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Unless you're living under a rock and just crawled out to read this, you know the Super Basin is this weekend. As you contemplate your plans for the Big Game, thoughts turn to beer, nachos, burgers, wings, or possibly wine and crab-stuffed stuffed mushrooms for football's final hurrah of the season. Regardless of your food proclivities, thoughts inevitably turn to your TV as well — unless your friend with the $10,000 4K projector and 120-inch screen invited you to watch the game in his or her home theater.

If not, you lot may be thinking your old apartment panel isn't big enough, or thin enough, or doesn't accept the brightness and motion blur compensation you lot might want for this year'southward caricature. It's not too late to go to Best Buy, Costco, or Amazon on your favorite device to check out the latest big screens.

And and then the nagging question surfaces again – is a 4K Television receiver actually worth the actress money? Well, merely you can answer that question for yourself, but we'll try to nowadays some data here that will help. Spoiler alert – yes, it probably is for many buyers, unless you're looking for the nigh gigantic screen at the everyman price.

What exactly is 4K, y'all ask? Information technology is about resolution — frequently 3840×2160 for TVs and 4096×2160 in theaters, simply either manner, roughly 4,000 horizontal lines of pixels. But 4K as well encompasses more than that.

For case, manufacturers are calling 4K UHD, because they're building in more capabilities to heighten the picture quality. UHD sets incorporate more powerful chipsets for faster processing, which is critical for HDR — peradventure the well-nigh of import new capability in 4K TV. HDR stands for high dynamic range, and if you're a lensman, yous probable know what it is. But every bit applied to TVs information technology's somewhat different, even if conceptually they're both well-nigh improving colour and dissimilarity.

Vizio HD TV

HDR on TVs is well-nigh displaying more accurate color, and with a wider color gamut, along with a better contrast ratio — including the all-important art of making blacks wait black. LED-backlit TVs take had difficulties with black levels in the past. But new local dimming assortment engineering science – now becoming bachelor on affordable models — can better control the backlight to brand the blackness in nighttime scenes blacker. Also in Television set HDR, the content must also be mastered in HDR for y'all to really be able to appreciate the difference. While HDR processing tin exist applied to non-HDR content, it is akin to upscaling 1080p to 4K – it may await a bit ameliorate, but you lot may not detect that much of a difference, depending on the program.

HDR is likely the well-nigh important new feature out at that place in UHD/4K TVs, only there are no gear up standards yet. Dolby Labs has been working on Dolby Vision and its predecessors since around 2008. Using its market position in movie and Television audio from mastering to decoding in consumer electronics, Dolby Vision aims to define HDR from the content creation to the display.

At CES 2022 concluding month, the UHD Alliance, comprised of some of the heaviest hitters in consumer electronics and video content, announced its specifications for HDR and more than for UHD TVs. The alliance has a licensing and logo programme for vendors that meet the criteria to earn the Ultra Hd Premium specification, which has specific requirements for HDR color and contrast criteria, resolution, and even has recommendations for more immersive audio.

Samsung, LG, and TCL announced Ultra Hard disk drive Premium sets, simply Sony, while a member, announced 4K HDR sets, but not Ultra HD. Dolby is a fellow member company and Dolby Vision is compliant with Ultra HD Premium. Netflix and Amazon are also members of the consortium, and both have announced support of HDR streaming content, with Amazon jumping in with some content in 2022.

HDTV TV

Where'due south the 4K content?

Perhaps the most important question: If yous buy into 4K, where's the content? About of it, correct now, is in the streaming world. Both Netflix and Amazon are streaming an array of content in 4K resolution at the fourth dimension of this writing. Netflix shows include House of Cards, Bloodline, Frankie and Grace, and others that are Netflix-financed exclusives, plus a limited set of movies. Amazon's content includes its exclusive series like The Homo in the High Castle, Alpha House, and Mozart in the Jungle as well as some movies. In the U.S., While Amazon includes 4K content in the $99 Amazon Prime number subscription, you have to stride up to the $eleven.99 per month tier on Netflix to go their Ultra Hard disk service, which also includes 4 simultaneous streams. At CES, Sony announced its Ultra service, an app which would offering 4K movies and titles on its Android powered sets, but it's non out yet.

Another major source of 4K content is YouTube. While a lot of information technology isn't professional material, there'southward a surprising amount out there and information technology'due south worth exploring. Many video blogs and reviews are shot and uploaded in 4K. Sony and Panasonic take both launched 4K YouTube channels to characteristic content shot with their equipment.

On the TV provider front, DirecTV and Dish both have 4K capable set-top boxes and DVRs. The content side is fairly express to appointment, equally they feature mostly contempo movies and Television set shows yous can hire in 4K. At CES, Dish announced its latest Hopper 3 DVR, which features sixteen tuners and 4K support, including 4K capability with its born Netflix app. Dish also announced new 4K content from Sony pictures, the Orchard, and Mance media. No give-and-take from either on linear Tv set available in 4K.

Time Warner Cable? AT&T Uverse? Comcast? There's been talk and announcements of future 4K boxes and content, but zilch is bachelor yet. And that brings us to possibly the large gorilla of cable: ESPN. The ABC-endemic sports network commands more per-subscriber revenue than any other cable channel. With cord cutting, that revenue has been falling off of late. But that base still enables ESPN to outbid other networks for the rights to televise a vast array of sports content. Only don't expect whatsoever of it in 4K side by side year. The problem is the circulate infrastructure and the mastering: Near sports today isn't shot with 4K cameras. It will crave an upgrade of the unabridged ecosystem for that to happen, and it volition have time.

Super Bowl 50

But we started this piece talking about the Super Bowl — and that's key. Notably, CBS will shoot the Super Bowl in 4K, merely equally Flim-flam did in 2022. We don't accept the infrastructure for either cable or broadcast to deliver 4K at this point, unfortunately. But as 4K TVs become more than prevalent, the ability to monetize the higher-quality broadcast (only similar Hard disk drive channel tiers did) will bulldoze more than of the content to exist produced in 4K. On the broadcast side, the upcoming ATSC 3.0 standard hopes to exist out soon, which will enable H.265 video encoding which will exist needed for those UHD broadcasting. While some demos were shown at CES, realistically ATSC three.0 capable tuners won't come up till 2022 or 2022.

What nearly 4K Blu-ray? Yep, it'southward coming. At CES, Panasonic, Samsung, and Philips all appear players that support the new Ultra HD Blu-ray specification. Like all new tech, await college initial pricing in the $300 to $400 range, just like the first wave of Blu-ray (and Hard disk DVD) players rolled out well-nigh 10 years agone. That said, different then, we're in the streaming era, and so it remains to exist seen if concrete UHD media becomes mainstream and not just a niche product for dedicated home theater rooms.

4K Idiot box pricing

While the content availability isn't all good news, pricing on the latest crop of 4K/UHD TVs generally is. Taking a look at TVs sized 50 inches and above, where yous'd notice the 4K differences, the sweet spots in pricing seem to exist effectually the 55 to lx-inch panels (over again, at the time of this writing). At Best Purchase, for example, 55-inch 4K sets range from $499 to $899. The increasingly less available 1080p (HD) sets run from $399 to $799. At Amazon, you lot tin can buy the 55-inch Sony XBR 55X810C or the 55-inch Samsung JS7000, both for $998; the latter model includes HDR back up. And Amazon is selling the 55-inch Vizio M Series for just $799; it's a 4K model with v HDMI reports and 32-zone local dimming.

At the low end of 1080p, you can still find a non-smart TV, just in 4K sets it is almost impossible to find one that is not also a smart Idiot box. The toll divergence here is around 15-twenty% for 4K. With 65-inch panels, the prices range from $1,350 to $1,999 for 4K, while 1080p 65-inchers are going for $899 to $1,079. These are only representative prices, and shopping around for closeouts and Amazon specials tin yield greater savings. The point is, unlike just a year or two ago, the price points are such that it makes sense to become the latest technology and be futurity-proofed for several years.

1 final annotation: 4K isn't 3D. While 4K may non be the leap SD to Hard disk drive was, it's not a fad, and the content and ecosystem is coming. If you've been on the fence, and you're looking for a new TV or an upgrade, the time is right for 4K. Typically the newer tech from CES doesn't make it to market until spring or autumn, so yous may want to wait for those. If you buy 4K now or later, yous volition be ready for Super Bowl 55 in all its 4K/HDR glory.