly OLED SE TV panel, which promises to cost less than current cheaper OLED TV panels, while being brighter at the same time.
LG Display had already confirmed that the screen would be used in 2026 TVs, and I’m taking the leap to assume that means it will be in the LG B6, the new budget OLED TV for 2026 that LG has confirmed is coming, but said it won’t officially discuss until spring, so probably not until March.
But it will almost certainly come to other TVs as well, because LG Display sells its panels to other companies – we just didn’t know exactly what else to expect to see it in.
A new report from Daily Korea (via FlatpanelsHD ) says that Samsung has increased the number of OLED TV screens it orders for 2026 TVs by 30%, and it looks like that number includes OLED SE panels.
We can assume this means Samsung’s budget-friendly OLED TV for this year, the Samsung S85H, will include the new brighter and cheaper panel, hopefully adding a lot more punch over its (still good) predecessor from 2025, the Samsung S85F.
However, there is one downside to all of this: reflections. A big part of why the new OLED SE panel is cheaper and brighter is that LG Display has removed the polarizer layer, which is the primary way these screens reduce reflections so you can better see what’s on the screen.
That’s actually why we know Samsung is using these panels: the report says Samsung’s purchases include “polarizer-free panels,” and every other OLED display uses a polarizer.
Removing the polarizer is likely the main reason the panels are brighter than before, reportedly hitting up to 1,000 nits of peak HDR brightness, compared to the 777 nits we measured from the Samsung S85F. Polarizers absorb light as they work, so removing it is an easy route to a brighter screen, although it comes with the disadvantage of showing stronger reflections.
Instead of the polarizer, FlatpanelsHD reports that this display will use “a new reflective film” (which I suspect is anti-reflective in practice), and says this has a measured light reflectance of 4.4% – this compares to a claimed 0.3% reflectance on LG’s new high-end Tandem OLED panel used in the LG G6 (which is one of the 5 CES 2026 TVs we’re most excited to test).
Is the Samsung S85H the cheap OLED to beat, then? Not so fast
While the increased reflectivity is the biggest catch with the new OLED panel, the Samsung S85H will have another catch of its own: its lack of Dolby Vision HDR support.
Samsung never supports Dolby Vision HDR on its TVs and is all-in on the rival HDR10+ format, of which the company is one of the main creators. However, Dolby Vision currently has wider support among movies and series on streaming services, even those that support both formats.
The LG B6 will likely use the same panel as the Samsung S85H, but will support Dolby Vision, which could make a real difference.
When our lead TV reviewer James Davidson compared the Samsung S85F and the LG B5 – the two 2025 models – he found that Dolby Vision made a real difference to picture quality compared to standard HDR when watching the same video on both TVs.
That’s because an important feature of Dolby Vision is how it enables the TV to better adapt HDR images to particularly weaker TVs. Most films and series are created for 1,000 nits of maximum brightness as the highest brightness level, with all other tones calibrated from there – so if a TV can’t reach these brightness levels (as is the case with previous budget OLED TVs), a process called tone mapping must be used.
Tone mapping means that the TV decides how to reduce the bright elements to something the TV is capable of displaying, and if done poorly, it can smooth different tones together and remove detail from them.
Dolby Vision (and HDR10+) is designed to use tone mapping based on the original creator’s intent, so you can be sure it’s done well and preserves as much detail as possible.
This process doesn’t matter as much on brighter TVs (although it can still be a problem, and is one of the things Dolby Vision 2 is designed to address), but on these dimmer TVs it’s important – and even with the brighter panel, these budget OLEDs still seem to be in the zone where it makes a clear difference.
Still, we’re really looking forward to testing this new generation of OLED TVs and pitting them against each other – hopefully this will be a leap forward for affordable options among the best OLED TVs.
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