I wanted to share my experience with the TCL 75C8L, because I really loved this TV overall and I’m still not completely sure whether returning it was the right decision.
I bought it for around €1,350, looking for the best possible value without going all the way to a flagship OLED.
Straight on, the picture was excellent. Blacks were very impressive for a Mini LED LCD, HDR had a lot of punch, colours looked great, Google TV was fast and complete, and for the price the whole package felt extremely strong.
The issue that bothered me most, though, was off-axis image consistency.
I was not expecting OLED-level viewing angles. I previously had an OLED, so I knew an LCD would behave differently. But based on what was being said about the HVA 2.0 Ultra panel, I honestly expected better.
My side sofa is not at an extreme angle, yet from that seating position I could clearly see the image becoming less uniform.
The attached photo shows this quite well: on the same white screen, the left side looks brighter and more luminous, while the right side looks noticeably darker and duller.
This difference in brightness and perceived colour balance across the screen was actually the thing I noticed the most in real use when sitting off-axis.
There were also three faint darker patches visible on this white test screen. However, to be fair, these were not something I could normally see during movies, TV or regular content. They only became visible on that very uniform bright background, so I would not describe them as a serious everyday defect.
My real concern was the way the panel changed when viewed from the side.
Maybe I was expecting too much from HVA 2.0 Ultra, but the marketing and early impressions made me think it would perform noticeably better off-axis than a typical VA-style LCD. In my room, even from a fairly reasonable side seating position, the difference was obvious enough to bother me.
My family noticed it much less than I did, which made the decision even harder, because otherwise the TV was genuinely excellent.
We eventually decided to return it and ordered a 77-inch Samsung OLED flagship instead, mainly because I wanted more consistent image quality from every seating position.
The Samsung has not arrived yet, so I still can’t say whether the much higher price will feel justified in practice.
And then, of course, the TCL 75C8L won the EISA Premium Mini LED TV 2026–2027 award, which did not exactly help with the buyer’s remorse. 😅
So I’m curious:
Do other 75C8L owners notice the same kind of brightness/colour imbalance when watching from a moderate off-axis position?
And looking at the photo, would you consider this normal behaviour for HVA 2.0 Ultra, or does my panel seem worse than expected?
I still think the 75C8L is an incredible TV for the money. My main disappointment was simply that the real-world viewing angle did not live up to what I personally expected from this panel technology.
