One of the best LG OLED TVs I’ve tested is now hundreds of dollars off, permanently

ZDNET’s key takeaways

• It’s not the latest model in this series, but the LG G3 OLED is an incredible television that has one of the best displays I’ve ever seen.
• The price tag may have been a little scary when it first came out, but you can now find it for $2,000 (Amazon says this is an $800 discount, while Best Buy says this is $300 off).
• It might still be out of reach for many consumers. 

I’ll get straight to the point. I test a lot of TVs. When I found out I would be trying out LG’s G3 along with one of the company’s new soundbars, I knew I would be watching a highly-touted TV.

It didn’t disappoint.

Even though it’s more than a year old now and LG has replaced it with the G4, this is still an incredible television. It’s one of the best-looking TVs I’ve ever tested, both in terms of the display and the design of the set itself. It packs very impressive audio and a ton of features into its slim design, and any content I tried out looked beautiful.

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The G3 is available in sizes from 55 to 83 inches. For the purposes of this review, I tested the 65-inch. Let’s dive into what makes this TV so good.

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Right out of the box, I noticed how sleek the G3 is. At only an inch thick and with an almost non-existent bezel, it’s designed to sit flush on a wall. Since I was only enjoying it temporarily, I instead opted to mount it on a stand, but it still looked elegant.

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This set has four HDMI 2.1 eARC ports. All the inputs are in a small cutout on the left side of the TV that I found easy to access. Some TVs place inputs right in the middle, making them difficult to get to, but I didn’t have any issues connecting everything I wanted to the G3.

I’m a fan of physical media, so the first thing I usually do when I put a TV through its paces is fire up a Blu-ray disc. For this test, I picked a personal favorite movie: “Ghostbusters.” I felt like I was watching it for the first time. There are quite a few darker scenes in this movie, and I was able to pick out details I hadn’t noticed before. I felt like the G3 handled upscaling better than most TVs I encountered.

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To test something a little more modern, I went to Netflix and started the first thing I saw – the new “Beverly Hills Cop: Axel F.” A good mix of bright and dark scenes impressed me even more. Colors were incredibly vibrant when they were supposed to be, and dark scenes were never washed out.

I’ll call this easily one of the better displays I’ve seen on a television. It incorporates Micro Lens Array technology, or a layer of microscopic lenses on top of the OLED pixels that supposedly takes brightness to new levels. I especially noticed this when I tested a few games, and now my everyday screen looks dull by comparison. 

In terms of audio, the G3 supports Dolby Atmos and LG claims that the built-in AI transforms two-channel audio into virtual 7.1.2 surround sound. While it isn’t “actual” surround sound, I was very impressed with the audio, and I could tell it was a significant leap from standard TV speakers. There are several additional audio presets as well, such as sports, music, clear voice, and cinema, which adds a nice bass rumble to action scenes. 

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One of the small things I appreciate the most about the G3 is how well it handles harsh lighting. My living room has a lot of natural light spilling in from the side and a bright overhead light. While testing this TV, I had it sitting in front of my regular TV, which is a wall-mounted LED. The difference between the two was immediately noticeable. The side light didn’t impact the G3 at all, and while a reflection from my overhead light was visible, it wasn’t distracting. On my everyday TV, it detracts from the display quite a bit.

The anti-glare screen coupled with this set’s 1,400 nits of brightness means you’ll be able to enjoy content in any condition, especially bright windows, the bane of most TVs.

When it came time to give gaming a run, I quickly discovered this was going to be one of my favorite tests. As I mentioned before, the G3 has an incredibly vibrant display, and it truly shined here. No matter the game, colors were more vibrant than ever, but still quite natural at the same time. The 120Hz refresh rate is enough to make sure everything runs smoothly, and I never noticed any stuttering or slowdowns.

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I usually don’t tinker too much with settings, but I enjoyed nosing around the Game Optimizer menu to see what changes different options made. Most gamers probably won’t even notice these changes, but dedicated ones will.

ZDNET’s buying advice

When the LG G3 debuted, it carried an MSRP of $3,299.99 for the 65-inch version. That price is at the higher end for an OLED, so it certainly scared some people off. Now that the G4 is out, the price for last year’s set is down to around $2,000 at most retailers, including Amazon and Best Buy. If you’re looking for a new TV, the savings should be awfully tempting.

I really couldn’t pick one area this set excels at, as it does a phenomenal job at everything. If you’re looking for a more premium OLED TV but can’t stomach the premium prices that usually come along with them, you won’t find many better options than the G3.