This is the most important part of your new 4K TV if you’re buying on a budget like me – and it’s not the pixels
For the vast majority of people, shopping for one of the best TVs means shopping for a 4K TV. But I suspect that for the vast majority of that vast majority, the TV they buy won’t be fed many 4K shows or movies. And that’s important, because I think you should factor that into your buying decisions.
The reason most of your entertainment won’t be 4K is because unless you’re paying for the most expensive streaming packages, you’re likely getting 1080p Full HD (or lower, in some cases: I’m in the UK where streamers such as Now TV delivers 720p as standard).
I’m a cautious buyer, and I grudge paying extra for marginally better streaming resolution – partly on principle but mainly because if you subscribe to multiple of the best streaming services, that extra cash soon adds up, especially as streaming gets more expensive every year. A few years ago, 4K came as standard in many cases, but as ad-based tiers have appeared, it’s not guaranteed any more.
And even if you do plump for the Super Awesome Premium Plus packages, not all of the available content is in 4K. For example I watched an Anthony Bourdain show recently on a 4K streaming service; the show was filmed in 2002, apparently using RealVideo, and was so low-res you’d think they’d made it in Minecraft.
We can’t travel back in time to make SD shows HD, or HD ones 4K. But with the right TV, we don’t have to.
The hidden hero in the best TVs
My Anthony Bourdain show wasn’t unwatchable, and my TV deserves all the credit for that: despite being blown up to 65 inches, the picture wasn’t too bad. That’s because my TV has a good image processor that upscales relatively low-res content well.
As a general rule, the bigger the TV, the more important its upscaling is going to be. Issues that aren’t apparent on a 42-inch 4K panel will be terribly obvious on a 65-inch or larger. That’s because the smaller panel has a much higher pixel density: both displays are packing 3840×2160 pixels, but the smaller display packs them in much more tightly, so image flaws aren’t quite so visible.
We’ve written a detailed guide to 4K upscaling, which you can find here. But the executive summary is that it works like this: the processor analyzes the signal, applies noise reduction, sharpens anything that needs to be sharpened and, for lower resolution signals, it then converts the signal to 4K resolution (or 8K if you have an 8K TV).
It’s far from new technology, but it doesn’t get talk about as often as it used too – but it’s just as important in the streaming age, especially with some new streaming tiers taking is backwards, as I mentioned above.
Image processing is also important for streaming at any resolution because streaming video isn’t lossless: it’s optimized for efficient delivery, and that means sacrificing some of the data (which is one reason many movie fans with serious home cinema setups prefer the best 4K Blu-ray players to streaming).
That data optimization can cause visible issues such as noticeable color banding or ugly gradients in darker backgrounds, where instead of a smooth range of colors or near-darkness, you see patches of color with clear dividing lines between them. If you have network congestion, the bitrate can drop and make those issues even more apparent. But with good picture processing your TV can spot those issues and fix them in real time.
How to buy the best TV for upscaling
Price is, inevitably, a big part of this: just like budget phones don’t come with the latest and greatest mobile processors, TVs built to a low price aren’t likely to have state-of-the-art upscaling.
The very best processing usually turns up in TV makers’ flagship models first, especially with household names: the likes of Sony, LG, Samsung, Panasonic and Philips all push their extremely clever image processing systems as key selling points for their latest and greatest televisions.
All TV makers use upscaling tech, but these companies have particularly impressed us, based not only on how well they add sharpness, but in how they manage to reduce color bands – especially Sony, LG and Panasonic when it comes to the latter, though Samsung’s 2025 TVs also make a great improvement in this area from our demos so far.
I’m a bit biased, of course, but I’d definitely recommend reading our in-depth reviews of any TVs you’re considering: upscaling is one of the key features we look at very carefully, and because we review so many TVs we’ve got extensive knowledge of what makes upscaling look natural, and what leaves things looking artificial and not making the most of your 4K screen.
But I’d also suggest going to a store, even if you’re planning to buy online. That’s where you can test different models’ upscaling really easily: turn off the retail/demo mode with its over-the-top brightness, contrast and motion smoothing and ask to see something that isn’t 4K – and ideally, that isn’t even Full HD.
Watching 4K content on a 4K display isn’t going to show you how good its image processing system is: it’s the lower-res stuff that separates the OK from the awesome.
For the vast majority of people, shopping for one of the best TVs means shopping for a 4K TV. But I suspect that for the vast majority of that vast majority, the TV they buy won’t be fed many 4K shows or movies. And that’s important, because I think you…
