Philips Philips The One 55PUS9000/12

Ambilight is the reason to buy this television and it has no equivalent at any price from any other brand. Forty-nine LEDs project colour matched to the on-screen image onto the wall behind the set, which measurably reduces perceived eye strain in a dark room and makes the picture feel larger than 55 inches. If you have seen it and want it, nothing else here substitutes.

The rest of the specification is mixed. Netzwelt measured roughly 400 cd/m² — on the 65-inch model, not the 55-inch — and described the contrast as somewhat flat, lacking deep blacks. This is a quantum-dot VA panel on a conventional direct-LED backlight, not Mini-LED, so the QLED badge should not place it alongside the TCL, Hisense, Panasonic or Sony sets in this ranking. On measured brightness it is the dimmest television here by a wide margin.

HDR support is the broadest of any set: Dolby Vision, HDR10, HDR10+ and HLG all present, which is unusual and genuinely useful. The panel runs at up to 144Hz, though the modes split — 100Hz for broadcast, 120Hz for consoles, 144Hz for PC. Netzwelt reports four HDMI 2.1 ports with 144Hz, VRR and ALLM, but Prad's datasheet lists four HDMI ports without confirming the version, so treat the four-full-bandwidth claim as unconfirmed. Colour reproduction is described as natural, and the illuminated remote is a small but genuinely useful touch.

The Titan OS app catalogue is the real risk. Netzwelt found Apple TV+, MagentaTV and waipu.tv all missing. Titan OS is Philips' own web-app-based platform rather than Google TV, and its catalogue is materially thinner than webOS, Tizen or Google TV. Check that every service you subscribe to is available before committing — an external streaming stick solves it, but that is an extra cost and an extra HDMI port.

The EU energy label reads class F for SDR and class G for HDR. Input lag was not measured by any source we could find, and the audio wattage was not published.