LED vs. OLED Displays: Comprehensive Comparison 2024
LED and OLED are often pitted against each other in comparisons of the better display technology. In this guide, we’ll explain how each technology works, the differences between them, and which is better suited for your personal preferences.
1. What is LED?
Light Emitting Diodes, or LED, are a type of lighting technology commonly used in displays and many kinds of lighting. They work as an energy-efficient, safe alternative to other kinds of light – namely incandescent light, which can be costly, power-wasting, and even dangerous to use in some applications.
For a super simplified explanation on LEDs, LEDs generate light through the movement of electrons across a diode. As the electrons move, they fall into areas of opposite charge, causing them to release energy. This energy is usually released as sometime called a photon – a unit of visible light. Applying electricity to a diode allows us to reliably create light that isn’t too hot or wasteful.
Technically, both LED and OLEDs use LED technology to produce the images you see on screen. However, when most people use the term “LED,” they’re talking about a particular type of display technology often referred to as liquid crystal displays, or LCD.
How do LED displays work?
When most people talk about LED displays, they’re actually talking about liquid crystal displays (LCDs) that are powered by a large LED unit. LCDs are the display technology of choice for most applications, and that’s been the case since the middle of the 2010s. But how do they work?
LCDs work through the use of multiple layers of optical and electrical technologies. In the back, you have your LED light, which powers the whole thing. This light is diffused evenly across the entire screen, like when you have a pure white screen on your laptop or television.
That light is controlled through the use of polarized filters. Polarized filters, like what coats your sunglasses or certain camera lenses, can block out some light from passing through. When you use two polarized filters together, however, you witness a very interesting phenomenon. Turned one way, the two filters layered over one another block out all light, creating opaque black. Turned another way, the sheets are transparent, allowing light to pass through. This is part of how these screens control the light on screen to create images – by using polarized filters.
Televisions and monitors create images by putting together lots of tiny pixels. To control light at the super tiny level of pixels, however, engineers needed a way to “turn” the polarized filter to control the passage of light. That’s where “liquid crystal” comes in, a special chemical with the ability to “turn” light waves, essentially recreating the effect of physically turning a polarized sheet. The liquid crystal can be controlled via electrical impulse, turning it “off” (black) or “on” (white).
Then, each pixel is divided into three sub-pixels, which each have their own-colored filter over them – either red, green, or blue. These three colors can mix to produce any color, which is how they can make such vibrant, realistically colored images.
These displays are cheap, ubiquitous, and they work well. However, many display technologies companies are in an arms race to produce the best new display – and many seem to think OLED might be their secret weapon.
2. What is OLED?
Organic Light Emitting Diodes – or OLEDs – are a new type of display technology that boast life-like color, contrast, black level, and more. Like LED LCDs, they rely on LED technology to power their light source(s).
However, unlike LED LCD screens, OLEDs do not rely on an LED backlight to power them. Instead, OLEDs rely on self-emissive light units – meaning that every pixel itself is a light source. This means that OLEDs don’t use polarized film or the technology of liquid crystal at all, and thus have far fewer layers that constitute them.
How do LED and OLED displays differ?
The main difference between LED LCD displays and OLED displays is that OLEDs rely on self-emissive pixels instead of a backlight system combined with layers of polarized film and liquid crystal. In an LCD display, there is a single light, and each pixel is controlled by optical means to either block light or allow light to pass through. This makes LCD displays cheaper to produce, but it also means they suffer in terms of speed, contrast, color, and energy efficiency, especially when compared with OLED screens.
3. LED vs. OLED displays: comprehensive comparison
3.1 Black level
OLED displays boast superior black levels over LED LCD screens, due to their lack of backlight. Since LED LCD backlights are always on (unless, of course, the television or display is powered fully “off”), they have a tendency to allow a little bit of light through at all times, even when the screen is supposed to be black. Some viewers find this light leak to be frustrating, as it can impact film viewings and video game playing.
OLEDs can fully turn off their light units when there is supposed to be black on screen, since their light units are all independent from one another. This deep black is great, especially for viewers who love dramatic or scary movies, or who love watching television in the dark.
3.2 Price
Unfortunately, OLED displays are still quite a bit pricier than LCD displays, even after a few years in production. While the price is likely to go down if OLEDs are widely adopted as a competing display technology, they are still pretty new compared to LCDs, which have been the industry standard for almost two decades. Plus, LCDs have the economical bonus of using only one or a handful of lights to power themselves; OLEDs have millions or even billions of light units. Fortunately, LEDs are relatively cheap lighting units.
3.3 Brightness
Usually, LED LCDs win out in terms of brightness over OLEDs. A common complaint is that OLEDs just aren’t that bright, making them unsuitable for outdoor TV watching, and even (according to some consumers) unfit for any daytime watching. While this metric can vary greatly depending on the model and brand, it’s worth considering your preferences and screen-watching habits when purchasing a display. Is this going to be something you’re looking at in the daylight frequently – like a smartphone – or is this a purchase that’s only used at night to watch a movie when there’s no light to interfere?
3.4 Burn-in
OLEDs famously suffer from a problem called burn-in, which also affected plasma televisions. Burn-in refers to the persistence of images onscreen, even after their source has gone, and it’s caused by the self-emissive nature of the OLED system. Relying on individual lights means that individual lights can dim over time – especially if they’re used more than the others – resulting in faint, ghostly outlines of images that remained on screen for too long. People often get burn-in in the shape of television logos, images that have been left on screen, the lower third on news channels, and in vague, unspecified blotches.
LED LCDs don’t suffer from this problem, due to the fact that they’re powered by a singular backlight. When brightness diminishes over time in an LCD, it diminishes uniformly – that is, the entire screen gets dimmer, not just in one area.
3.5 Energy efficiency
Energy efficiency can vary greatly depending on the display and the way it’s being used, regardless of whether you’re using LED LCDs or OLEDs.
It’s very difficult to accurately predict whether an LED LCD or an OLED display will use more energy. This is because LCD screens produce the same amount of light regardless of what is being displayed on screen; even when they are producing dark images or are displaying a black screen, they are producing the same amount of light as they would to create a very bright image.
This, of course, leads to some wasted energy. AMOLEDs are often erroneously thought to be more energy efficient because they do not waste energy creating black or dark hues – instead, pixels in areas of the screen that are meant to be black are either completely “off” or are dimmed. This means that AMOLEDs do beat out LCDs when it comes to making dark images – they use significantly less power for the same images.
However, AMOLEDs also struggle more to create bright images, and may end up using more power than an LCD to create some things on screen.
Thus, the difference between the two comes down to how each technology is used. For those concerned with energy efficiency, it may be a relief to know that they can control their energy consumption through their habits. However, AMOLEDs may still consume more energy than LCDs.
4. Looking for reliable LED displays?
At LED Sino, we offer several high-quality LED display products and solutions, perfectly suited for clients in a wide range of industries and with a wide range of industry needs. Whether you’re looking for affordable LED display rentals for an upcoming event, or you’re looking to purchase displays for your event center, conference center, auditorium, church, or arena, we can help you get set up with clear, vivid, and reliable LED displays.