I have spent a few weeks living with TCL’s 2025 lineup, and I can already tell that the 85QM9K shows exactly where the brand wants to go. This is the top of TCL’s “Ultimate Series,” positioned above the QM8K, and it reads like a direct challenge to other brands in the premium space.
Much like phones, when you see TVs in a vacuum or on their own, it can be tough to find faults. But once you start comparing, digging deeper, and really pushing them, you realize we are still in search of that perfect experience. That’s the mindset I brought into this review, trying to balance excitement over new tech with a discerning eye for where TCL could still improve.
The concept, as it appears to me, is simple: combine class-leading Mini LED hardware with smarter local dimming control, and run it all through Google TV with Gemini built in.
On paper, it is a beast. The 85-inch model brings 4K resolution, a native 144 Hz panel, 5,184 local dimming zones, and a claimed peak of up to 6,500 nits. TCL’s Halo Control System sits on top of a dense Mini LED array and quantum dots to push brightness, color, and contrast while trying to keep blooming in check. Add in AMD FreeSync Premium Pro, two HDMI 2.1 ports, and an ATSC 3.0 tuner, and you have a very modern spec sheet for movies, sports, and gaming.
Below is how it all comes together in real use.
If you want big-screen punch for movies and smooth, low-lag play for games, the 85QM9K hits both marks and still finds room for smarter Google TV with Gemini.
The Quick Take
If you want a very bright, very punchy 85-inch TV for HDR movies and high-frame-rate gaming, the 85QM9K belongs on your shortlist of candidates. It delivers huge pop with highlight detail, strong black levels for a VA-type LCD, and the right gaming hooks.
Gemini on Google TV makes the smart experience feel natural and more conversational, and bridges the AI experience across other devices. There is still some blooming in tough scenes and the screen finish can appear reflective in brighter rooms, so its placement will matter.
I already own a QM6 series set and love its picture, but it was immediately noticeable how much brighter and clearer the new model is. That first impression sticks, even if you later start spotting the areas where TCL still has room to improve.
Audio is better than the average TV, but a soundbar will still do this panel justice. At its list price of $3,999.99, TCL is not exactly undercutting rivals so much as competing head on.
Glossary: TV Tech Made Simple
Throughout this review you might encounter a few terms that you may be unfamiliar with. Here is a quick primer on what some of that jargon means.
- Quantum dots: Tiny crystals that make colors richer and more accurate.
- Blooming: When bright highlights glow into darker areas and create halos.
- Local dimming: A way the TV dims or brightens zones of the screen for deeper blacks and stronger contrast.
- Mini LED: Thousands of extra-small LEDs that give TVs more brightness and finer light control.
- VA-type LCD: A screen panel design that delivers strong contrast and deep blacks when viewed head-on, though picture quality can fade if you move too far off to the side.
- DCI-P3: A wide color standard used in movies that gives TVs richer reds and greens than older color ranges, making pictures look more lifelike.
- ATSC 3.0: Also called NextGen TV, it’s the newest U.S. broadcast standard that can deliver free over-the-air channels in 4K with HDR and better sound.
- eARC: Short for Enhanced Audio Return Channel, it lets a TV send uncompressed, high-quality audio (like Dolby Atmos) to a soundbar or receiver through a single HDMI cable.
What Stands Out
- HDR impact: Mini LED plus quantum dots and TCL’s Halo Control System combine for searing highlights and deep shadows. TCL touts up to 6,500 nits in small specular peaks. It is a marketing number, yes, but the set is clearly in the top tier for sustained brightness.
- Zone density: 5,184 local dimming zones on the 85-inch model give the processing room to work. It does not eliminate blooming in the toughest starfield or subtitle tests, but it reduces it meaningfully for day-to-day viewing.
- 144 Hz panel with broad VRR: Native 144 Hz with VRR from 48 to 144 Hz and a “Game Accelerator 288” mode for competitive play at reduced resolution. FreeSync Premium Pro certification, ALLM, and two HDMI 2.1 ports cover current consoles and PC.
- Google TV with Gemini: First out of the gate with Gemini integrated. You can have back-and-forth requests without repeating yourself, and far-field mics make hands-free control easy.
- ATSC 3.0 on board: NextGen TV support is here for free over-the-air 4K HDR where available.
Design, Setup, and First Impressions
TCL leans into a premium look here. The chrome-polished frame and a slim, “ZeroBorder” aesthetic give it a showroom vibe without feeling gaudy. It’s probably the classiest looking TV set in my home.
The central pedestal stand is the right call for an 85-inch set, since it fits on furniture that is not as wide as the panel. Ports face to the side for easier wall mounting, and the VESA pattern is 600 by 500 millimeters.
I was initially worried about placement in the room as I don’t have the wall mount that I plan to use. Wondering if I had to keep it in the box until it arrived, I was pleased to find that the central pedestal was present instead of legs at the far end. Out it came, and we had it on a stand in a few moments time.
Unlike 55-inch and 65-inch sets, unboxing an 85-inch TV is a team sport. TCL’s packaging lets you attach the stand with the panel still cradled in foam, which is safer than trying to lift and attach, or laying it down.
The backlit remote is a small but appreciated quality-of-life touch for dark rooms. It’s a sharp looking remote that I assumed would be heavier, but I’ve come to appreciate its weight.
The process of setting up an account, installing apps, and logging into things couldn’t go smoother, thanks to Google TV. Now things are as easy as scanning a QR code from your phone and logging in. Check a few boxes to confirm settings and preferences, and away you go.
Boy, that picture sure is something. It’s bright in the right spots and incredibly dark where it needs to be. In fact, this seems like a good place to dig in a bit more.
Picture Quality
Brightness, Contrast, and HDR
This set is built for HDR punch. The VA-based “CrystGlow WHVA” panel already starts with strong native contrast, and the local dimming system layers on deep blacks and bright highlights.
Dolby Vision IQ can use the ambient light sensor to adapt tone mapping, which helps preserve detail if you watch with lamps on. As the summer draws to a close and we lose a bit of daylight each day, I appreciate that the TV adapts for the environment. Ohio is prone to its share of dark grey clouds for days and weeks on end, but there’s still plenty of sun and golden hour light to fill the room. With that being said, I like that the TVs picture remains consistent no matter what time of day it is.
Quick side note: TCL markets “HDR6500,” which indicates peaks up to 6,500 nits in specific windows. Even if you treat that as best-case, the visible takeaway is the same. The 85QM9K is exceptionally bright. And that brightness is paired with real contrast for a wide dynamic range.
You can still see some halos around high-contrast elements, especially white subtitles on a black background, but it is controlled better than most LCD sets I have seen. To be fair, these halos really only present themselves when you’re actively looking for them. A non-critical or undiscerning eye doesn’t even catch them.
The screen finish is reflective, so avoid light sources directly opposite the panel if you can. I’ve got a canvas/frame TV in the home and I’ve really loved how flat or matted the picture is, even when the room is filled with light.
The reflective finish on the QM9K is one of those things where I noticed it fairly early on as we were placing it near a window. It’s not terrible or problematic, but more of one of those “room for improvement” features that might arrive in future models.
Color
Quantum dots and ten-bit processing deliver rich, clean color. TCL rates coverage at 97 percent of DCI-P3, which matches what I am seeing in real content. Skin tones look natural after a quick pass through the picture settings, and animation pops without veering into neon.
Toggling through the various video modes you can see stark differences for video games, sports, and movies. And there’s always custom settings, too. Suffice it to say, you can be up and running, and consuming whatever content you’d like, with a gorgeous image.
Motion and Viewing Angle
The native 144 Hz panel helps with clarity in fast sports and panning shots. TCL’s motion interpolation can smooth things further if you like that look. Yes, you can dial it down to reduce soap-opera effect that can be off-putting at first.
Like other VA-type LCDs, color and contrast are strongest when you are near the center. This isn’t to suggest things get bad from the sides. Rather, it just feels perfectly tuned when you’re right in the middle.
Gaming
This is a comfortable gaming display. The two HDMI 2.1 ports handle 4K at 120 Hz on consoles, and PC gamers can take advantage of up to 144 Hz VRR. FreeSync Premium Pro and ALLM are here, and TCL’s “Game Accelerator 288” mode pushes high frame rates at a lower resolution for twitch titles. Input lag feels appropriately low in game mode, and HDR tone mapping plays nicely with current consoles.
Smart Features and Gemini
Google TV organizes apps and recommendations cleanly. The Gemini integration is the story, though, and it feels pretty seamless. Context-aware requests make search feel less like a series of commands and more like a conversation. Ask for comedies, narrow to the nineties, then filter to what is on Netflix, and it understands without a full reset. It feels like we’re finally at that point in content discovery and search that we imagined a decade back.
One of the neat things about having Gemini built into the TCL QM9K is that it’s not just another “search Netflix for me” type of voice assistant. It’s a smarter, more context-aware layer that can tie together content discovery, smart home control, and even general productivity in ways that go beyond what older TVs offered. It’s truly intuitive stuff and lets users talk in ways they already do.
A few cool use cases you could actually live with:
Smarter Content Hunting
Instead of barking one rigid or specifically phrased command at a time, you can carry on like a normal conversation.
- “Show me action movies.“
- “Only from the 90s.“
- “Are any free to stream?“
- “Okay, add the ones on Prime Video to my watchlist.“
You don’t need to restate everything, Gemini keeps track of the thread.
Ambient Info When You Walk In
Want your TV to go to sleep or power off when you leave the room? The presence sensor uses mmWave to wake into an ambient mode when you enter the room and can power things down when you leave. This isn’t necessarily vital, but it is pretty handy. And it does not rely on a camera, so don’t fret about your TV watching you watch it in your underwear.
Hands-free Smart Home Control
Because it sits at the center of your living room, you can say “turn off the kitchen lights”, “set the thermostat to seventy”, or “show my front door camera” while your hands are full with popcorn or a game controller.
Contextual Recommendations
Gemini is designed to remember what you asked earlier. If you watched a few episodes of a cooking show, you can follow up with, “Find similar shows from other networks,” or even, “Recommend some cookbooks from YouTube creators,” and it knows what you’re talking about.
Multi-step Sports Info
Game nights get easier: “Show me tonight’s Packers game”, then “What’s the score right now?” and “When do they play the Steelers next?” You can chain questions without having to reintroduce the subject.
General Knowledge While Watching
If you’re watching a movie and someone asks, “What else is that actor in?” you can throw the question to Gemini without digging out your phone.
Audio
TCL worked with Bang and Olufsen on tuning, and the set includes up-firing drivers for height effects. Dolby Atmos and DTS Virtual:X are supported and the preset audio modes are distinguishable.
Generally speaking, this is all better than the typical thin-TV sound, especially for dialogue clarity, but the laws of physics still apply. Walls are still going to do their thing to your sound. That is to say, if you want real cinema impact, pair it with a capable soundbar or AVR and speakers. Otherwise, you might be making adjustments for content from app to app and/or video to video.
Volume-wise we rarely get the TV above 20 for music as it fills the room nicely. Depending on what we’re watching (or playing), and which mode we’re using for audio, things get almost uncomfortable should we push near 30. There’s no distortion whatsoever at that level and we feel very comfortable knowing it can go louder without messing with the quality.
Connectivity
You get two HDMI 2.1 and two HDMI 2.0 inputs, USB 3.0 and USB 2.0, Ethernet, optical audio out, Wi-Fi 6, and Bluetooth 5.4. The ATSC 3.0 tuner is a nice future-proofing perk for over-the-air broadcasts that are rolling out in more markets.
I cannot imagine a scenario where I’d like more ports on the rear of the TV. Connect your gaming consoles, hardwire that internet connection for Plex streaming, and pair your other devices, and I bet you’ll still have leftover options.
Look more closely at the HDMI ports, though, and you’ll notice that two of them are 2.0 and two of them are 2.1. Not sure what the difference means? You’ll probably be just fine. But, those who do know, might like to swap one of the 2.0 ports out in favor of the 2.1 standard.
Note: The step up to HDMI 2.1 matters if you’re pairing this TV with modern consoles or high-end audio gear. Compared to HDMI 2.0’s 18Gbps bandwidth (good for 4K at 60Hz), HDMI 2.1 delivers up to 48Gbps which translates to 4K at 120Hz and even 8K playback. It also unlocks gaming features like Variable Refresh Rate (VRR) and Auto Low Latency Mode (ALLM), plus eARC for lossless Dolby Atmos and DTS:X audio.
All of these highlighted features are present in the QM9K so you can definitely take advantages of them.
In short, HDMI 2.1 future-proofs the set for smoother gameplay and higher-quality sound, while HDMI 2.0 is fine if you’re sticking with standard 4K/60 content.
Specs Snapshot
- Panel: 84.6 inches, 4K, QD-Mini LED, VA-type
- Refresh: 144 Hz native, VRR 48 to 144 Hz
- Local dimming: 5,184 zones
- Peak brightness: up to 6,500 nits claimed
- HDR: Dolby Vision IQ, HDR10, HDR10+, HLG, IMAX Enhanced
- Color: 97 percent DCI-P3, ten-bit
- Processor: AIPQ Pro
- OS: Google TV with Gemini
- Gaming: FreeSync Premium Pro, ALLM, “Game Accelerator 288”
- Audio: Bang and Olufsen tuned, Dolby Atmos, DTS Virtual:X
- Tuner: ATSC 3.0
- Ports: 2x HDMI 2.1, 2x HDMI 2.0, USB 3.0, USB 2.0, Ethernet, optical
- Mount: VESA 600 x 500 millimeters
- Dimensions: 74.02 by 42.24 by 2.09 inches without stand
- Weight: 85.76 pounds without stand
Living With It
As mentioned above, day one setup is straightforward. You can fast-track configuration with an Android phone to copy Wi-Fi and account details, or, should this be your first foray into a smarter TV experience, step through manually with the remote. You’ll formally pair that Bluetooth remote to enable voice if you want the most out of the experience. And yes, you do want that because that’s where all of the simplicity comes from. There is an optional TCL account, but it is not required.
A few tips that you may consider:
- Start in Movie or Filmmaker-style mode, then nudge brightness and color to taste. Leave motion smoothing low unless you prefer the effect.
- Enable local dimming on its higher setting for HDR movies, then try the medium setting for sports to reduce shifts on bright fields.
- In a bright room, position the panel to avoid direct reflections. If you cannot, increase the TV’s peak brightness and disable light sensors during daytime viewing.
Warranty
In the United States, TCL covers the set for one year on parts and labor for personal use. For screens this large, TCL can authorize in-home service or an exchange after remote troubleshooting. The usual exclusions apply, including damage from improper installation or power events and any burn-in from static images.
Who Should Buy the QM9K Series
- Home theater fans who want dazzling HDR and big-screen immersion without moving to a projector
- Console and PC gamers who want 4K at 120 Hz, fast VRR, and low input lag
- Consumers looking for the perfect device to build a room around
- Viewers who live in medium to bright rooms and want a TV that can overcome ambient light, with the caveat about reflections
What Could be Better
- Some blooming remains in challenging scenes (if you look for it)
- Reflective screen finish requires thoughtful room placement
- Two HDMI 2.1 ports may feel tight for multi-console and PC setups
- Built-in audio is great for a TV, but external speakers still elevate the experience
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Products earning this distinction exemplify excellence across the board, delivering an experience that truly rises above the rest.
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Verdict
The TCL 85QM9K is a statement piece of a TV that backs up its ambition with serious hardware. It throws bright, colorful, high-contrast images that make HDR movies and sports feel alive, and it has the gaming chops to match.
Gemini on Google TV is more than a bullet point. It genuinely makes the interface feel easier to live with and feels like the logical evolution of the Google TV experience. You still need to manage room reflections, and videophiles will spot a little haloing, but those trade-offs are common in this space and feel minimized here.
At $3,999.99 for the 85-inch size, TCL is no longer playing the budget card. It is meeting top competitors on price and trying to beat them on performance and features. And based on what I’ve seen, I can’t imagine expecting more for the money. If you are shopping premium 85-inch Mini LED sets this year, the 85QM9K belongs in the final comparison.
Should you be looking for any other size TV in 2025, and want the same experience, you’ll find the QM9K in 65-inch, 75-inch, and 98-inch options, too.
