Best electronics — TVs, phones and laptops compared

In electronics the specification sheet and the experience of using a device diverge faster than in any other category. A phone with a large battery can last less than a smaller one, a laptop advertised on its peak clock can spend most of an hour throttled, and two televisions with the same nominal resolution can look nothing alike in a bright room.

So we look first at the measurements a manufacturer is least keen to publish. For screens: sustained brightness in nits, panel type and how the picture holds up off-axis. For laptops and phones: performance after twenty minutes of load rather than in the first thirty seconds, and battery life at a fixed screen brightness instead of at whatever setting flatters the result. For audio: measured frequency response and the codecs actually supported at both ends of a connection.

The second thing we weigh is how long the device stays useful. Guaranteed years of system and security updates, whether the battery can be replaced, whether spare parts are sold at all. In this category that decides real cost more often than the price on the shelf does — a phone supported for five years is cheaper per year than a phone supported for two, almost regardless of what each one cost.