The Samsung S95D was not only one of the best TVs of last year – we named it our TV of the year for 2024 as part of the TechRadar Choice Awards. So following in its footsteps was never going to be an easy task.
In my Samsung S95D review, I was blown away by its picture quality, gaming features, gorgeous design and solid built-in sound. But one of the most impressive parts to it was its OLED Glare Free screen, which effectively eliminated distracting mirror-like reflections even in the brightest decisions. This not only made it one of the best OLED TVs I’d seen, but I labelled it “the standard bearer for OLED in 2024″.
So, when I was offered the chance to see and get a hands-on with its successor, the Samsung S95F, I jumped at the chance. My colleagues had the chance to see the S95F in action at CES 2025, but it was now my turn – and given my experience with the S95D, I was naturally very curious about it.
Reflection-beating screen gets better
One thing worth noting; the Samsung S95F model I got to test was the 83-inch model, which is unique from the rest of the lineup. This model actually uses LG’s new W-OLED four-stack Tandem RGB panel that can be found in the LG G5, rather than the QD-OLED panel used in the other sized models (55, 65 and 77 inches).
My first port of call in my short test was to see if the S95F improved in one area that I felt the S95D struggled – namely its deep shadow detail in Filmmaker Mode. I heavily use Filmmaker Mode when reviewing TVs as I find it to be the most accurate picture mode in almost all cases.
While black levels, contrast and shadow detail were overall excellent on the S95D, I noticed in darker scenes that black crush occurred, which resulted in a loss in shadow detail. This mostly happened in well-lit conditions, which was a shame because it was a novelty getting to watch dark scenes in a bright environment with only haze reflections to deal with.
So, I naturally wanted to see how the S95F’s new OLED Glare Free 2.0 screen fared; and what an improvement it was. Using the same opening crime scene investigation sequence from The Batman that showed me the weakness in the S95D, the S95F demonstrated significantly improved shadow detail, with textures in Batman’s armor and other character’s clothing maintained far better while in Filmmaker Mode.
The room I was in had dimming lights, so I turned them up to the maximum and even then, black levels were still incredibly accurate and shadow detail was refined. Admittedly, with the lights on maximum, there was now a minor amount of black crush, but that’s a small price to pay to avoid the annoyance of direct reflections.
A better handling of reflections
There are three types of reflections that TVs can suffer from; mirror-like, where objects clearly appear in the screen; haze, where objects are obscured by matte screens (like the ones found on the S95D and S95F) but there is still a hint of the object (such as a cloud-like look from a lamp) and Lambertian, which is reminiscent of haze but this evenly distributes across the reflected light across the screen and it can give blacks a faded look.
The S95D was extremely effective at dealing with mirror-like reflections, which is why I rated it so highly – it’s possible to watch in spaces where other OLED TVs would’ve been overwhelmed by the light – but there were undeniably haze reflections for light sources and a sign of Lambertian reflection which resulted in the dulled, crushed blacks. The S95F’s screen showed a marked improvement in this.
Using footage from the Spears & Munsil Benchmark UHD 4K Blu-ray, scenes with pitch-black backgrounds, such as a ferris wheel at night and studio shots of animals and objects, showed deeper black levels more in line with OLED with glossy screens, even with strong lights in the room.
Even angling myself to purposely catch the overhead lights, the haze reflections were dramatically reduced and textures and details of objects appear clearer and more lifelike.
I loved that the S95D’s anti-reflective screen made it a more flexible TV, and the downsides felt worth it, because they only occurred in conditions where reflections would have wiped out the TV’s quality anyway. But now the downsides have been massively reduced too – it’s very impressive.
Brighter and bolder
As I continued to watch the S95F, I also noticed a marked increase in brightness in Filmmaker Mode, and even a better handling of brightness. Viewing a black and white scene in Oppenheimer where the foyer in the university is brightly lit compared to the rest of the room, I noticed that the bright whites were punchy but without any loss in detail or any sign of oversaturation.
Turning on HDR Tone Mapping from Static to Active gave an even bolder brightness boost, yet the contrast between the black and white tones remained superb.
When I measured the brightness of the Samsung S95F it hit 2,388 nits in a 10% HDR window pattern – a huge increase over the 1,868 I measured for the Samsung S95D. Fullscreen brightness, measured on a 100% white window HDR pattern, was also a giant improvement, rising from 318 nits measured on the S95D to 465 nits measured on the S95F.
Again, it’s worth noting that the S95D I tested was the 65-inch model using the QD-OLED panel, whereas this 83-inch S95F uses the new-gen W-OLED panel – I’ll be very curious to see how closely the smaller QD-OLED sizes match these figures.
I was glad to see that elsewhere the S95F maintained everything that made the S95D’s picture great. Colors were bold, vibrant and dynamic; textures were true-to-life; and contrast was excellent and well balanced. And of course, black levels and shadow detail was improved over the S95D.
After my brief time, I can’t wait to get my hands on the Samsung S95F for a full test. We’ll probably test one of the QD-OLED models for a fairer full comparison to the S95D, and to provide a counterpoint to these 83-inch measurements. But whatever size, it’s only excited me to try out the S95F in full. Will it be a TV of the year award repeat? There’s tough competition, but we’ll have reviews of all this year’s hottest OLEDs in the next few months.
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