The 4 Best Sounding TVs of 2025

Updated Apr 30, 2025 at 06:55 pm
Best Sounding TVs

No home entertainment system can deliver an extraordinary experience without proper sound quality, even if you have the best picture quality from your TV. Like in a movie theater or a stadium, sound plays an important role in immersing the audience. TVs are getting thinner and thinner, which means less space for proper speakers. Despite this, our testing shows that some modern high-end TVs can get loud; some have okay bass and deliver clear and understandable dialogue, but the sound quality is nothing compared to a proper sound setup. We suggest you check our recommendations for the best soundbars if you want the best sound. However, there are still some TVs that provide solid enough sound to immerse you in your content.

Below are our recommendations for the TVs with the best sound you can buy. Make sure to check out recommendations for the best TVs, the best outdoor TVs, and the best smart TVs. You can also vote on which new models you want us to purchase and test. To learn more about the 2025 models, check out our 2025 TV lineup page.


  1. Best Sounding TV

    The best-sounding TV we've tested is the Panasonic Z95A OLED. It's an impressive TV that delivers fantastic visuals with good sound quality. It has a built-in 5.1 speaker system that sounds about as good as a mid-range soundbar, so it sounds much better than typical TV speakers. It has a sound profile that is balanced enough that dialogue is easy to understand, and dialogue remains clear during action scenes thanks to its dedicated center speaker. Although its bass isn't as good as soundbars with a dedicated subwoofer on your floor, the built-in subwoofer provides more bass than traditional TV speakers, so you hear some low-end rumble in movies, shows, and games. The speakers also get very loud, which is great for big rooms or if you just want to crank the volume for immersion. It also passes through Dolby Digital formats through eARC, so you can plug in your own soundbar or home theater system. However, it doesn't passthrough DTS audio formats commonly found on physical media.

    Of course, it also delivers fantastic picture quality thanks to its OLED panel. Blacks are perfectly deep and uniform in a dark room, which is great for watching movies as there's no distracting blooming or haloing around bright objects or subtitles. It displays a wide color gamut with HDR content, making colors look incredibly vibrant and lifelike. The TV's MLA technology makes it one of the brightest OLEDs on the market, so it looks great even in brighter rooms.

    See our review

  2. Best Sounding Bright Room TV

    Current Deal: The Sony BRAVIA 9 QLED 65" has dropped in price by $401 at Amazon.com.

    The best-sounding TV for a bright room we've tested is the Sony BRAVIA 9 QLED, an amazing TV loaded with modern features. It uses a 70W 2.2.2 channel speaker system with two midrange drivers, two tweeters, two beam tweeters, and two subwoofers. Its well-balanced sound profile makes dialogue clear and easy to understand. It gets very loud, with little compression and very little distortion at high volume levels. It supports eARC and a wide range of audio formats, including DTS:X via DTS-HD MA, which is great as it's the most commonly supported format on UHD Blu-ray movies. The TV also has Sony's S-Center speaker input, which allows you to use the TV's built-in speakers as a center channel when paired with certain Sony soundbars and receivers.

    Additionally, the TV has excellent picture quality. It delivers deep blacks that are as close to OLEDs like the Panasonic Z95A OLED as you can currently get, with minimal blooming thanks to its incredible local dimming control. The BRAVIA 9 is also one of the brightest TVs on the market, so it easily overcomes glare in well-lit rooms, and highlights in HDR content really stand out. The TV also delivers vibrant and lifelike colors thanks to its wide color gamut, so you get an impressive HDR experience whether you're gaming or watching movies.

    See our review

  3. Best Sounding Mid-Range TV

    The Hisense U8/U8N is the best-sounding mid-range TV we've tested. It's a great TV overall, available in a few different sizes, from 55 to 100 inches, and it combines its great picture quality with satisfactory sound quality. It features a 50W 2.1.2 channel speaker setup, has a decent frequency response with a well-balanced sound profile that delivers clear dialogue, and even outputs some bass. It also gets quite loud, although at the cost of some distortion and pumping artifacts at max volume. That said, not everyone is sensitive to this. If you plan on using an external soundbar or home theater system, it supports eARC audio passthrough with all major formats.

    It delivers worse sound quality than the Sony BRAVIA 9 QLED, but still has excellent overall picture quality. It's almost as bright as the Sony, and although its contrast isn't as good, it still provides very deep blacks in a dark room. It has worse accuracy and image processing than the BRAVIA 9, but it's certainly not bad in those aspects. It uses the user-friendly Google TV smart platform, which is easy to use and has a huge selection of streaming apps, so you can easily find your favorite streaming content.

    See our review

  4. Best Sounding Budget TV

    Current Deal: The Hisense U6/U6N 55" has dropped in price by $200 at BestBuy.com.

    The Hisense U6/U6N is the best budget TV with decent sound quality that we've tested. It's a simple TV with satisfactory overall performance and offers great value for its price. It features a 20W 2.0 channel speaker setup, and surprisingly, it has alright sound quality for a budget-friendly TV, as most other low-cost options have bad sound. The speakers don't get very loud, but the sound profile is well-balanced enough that dialogue is clear at moderate volume levels. Unfortunately, it loses its balance at maximum volume, making dialogue hard to hear. On the other hand, it has very minimal distortion at all volume levels. If you're using a soundbar, the TV supports passthrough for Dolby and DTS audio formats over eARC, so there's no need to worry about compatibility.

    Like the Hisense U8/U8N, it uses the user-friendly Google TV platform. It has a bunch of apps you can download, and the mic built into the remote gives you access to the Google Assistant and Alexa voice assistant features. It also has good overall picture quality with deep blacks, helped by a very good local dimming feature, so it looks great in a dark room. It has okay peak brightness in HDR and good peak brightness in SDR, with decent reflection handling, so it's capable enough for moderately lit rooms.

    See our review

Notable Mentions

  • LG G4 OLED:

    The LG G4 OLED is a great alternative to the Panasonic Z95A OLED if you're okay with sacrificing some sound performance for increased brightness. It has 60W 4.2 channel speakers built-in that can be virtually upmixed to 11.1.2 using the new α11 AI Sound Pro feature, so it does a decent job mimicking a proper surround sound system. The speakers get loud and have a well-balanced sound profile, making dialogue easy to understand. It doesn't sound as good overall as the Panasonic, but it's a great choice if you care more about brightness and still want a TV that sounds good. 

     

    See our review
  • Sony BRAVIA 7:

    If you want a Sony TV and like what the Sony BRAVIA 9 QLED offers, but it's out of your price range, consider the Sony BRAVIA 7 QLED. It's not as loud, and its sound profile isn't as well-balanced, but it still provides clear dialogue at moderate volume levels. It has less distortion than the BRAVIA 9, even at maximum volume. The BRAVIA 7 doesn't have the same brightness and black levels as the BRAVIA 9, but it still overcomes glare in a bright room and looks very good in a dark room, making it a solid TV overall.

    See our review

Recent Updates

  1. Apr 30, 2025

    We made the Panasonic Z95A OLED our new top pick and moved the Sony BRAVIA 9 QLED into a new 'Best Sounding Bright Room TV' category. We also moved the LG G4 OLED into Notable Mentions.

  2. Dec 18, 2024

    We replaced the Sony X90L/X90CL with the Sony BRAVIA 7 QLED in the Notable Mentions section.

  3. Oct 04, 2024 :  Replaced the LG G3 OLED, the Hisense U8/U8K, and the Hisense U6/U6K with their 2024 successors. We also updated some text throughout for clarity.

  4. Jul 09, 2024 :  We replaced the Sony X93L/X93CL with the Sony BRAVIA 9 QLED in the 'Best Sounding TV' category and refreshed some text throughout for accuracy.

  5. May 10, 2024 :  Added mentions of the Hisense U7N, the Hisense U8N, and the LG G4 OLED in the 'Best Sounding Budget TV,' the 'Best Sounding Mid-Range TV,' and the 'Best Sounding OLED TV' categories, respectively.

All Reviews

Our recommendations above are what we think are currently the TVs with the best sound to buy for most people with different needs. We factor in the price (a cheaper TV wins over a pricier one if the difference isn't worth it), and availability (no TVs that are difficult to find or almost out of stock everywhere).

If you would like to do the work of choosing yourself, here is the list of all our reviews of TVs, sorted by their sound quality. Be careful not to get too caught up in the details. While no TV is perfect, most TVs are great enough to please almost everyone, and the differences are often not noticeable unless you really look for them. Keep in mind that no TV can deliver the sound quality of a dedicated sound system or a soundbar.