Sony Bravia XR A95L QD-OLED TV review

Summary

Sony’s flagship TV, the Bravia XR A95L, is a fully loaded QD-OLED screen that is the most sophisticated set the firm makes in addition to being the top model in the Master Series. As a result, the 65-inch model costs $3,499, which is a premium price. But do you get value for your money?

To put it briefly: sure

The A95L definitely deserves to be included among the most dependable of the industry’s major players—and it outperforms them in many categories—thanks to its amazing image and sound quality, a plethora of unique and intriguing functions, and a few killer extras.

This would be an easy decision for anybody wanting to purchase a high-end TV if not for its color reproduction and brightness levels, which are somewhat below what you’ll see from the top sets from LG and Samsung. However, not everyone will find these problems to be deal-breakers. Nevertheless, the A95L is without a doubt among the greatest OLED TVs available today, assuming you can afford it, as well as among the finest TVs in general.

Review of the Sony Bravia XR A95L: News and updates

Although Sony has not yet revealed their 2024 TV schedule, we anticipate that information to be released within the next three months. It will hopefully employ LG Display’s new META 2.0 panels, which we saw at CES 2024, to provide even better peak brightness in the A95L’s replacement.

Review of the Sony Bravia XR A95L: Cost and accessibility

Three sizes of the A95L are available at the following prices:

The 55-inch Sony XR-55A95L costs $2,799.99.
The 65-inch Sony XR-65A95L costs $3,499.99.
Sony 77-inch XR-77A95L: $4,999.99

Despite the fact that we only examined the 65-inch A95L, we anticipate performance to be similar across the three as they all share almost the same hardware and image technology. Performance is not impacted at all by the one significant difference between the sizes, which we’ll discuss in the next section.

Review of the Sony Bravia XR A95L: Design

The A95L, like the majority of contemporary OLED-based TVs, stands out for its overall dimensions of 56.9 x 32.8 x 1.4 inches as well as its thin profile, which measures just 0.25 inches at its narrowest point. These characteristics combined with the set’s 51.6-pound weight means you will need assistance transporting and assembling it. The top, left, and right sides of the screen are surrounded by an even narrower black metal bezel (about one-sixteenth inch), while the bottom has a larger bezel (just short of two-thirds inch at its broadest) to display the IR emitter in the center and Sony’s emblem in the lower left corner.

You may install the supplied stand if you choose not to mount the A95L on the wall using the inbuilt 300x300mm VESA holes on the back panel. This panel has a tastefully designed field of squares and snap-off panels to conceal the ports (see the next section). The two feet are designed to screw into a corner on the rear of the set.

There are two alternative installation locations for the 55- and 65-inch TVs: one where the screen is positioned so that it almost touches the supporting surface, and another where it is raised by around 3.2 inches to provide room for a soundbar. The TV’s speaker hardware prevents the smaller versions from allowing you to put the feet centrally; however, the 77-inch A95L introduces a third stand position that does just that.

Review of the Sony Bravia XR A95L: Ports

The TV’s power wire protrudes from its right side. The remaining ports are all to the left. A coaxial cable connection, IR and RS-232C jacks, an Ethernet port, a jack that can be used as both an S-Center speaker in and a digital audio out, a Power button, a far-field microphone switch, two USB ports, two center speaker in leads, and, of course, HDMI connectors are some of these.

There are four of them, however only two (the third and fourth, the former of which also has eARC support) may use higher-bandwidth capabilities like Auto Low-Latency Mode (ALLM), Variable Refresh Rate (VRR), and 4K at 120Hz thanks to the support of the HDMI 2.1 standard. While having a lot of ports is a wonderful thing and even necessary to maximize your gaming experience, Sony’s two ports seem a little meager compared to LG and Samsung’s high-end TVs. It would be convenient to have other choices, even if not many devices can use HDMI 2.1.

Review of the Sony Bravia XR A95L: Performance

By itself, QD-OLED TVs already bring together the finest aspects of modern display technology: OLED for flawless blacks and infinite contrast and quantum dots for brilliant colors and increased brightness. Furthermore, Sony says that the Cognitive Processor XR further improves image quality by enabling and executing a number of additional functionalities. After using the A95L for a while, I have to say it was an absolute success.

The A95L’s image quality is consistently exquisite across all content types, not just excellent. It’s difficult to express ideas without coming out as mindless rhapsodizing, yet that’s exactly what this TV reduces you to. Let’s simply go over the list instead. The brilliant interplay of scenes with all black on black (as in The Batman), where each visual element is quickly and completely recognizable? Verify. Like in Denis Villeneuve’s Dune, piercing, dark outlines are placed against stronger, brighter backgrounds, and every character seems very natural? Verify.

Spectral-shattering animation sequences that rely on a small number of essential colors, where every little variation has the greatest possible dramatic effect? Stunning bursts of hundreds of hues at once, working in perfect unison, so brilliantly rendered that they excite you without being overpowering? Conventional movies that merge Earth tones and skin tones against either grayscale cityscapes or lush, natural countryside, seeming so authentic that one might mistakenly believe the screen had turned into a window? Super Mario Bros. appears in Avatar: The Way of Water. Check, check, and double check the movie, as well as Top Gun: Maverick and Mission: Impossible—Dead Reckoning Part Two, in that order.

The A95L excels with content, regardless of how thrillingly dramatic or ordinary it may be. It achieves this at every angle of view and with all main types of high definition (HDR10, HLG, Dolby Vision) with the exception of HDR10+.

Review of the Sony Bravia XR A95L: Lab test findings

We usually undertake technical testing in addition to our qualitative evaluations of TVs. We used the Calman TV calibration software from Portrait Displays, an X-Rite i1 Pro spectrophotometer, and a SpectraCal VideoForge Pro pattern generator. These showed that the A95L’s colors are somewhat less accurate than those of its nearest rivals, the LG G3 and Samsung S95C, since its Delta-E, which measures the difference between a color at its source and as presented on the screen, is greater. Even while I believe you won’t notice the difference when viewing in person (for reasons we’ll discuss soon), it does exist.

Not merely the Rec was covered in full by the Sony A95L. Any OLED would provide a color spectrum of 709 (SDR), and the UHDA-P3 (HDR) color gamut was flawless. That and the A95K from the previous generation are tied for the greatest sub-100% value to date. The larger Rec. is covered by the A95L. 2020 color gamut, but it achieved an impressive performance there as well—89.41%, behind the A95K by only three hundredths of a point.

It’s different with brightness. The brightness of the A95L with HDR content is around 11% less than that of the LG G3 and Samsung S95C, which we usually test at 1,215 nits on 10% of the screen. That being said, the A95L is capable of reaching the same 1,300-nit range in other settings. However, the brightness completely craters while using SDR. Although this seems quite undesirable at first glance, we now know why.

We usually test TVs either in Filmmaker Mode—an industry-standard set of settings intended to replicate the theater experience as precisely as possible with an image that seems almost calibrated right out of the box—or in the closest setting the TV provides. The most accurate mode on the A95L is called Professional by Sony; it is comparable to Filmmaker but made to match the specs of the BVM-HX310 Professional Master Monitor, a piece of high-end gear meant to deliver perfect color fidelity and full-screen HDR brightness, with starting prices of about $25,000.

To put it another way, Sony plans for the A95L to be generally darker in Professional mode, which accounts for our HDR and SDR findings (the latter coming in at 112 nits, the lowest of any major TV we’ve seen in the previous two years). Not all bad, though; you can always activate the built-in environmental adjustment features or switch to, say, Standard or Cinema modes, which we measured as much brighter (273 and 315 nits, respectively), but have less accurate and oversaturated SDR colors. It balances the picture differently, somewhat offsetting the lower color accuracy. It’s only one consideration you should make if you want to purchase the A95L.

Review of the Sony Bravia XR A95L audio

Higher-end Sony models have been cited as benchmarks for TV audio quality in recent years. These turn the screen into a speaker by using a technique known as Acoustic Surface Audio+, which creates the illusion that the sound is coming directly from that area of the image. This technology is also used by the A95L, which sounds just as fantastic as its predecessors.

The A95L offers TV audio hitherto unheard of clarity, whether it is on intensely pounding bass recordings (like The Knife’s “Silent Shout”) or more treble-focused extravaganzas (like the soprano test track I use that crests to a high B-flat). Even though this set may not be as loud as others (a clear downgrade from the thunderous Hisense UX), it still produces sound that fills a room and has a crystalline quality that is far superior to any other standard TV audio technology, whether you’re listening to music or watching a film with a densely layered soundtrack. With this technology and compatibility for Dolby Atmos, viewing TV can now be enhanced by listening to it, which is really unusual. It’s highly commendable when a picture looks as fantastic as the A95L’s.

Nevertheless, you can enhance the A95L with an additional speaker, like one of our top soundbars (Sony offers many models at varying price points). However, you won’t feel let down by the TV’s audio quality unless you’re setting up a true home theater.

Review of the Sony Bravia XR A95L: Gaming

Input latency is one of the A95L’s major performance letdowns. We measured 16.1 ms with our Leo Bodnar 4K Input Lag tester. Although it is significantly beyond what we’ve observed from rival sets like LG and Samsung (which easily reach below 10ms), it is still below our basic 20ms standard, making it acceptable. Although this is a typical occurrence with Sony TVs, it’s still a regrettable glitch on a screen that normally captures so many details so well.

Nevertheless, games look fantastic on the A95L as expected (both Starfield and Assassin’s Creed Valhalla wowed us), and there are plenty of gaming accessories available. Connecting a PS5 enables you to access two Perfect for PlayStation 5 features, in addition to 4K120Hz, VRR, and ALLM (all provided by the two HDMI 2.1 ports): Auto HDR Tone Mapping, which automatically optimizes the PS5’s HDR settings, and Auto Genre Picture Mode, which automatically switches picture modes to maximize game performance and visual quality.

When the TV is in game mode, you may access a new range of gaming features and technical details about the image by pressing the Menu button on the remote control. These include Dolby Vision Game, VRR, motion blur reduction, black equalization, and crosshair (which places one in the middle of the screen to aid with aim) as of this writing in early November 2023.

Future firmware upgrades are intended to provide two more functions that might be quite attractive. One specific to the A95L is MultiView, which lets you view videos on one side of the screen and play games on the other (with certain restrictions). With the second, you may make your game window smaller so that it more closely resembles a computer display. We can’t wait to use these features when they become accessible.

Review of the Sony Bravia XR A95L: clever features

One of the best smart TV interfaces available is still Google TV. It made perfect sense to combine the capabilities of Google Search with a TV; there wasn’t a better way to do it. It might expose intriguing content you would discover elsewhere by drawing on your searches and preferences on other devices, such your computer and phone. Because of this, Google TV’s suggestions are quite excellent and almost always consist of foods I would like to sit down and devour.

The very clear UI includes a top navigation bar that enables you to quickly access live TV, a sizable app store, your “library” (a collection of information sourced from all over the Internet), and, rather self-indulgently, a list of Sony’s own branded content. Otherwise, you can simply navigate through a carousel of new options, top picks for you, your collection of apps, content you’re currently watching, and several other carefully curated lists of items you might want to see on the main For You page. All of these lists are relevant in a way that’s nearly unprecedented for TV recommendations.

Even while it’s unlikely that you’ll run out of content this way, you can stream content via Chromecast or Apple AirPlay and see over-the-air 4K broadcasts with an embedded ATSC 3.0 tuner. Apart from using the far-field microphone on the TV or the remote control to activate Google Assistant, further smart home integration options include Apple HomeKit and Amazon Alexa.

Naturally, Sony doesn’t stop there. Bravia Core, a proprietary streaming service that offers high-bitrate versions of its own licensed films and TV series, is included first. If you enjoy what’s offered, the A95L contains credits to buy 10, which is a wonderful extra. others are free, and others need payment. Gran Turismo and Spider-Man: Across the Spider were two popular recent releases during our review period, but they were the exceptions rather than the norm. There aren’t many big, exciting titles available for Bravia Core. It’s whipped cream on an ice cream sundae, but it’s not very noteworthy on its own.

Regarding the Bravia Cam, the same might be said. Although it is included with the A95L, you may purchase this device separately for use with other Sony TVs for $199.99. It is a camera, as its name implies, that plugs into a port on the top back of the TV to enhance the viewing experience. Video conferencing is one option. However, it serves as the centerpiece for Sony’s environmental adjustment features. The Bravia cam adjusts the picture and sound in real time to ensure that everyone is viewing the TV at their best by analyzing your unique viewing environment, including the amount of light, the number of people in the room, and where they are sitting.

Though it’s still not the same as a complete calibration for your particular viewing position and tastes, these functions are fortunately simple to switch on and off via the settings. All things considered, it’s a great alternative that manages this concept better than most other TVs you can purchase. The Bravia Cam also has new features like gesture controls, which allow you to do basic TV operations by just waving your hands in front of the camera, and a proximity sensor, which lets your kids know when they approach too near to the screen. (To help you get the hang of this, there is an integrated training system.)

My opinions of the Bravia Cam are almost same as when I tried it with the A95K: it’s entertaining but unimportant, and the gesture controls still need improvement before they can really transform the game. All this said, it’s clear where TV is headed, and it’s exciting to be leading the way.

Remote for Sony Bravia XR A95L

The Sony Premium Remote that comes with the A95L goes above and beyond even the company’s previous generation of remote controls, which was designed to be smaller and sleeker to better fit Sony TVs. In contrast to the conventional black model, this one has a sleek, brushed-metal top panel and complete backlighting, which ensures optimal visibility of all buttons under all lighting circumstances.

This version of the remote has two major additions: two shortcut buttons. The first is for YouTube, which is a welcome comeback, and the other is for Crunchyroll, an anime-focused streaming service. The other shortcut buttons are for Bravia Core, Netflix, Disney+, and Amazon Prime Video.

Other than that, it’s a pretty standard remote with a neat collection of well-organized buttons—including one for instantaneously establishing a connection with Google Assistant—but isn’t too neat. I’m still not quite persuaded that the TV needs three buttons to bring up menus: a Gear button to change all the TV’s settings, a button called “Menu” that opens a context-sensitive list of choices, and a button with a wrench to access the fast settings. It might be a bit perplexing at first, but you’ll get accustomed to it eventually.

Conclusion: Sony Bravia XR A95L

There’s no denying that the Sony Bravia A95L is an excellent TV, combining excellent image and sound quality with an amazing Google TV interface and a plethora of additional fun and practical features. The A95L comes with a lot more features than other TVs, all neatly packed.

Having said that, picking faults is easy. Not everyone will find the Professional mode’s approach to brightness to be pleasing. More accuracy in the colors would be nice. A pair of HDMI 2.1 ports is a little sparse. Additionally, input latency is rather considerable.

However, the A95L’s remarkable handling of HDR color and its apparently endless supply of useful features and extras guarantee that it ranks among the best TVs of this generation, along with the LG G3 and the Samsung S95C. Depending on what you want from a TV and what you may be prepared to give up to acquire it, you can decide whether it should be your top option. All things considered, if you’re looking for a high-end OLED TV, the Sony A95L is a true winner and deserves your consideration.

Pros