OLED screens have taken another leap forward at CES 2023 thanks to new META tech from LG Display. But what exactly is META and how does it improve brightness?
Both LG and Panasonic announced new OLED TVs with substantially brighter screens than their previous generations at CES 2023. In fact, they are up to 150% brighter in some cases, with peak brightness claims of 2,100 nits. LG credits the jump in performance to its Brightness Booster Max technology, and Panasonic says it’s using a Master OLED Ultimate module with a Micro Lens Array. What does all this actually mean? Here’s the explanation from the horse’s mouth.
LG Electronics and Panasonic (and pretty much every other company that sells OLED TVs) get their OLED panels from LG Display, a dedicated division within LG’s giant enterprise that develops and manufactures displays. And even though there’s plenty of room for these companies to make their own unique tweaks — which explains why there can be noticeable differences in image quality from one manufacturer’s OLED TV to another — they’re all working from the same starting point.
For the 2023 model year, the starting point for flagship OLED TVs is LG Display’s third-gen OLED panel, which is based on something the company calls “META” technology.
Yes, it’s a little confusing. Meta is now the name for a new display technology as well as the name of the company formerly known as Facebook. To keep them separate, we’ll stick with LG Display’s all-caps formatting when referring to its OLED tech.
META, according to LG Display, is actually the combination of two discrete technologies. There’s a hardware component — the Micro Lens Array that Panasonic mentioned — and a software component, the brightness-enhancing algorithm known as META Booster. Together, they give LG Display’s new panels better brightness, better viewing angles, and even better energy efficiency.
