Samsung QN900F 8K TV review: Is 2025 finally the year to buy an 8K TV?

Telegraph

22-04-2025

Our rating: 9/10
We like:
Anti-glare display kills reflections
Excellent picture quality
Excellent gaming performance
We don't like:
New frame isn't as premium as older models
No 8K content for movie watchers
Tizen OS doesn't feel dynamic
Price: £4,899 (75in) – Available to buy soon
What is the Samsung QN900F?
Samsung is preparing itself for the next step in TV viewing, which is the inevitable move to 8K resolution. This high-def revolution is still finding its feet, but that hasn't stopped Samsung from launching its latest 8K television, the QN900F, which is available to buy soon.
In fact, there are two new 8K models from Samsung in 2025, one offering slightly higher specs at a higher price and this model, which is a more approachable 8K set that steps down on design and the processor slightly.
An 8K TV offers four times the number of pixels that you get from a 4K television, so the viewing experience has the potential to be incredibly detailed, but there's very little 8K TV out there at the time of writing. So, have we reached that moment where 8K has started to go mainstream, or should you stick to the best 4K TVs instead?
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Design and technology
Score: 8/10
The Samsung QN900F has a different design to the QN900D I reviewed in 2024 as it slots into a slightly lower position. Rather than a perforated bezel that seamlessly frames the screen, there's now more of a traditional metal around the edges. That removes some of the premium effect that you'll get from the older models and indeed the new higher-end Samsung QN990F.
There's also a change in how the connections work. I'll talk about the exact properties of these connections further down this review, but first I want to address the big difference from a design perspective: the QN900F doesn't have Samsung's One Connect box.
Traditionally, the One Connect box allows all the connections in a separate box, which leads to two things. Firstly, it allows for a slimmer TV design and secondly, it allows for a more flexible installation, as all your connected devices can be positioned somewhere else. The QN990F has a new wireless One Connect box, while this TV, the QN900F, retains traditional connections on the rear of the screen.
That means that the TV is thicker at about 45mm, of which 25mm is the new bezel design. It's perhaps no coincidence that the bezel looks a lot like Samsung's The Frame bezels. This model also supports Samsung's Art Store, so if you have it hanging on your wall, it looks like a giant picture frame.
The QN900F has two feet rather than a central pedestal stand. These feet neatly clip into the back of the TV to support it and there's a choice of locations and can be positioned closer to the centre or towards the edges, both in high or low positions, allowing you to slot peripherals under the TV if you want. Best of all, you don't need any tools to assemble this TV, although, for the 75-inch model I tested, you need a couple of strong people to safely lift and move the screen around.
The design story flows into the technology, too: the QN900F is powered by the NQ8 AI Gen 2 processor. This is a step down from the NQ8 AI Gen 3 chip that powers both the QN900D and the QN990F. It's not quite as powerful, although both are a step-up over the NQ4 AI Gen 2 which powers Samsung's top 4K TVs from 2024 and it's this processor that handles the upscaling.
There are two remotes, one is a standard Samsung TV remote with a lot of buttons on it, including my favourite 'info' button that in some apps and services will display the details of the quality of the programme you're watching when pressed. If you're expecting 4K, HDR and Dolby Atmos, it's here you'll see whether you're getting it. The second remote is a slim model that has basic controls, much more like remote you might get with a streaming device. This smaller control is solar-powered with a little panel on the back that will recharge it from the light in your room.
Picture quality
Score: 9/10
Samsung describes the QN900F as 'Neo QLED', which means it's a Mini-LED backlit panel with a quantum dot layer to boost the colours. Because it's 8K, it has a 7,680 x 4,320-pixel resolution and it comes in 65, 75 and 85-inch sizes. I tested the 75-inch model.
Mini-LED is used for its brightness, with over a thousand dimming zones to control that light in an attempt to make the picture as accurate as it can be. This is where Mini-LED differs from OLED, because in the best OLED TVs, each individual pixel can be turned on and off, while in a Mini-LED panel, the illumination is controlled in zones. The reward for using Mini-LED is the increased brightness.
Samsung doesn't support Dolby Vision, but you will get HDR10+. That's an equivalent standard that's almost as good, with Netflix announcing support earlier in 2025 and we've seen much more HDR10+ content available to view. It's now on Netflix, Prime Video and it's coming to Disney+, too.
HDR10+ can give staggering results, with Spider-Man: Homecoming on Prime Video looking bright and vibrant, but sometimes it looks a little muted, like Extraction on Netflix. This is likely because of the 'director's intent', with the film rated to slightly lower brightness by the studio.
That might see you reaching for the controller to turn up the brightness, which you can't do unless you choose the dreaded 'dynamic mode'. Samsung's Standard mode, for most viewing, seems perfectly fine, but in a darkened room you might appreciate the automatic switch to 'Filmmaker Mode', although to my eyes that always looks a little dull and a little too warm for my tastes.
Samsung also offers an AI mode that will try to adjust the picture to suit the environment. It's a subtle change but I found that it made Extraction a little more watchable, while for Spider-Man: Homecoming, it removed some of the highlights I was enjoying. It's worth playing around with to see if it suits your preferences.
Because the illumination is controlled in zones, there's a risk of blooming on all LED TVs. That's well-controlled on the Samsung QN900F. Even around white text on a black background, I didn't find blooming to be a significant problem but some of those edges won't be as precise as they would be on an OLED TV.
The other downside of LED technologies is something called black crush, where the darker scenes lose the subtle detail resulting in a dark mush. Even on the QN900F, that can be a problem and this is another area where this TV tech misses out compared to OLED. Why isn't Samsung using OLED for its big 8K TVs? Because it's hugely expensive, that's why.
All the above is true of pretty much any Mini-LED TV, but one thing that Samsung has introduced in 2025 is its glare-free screen. This has a matte finish rather than gloss and that means that bright lights and windows don't have the devastating effect on the picture that they would on a glossy-finished TV.
That's the key criticism of some of the best TVs. If you have a dark scene on the TV and you're in a bright room then you'll probably just see a reflection of yourself – and that doesn't happen with the QN900F. I've found myself watching movies in bright conditions that I'd normally reserve for a darkened room because they hold up remarkably well. Yes, some dark scenes in Game of Thrones are still lost to the gloom, but Samsung's anti-glare finish works incredibly well.
Then we come to the issue of there being basically no 8K content. You can stream 8K video from YouTube; the 8K content you can find (making sure it's actually 8K, not just claiming to be 8K in the title) is mostly animals or landscape clips. Once you get around the fact that you need a solid internet connection to stream these at full resolution, the results are staggering.
Native 8K content on this TV looks like nothing else – there's a realism you just don't get with lower quality video, underlined by the fact that you can watch this from close to the screen without losing detail. It's hugely immersive, but given the data demands, it's understandable why it's not a mainstream format yet.
I also tried filming some 8K content on a Samsung phone and watching it on the TV. It's almost laughable how good it looks, especially when you're watching your loved ones on a huge screen in such a high quality.
Sound
Score: 8/10
The Samsung Q900F has a 4.2.2 channel system, which outputs 70W and supports Dolby Atmos and Samsung's Object Tracking Sound+ system. That means the speakers can accurately give you left, centre and right separation, with more immersive surround sound effects, and bass to back it up while making sure it doesn't sound too tinny.
The TV can also produce appreciable volume without distortion, so you could use the TV's speakers alone and get a pretty good experience. But the best soundbars will enhance the sound to make this more of a home theatre experience. While the TV supports Dolby Atmos, you don't get the same level of enveloping sound from the TV alone.
Whether you add a soundbar or not depends on what you're doing with this TV: if it's a showpiece for your kitchen wall and you want a minimal installation, then just the screen will do, but if you're a serious movie watcher, you'll want more. I paired it with the Q990F soundbar – Samsung's top-of-the-range Dolby Atmos bar – and found much more impressive results.
One of the benefits of matching a Samsung screen with a Samsung soundbar is the Q-Symphony system. This allows the TV's speakers to be used in conjunction with the soundbar for even better results.
Operating system and usability
Score: 8/10
Samsung's TV uses the Tizen operating system and like Samsung's phones, it also has the promise of seven years of software updates, so you'll know that you're not going to miss out on features in a couple of years. You'll find all the major streaming services present and generally these play better than they do from an external device.
Samsung also pushes its own Samsung TV Plus service, where you can find a mixture of free content channels. There's not a huge draw to this service, but it's one of the few places where you can use the AI button on the remote to find out a little more about what's happening on the screen. This lets you take a peek at the cast of the show you're watching, but it seems a strange addition when I doubt that many people ever look at Samsung TV Plus.
Samsung's Tizen OS isn't the most engaging on a modern TV. On the home page, there's a range of content suggestions, but as you scroll over them, they mostly say 'available with a subscription' – regardless of whether you've signed into that service or not.
Samsung also pushes SmartThings fairly heavily, which is Samsung's smart home platform. I set the TV up using SmartThings on a Samsung phone and found it easy to get started, so it's worth considering when you first plug it in.
Gaming and peripherals
Score: 9/10
The Samsung QN900F is equipped with four HDMI 2.1 connectors and it will support 4K at up to 165Hz – which exceeds the current requirement for games consoles which are capped at 120Hz. You can also have 8K at 60Hz to support PC or PS5 Pro gaming.
For PC gamers, there's support for ALLM (auto low latency mode) and VRR (variable refresh rate) which you get from Nvidia FreeSync Premium Pro for example. This is also a HGiG compatible TV, which is there to make sure that the HDR performance in games is what was expected by the developer. One of the strongest arguments for an 8K screen right now is gaming, rather than movie watching, because of the lack of content.
One of the HDMI ports supports eARC for connection to your soundbar and there are two USB connections. There's support for Wi-Fi 6e – which is a higher standard than many televisions offer – as well as Ethernet for a wired connection.
Connect your games console or PC and you'll get access to a gaming toolbar where you can make additional tweaks to the settings on the fly to improve your gaming There are also built-in gaming options from the Xbox app, Amazon's Luna service, as well as GeForce Now if you want to stream games. While these are nice inclusions, if you're serious about gaming and you've bought this TV to game on, you'll be connecting the hardware rather than streaming.
Technical specifications
Samsung is updating its 8K televisions on a regular cadence with two models for 2025. The QN900F sits in a slightly lower position than the QN990F because of its physical design. But if we look at the specs, how does it compare to Samsung's 2025 flagship 4K Neo QLED TV, the QN90F, which sticks to resolutions you can actually take advantage of?
Should you buy the Samsung QN900F?
The Samsung QN900F presents itself as a more approachable 8K television, with Samsung being hopeful that gamers will be interested in its performance until we get to the point where 8K home cinema becomes a reality.
There's no denying that native 8K content is staggering, a big step in immersive reality compared to 4K and especially important when you're pushing for larger screen sizes in rooms that aren't getting any bigger. If you want the latest, then you can invest in the QN900F knowing that you're getting a great TV that delivers excellent performance, while simultaneously being future-proofed.
There's an argument for choosing the QN900D from 2024, however, because all you lose is the anti-glare screen, but you get a more premium design and a more powerful processor. Not to mention that, at the time of writing, it's about £1,000 cheaper.
There's no telling when the 8K display will really be put to good use. With 4K televisions, both of the Mini-LED variety like this and OLED coming in significantly cheaper than the QN900F, for most TV buyers it still feels like it isn't yet the time to invest in an 8K set.
Yes, if:
You want the absolute best 8K television
You're looking to buy a future-proofed TV
You're an avid gamer
No, if:
You're hoping to watch loads of 8K content
You want the best-value TV
Samsung QN900F FAQs
How much better is an 8K TV than a 4K TV?
Technically speaking, an 8K display has four times as many pixels as a 4K TV, so you could say it's four times better. However, while the display offers more detail, you need 8K content to take advantage of it. All streaming services and even Ultra HD Blu-ray discs only use 4K, so an 8K screen isn't going to give you more detail. However, 8K TVs offer other advantages, like a more powerful processor to run a wider range of picture enhancements, which is what this Samsung 8K TV offers.
Is there much 8K content I can watch in the UK?
In a word no, there isn't much 8K content in the UK. You can access 8K footage on YouTube, but it's mostly landscape or animal clips and there's not much to watch. You also need a very fast internet connection to stream 8K content. Netflix asks for a minimum of 15Mbps to stream 4K, so you're looking at speeds between 50-100Mbps to stream 8K.
How good is Samsung's 8K AI upscaling?
Samsung offers powerful AI upscaling on its TVs, meaning that lower quality content will be watchable on larger screens. The same applies to 8K: while there's not so much that an 8K TV needs to do to 4K content, it means Full HD Blu-rays still look great on large TVs, like this 75-inch model. It can also boost the visual performance of broadcast TV, which might be 720p resolution, to make it look better. Once you get to lower-quality old content, it's still watchable, but the deficiencies in the source become more apparent. Samsung's upscaling is excellent.
Does buying a Samsung 8K TV 'future-proof' my house?
To a certain degree, yes. The next step in television will be 8K, but the limitation from a streaming point of view (which is how most people watch movies) is bandwidth and infrastructure. With some households unable to access a full fibre internet connection (which would supply the needed connection speeds), we're still some way from the delivery of 8K content being realistic. However, with phones able to capture 8K video, buying an 8K TV is the only way to showcase this and live in the future, now.