Now that our Cyber Monday TV Live Blog is up and running, I’ve been inundated with requests from people who can’t decide between the best TV of the year, the LG C2 OLED, and the bottom TV, the LG B2 OLED. tiered model but more affordable.
At the time of this article, the 55-inch LG B2 OLED is selling for $999 at Best Buy. (opens in new tab)while the 55-inch LG C2 OLED is down to $1,296 on Amazon (opens in new tab). (However, you can buy the 48-inch version of the LG C2 OLED on Amazon for $1,049. (opens in new tab)so keep that in mind.)
Choosing between two OLED TVs can be difficult, especially when money is tight and you’ve never seen them side-by-side. Thankfully, we’ve put these two screens in our test lab and can help guide you to the best option.
The short answer is that our tests show that the LG C2 OLED is a better performer in terms of overall brightness, but only in small windows. In scenes where everything is bright, both perform pretty much the same at maximum brightness. In addition, there is no significant difference in color saturation (which is usually less than 1% of the DCI-P3 color space), and their input lag is basically the same.
We’ll break down all the details below, but if you’re in the market for an OLED and don’t want to spend too much, you’ll get 95-99% of the same performance from the LG B2 OLED as the C2 OLED. and will only miss one or two chances.
LG C2 OLED vs B2 OLED: features
“Wait Now” You might be thinking, “Did you say missing features?” I did. There aren’t many differences in specs between the two TVs, but the LG C2 OLED has a few tricks up its sleeve that the LG B2 doesn’t.
First, the LG C2 OLED has a total of four HDMI 2.1 ports that support [email protected] But the LG B2 OLED has only two. This means that connecting both a PS5 and an Xbox Series X will take up both of your HDMI 2.1 ports, leaving you with no room to plug in a soundbar in the eARC port.
You can get around this limitation by buying a soundbar with an additional HDMI 2.1 port capable of passing 4K/120Hz signals, but the more components you add between the console and the TV, the more problems you’ll have.
You’re also downgrading your processor by choosing the LG B2 OLED. It probably won’t matter much at the moment since it’s a new 2022 model, but while the C2 OLED is running on WebOS UI without any lag, the LG B2 OLED might be a little slower in a few years. You may also notice that the LG B2 OLED drops a bit when you scale it up, but that’s unlikely.
Finally, the last feature that the LG B2 OLED lacks is an ATSC 3.0 tuner, which will allow you to broadcast in 4K. NextGen TVs are still being rolled out to the public at times and will take a few more years to fully roll out, which isn’t a huge deal in the short term, but could be a problem down the road.
Both feature 120Hz OLED panels, run WebOS, support Alexa and Google Assistant, and come with a Magic Remote. The differences are ultimately minor.
Of course, there are several differences between them, but remember that they have essentially the same characteristics. Both feature 120Hz OLED panels, run WebOS, support Alexa and Google Assistant, and come with a Magic Remote. The differences are ultimately minor.
LG C2 OLED vs B2 OLED: lab tests
So how did the two stack up against each other in the lab? When they were tested with an X-Rite i1 Pro spectrophotometer, a SpectraCal VideoForge Pro pattern generator, and Portrait Displays’ Calman calibration software, there wasn’t much of a difference.
In our small-scale tests, the LG C2 OLED managed to produce around 800 nits of brightness in a 10% display window in HDR mode, while the LG B2 OLED managed around 600 nits of brightness. This is because the former uses LG OLED Evo panels, while the latter does not. A 200 nit difference is relatively large, yes, but you’re only talking about a 10% window or a 6.5 inch patch on a 65 inch TV.
That said, when we ran the test at full screen, the difference in light was ultimately minimal. In calibrated mode, the LG C2 OLED peaked at 240 nits in a 75% window, while the LG B2 OLED managed around 200 nits. A difference of 40 nits on an almost full-screen image won’t change much for you.
In terms of color saturation, both TVs can hit 98-99% of the DCI-P3 color space and over 100% of the Rec. 709 color space. That’s not to say that colors don’t look a bit more vivid on the LG C2 OLED – color perception depends on brightness – but in reality, there’s not much difference in what’s possible.
Finally, in terms of latency, our tests showed that the LG B2 OLED was capable of a 12.7ms response time compared to the C2’s 12.9ms response time. Anything under 20ms is fine for gaming and you won’t even notice a .2ms difference.
LG C2 OLED vs B2 OLED: Bottom line
Unless you need all four HDMI 2.1 ports or want to be on the cutting edge of NextGen TV programming, there isn’t enough difference in performance between the LG B2 OLED and the LG C2 OLED to warrant buying one. Honestly, you might not notice the difference between the two.
If you’re someone who appreciates the best in anything, you could say that the LG C2 OLED is a status symbol in the AV community. It currently represents the pinnacle of mainstream TV, so it tops our list of the best TV shows of 2022. It might be better than anything else, but it’s better.
If you want to read more about the current state of OLED TVs, check out my guide The best OLED TVs of 2022 and LG OLED TVs vs. Samsung OLEDsplus the best Cyber Monday TV deals for the best prices.