To help us provide you with free impartial advice, we may earn a commission if you buy through links on our site. Learn more
- Gorgeous black levels, contrast and colour
- Excellent gaming support
- Good value for what’s on offer
- Smaller screen sizes aren’t as bright
- Sound quality could be better
- No HDR10+ support
Thanks to a mix of LG’s well-established OLED picture quality and relatively aggressive pricing, LG’s mid-range C series of TVs have gradually attained classic, almost cult TV status over the years.
Recently, though, the C series situation has started to get a bit more complicated thanks to sudden surges in the picture quality being achieved by LG’s step up G series models. So does 2025’s C5 LG OLED series still have the power to excite AV fans as much as its predecessors used to?
LG OLED C5 TV review: Key Specifications
| Screen sizes available | 42in, 48in, 55in, 65in, 77in, and 83in |
| Panel type | OLED EX |
| Resolution | 3,840 x 2,160 |
| Refresh rates | Up to 144Hz for gaming |
| HDR Formats | HDR10, HLG, Dolby Vision |
| Audio Enhancement | AI Sound Pro, Dolby Atmos playback, virtual 11.1.2 upmix |
| HDMI Inputs | 4 (all fully featured v2.1 ports) |
| Freeview Play compatibility | Yes |
| Tuners | Terrestrial Freeview HD |
| Gaming Features | Variable refresh rates including in AMD Freesync and NVidia G-Sync form, 4K/120Hz and 144Hz support, fast-response Game mode with even faster Boost mode (giving 12.8ms and 9.2ms of lag respectively in 60Hz); Dark area brightness enhancement; superimposed crosshair |
| Wireless connectivity | Bluetooth 5.3, WiSA, Wi-Fi 6E, Apple Airplay2, built-in Google Cast, |
| Smart Assistants | Built-in Alexa, Built in ThinQ voice control, works with Apple Home, works with Hey Google, AI Concierge |
| Smart platform | webOS 25 |
What you need to know
The LG OLED C5 series sit squarely in the middle of LG’s mainstream 2025 OLED TV range, below the G5 series and above the entry level B5s. LG also sells much more expensive M5 wireless and Signature T “transparent” OLED models, but the prices attached to these mean they’re very much not mainstream.
The C5’s mid-range status means it gets LG’s mid-range EVO OLED panels, so it doesn’t benefit from the new Primary RGB Tandem OLED technology that’s busy rewriting the OLED picture quality rule book in the G5 series right now. There is a brightness enhancement over the basic OLED panels used in LG’s B5 models, however.
One key point to understand before we go any further, though, is that not all screen sizes in the C5 range are equal. While the screen sizes from 55in and up get LG’s Brightness Booster technology, the 42in and 48in sizes (reviewed and tested in this review) do not. The smaller sizes do have the same Alpha 9 Gen 8 processor used in the bigger models, however, and still squeeze in native 4K OLED resolution.
Price and competition
LG has been quite aggressive with its C series OLED pricing this year. At the time of writing, the 42in model costs £1,399, the 48in is £1,499, the 55in £1,899, the 65-inch £2,699, the 77in £3,799 and the 83in £5,999.
If you want to step up to LG’s G5 range, with its spectacular Primary RGB tandem technology and more powerful, feature-rich Alpha 11 Gen 2 processor, you will be looking at £1,799 for the 48in model, £2,399 for the 55in, £3,299 for the 65in, £4,499 for the 77in and £6,999 for the 83in. Note that the 48in G5 does still get the new Primary RGB Tandem technology but will again not get as bright as the bigger models.
The closest rivals for the LG C5 is Samsung’s S90F series. These OLED TVs are priced almost exactly the same for each size, and all of them in the UK, apart from the 65in model actually uses the same WRGB panel technology as the LG C5 instead of Samsung’s own QD OLED.
Design, Connections and Control
The LG OLED C5 sets are strikingly handsome TVs. The ultra-narrow, crisply finished frame around the screen creates a sleek and premium firstimpression that’s enhanced by the way the edges of the screen only stick out a handful of millimetres round the back. Only if you look at the C5 from an extreme angle can you see that there’s a chunk of its rear that sticks out much further than the rest, to accommodate speakers, connections and processing components.
The slim part of the rear is adorned in an unusual and attractive marbled stone effect, while the chunky section has a highly brushed finish that both contrasts nicely with the stone effect and handily disguises the fact that this section is actually made from plastic.
The screen sits low on a centrally mounted, metal-effect stand that further ramps up the sense of opulence, as well as helpfully allowing you to set the TV on quite narrow pieces of furniture.
The OLED48C5’s connections are excellent. In particular, all four of its HDMI ports support the full array of HDMI 2.1 gaming features, including variable refresh rates and 4K at high frame rates. I’ll cover this more in the gaming section.
The HDMI inputs are joined by an optical digital audio output, a headphone/line out, an Ethernet port, terrestrial antenna and satellite LNB inputs, an IR blaster line in, and three USB sockets.
The C5s ship with one of LG’s classic Magic Remote handsets, where the Magic bit comes from the way you can point it, wand-like at the part of the screen containing the option you want to select. This is backed up by a spinning ball at the heart of the remote that lets you scroll quickly up and down the TVs’ onscreen menus.
The latest Magic remote adds a trio of new buttons. The Accessibility button provides direct access to the TV’s extensive suite of features for people with sight or hearing issues. The Home Hub button calls up an onscreen ‘map’ for monitoring and accessing all your connected devices, both wired and wireless. And if you hold it down you get a more standard TV input selection menu.
A new AI button, finally, calls up a handy, compact list of recommended content links at first press, and a guide to issuing voice commands to your TV if you press it again. Hold it down and you activate the TV’s voice recognition system.
Smart TV Platform
The LG C5 is powered by LG’s webOS platform. WebOS 25 can run a touch sluggishly at times, especially in the first moments after powering the TV up, and I sometimes miss the extreme simplicity of the much more compact super-imposed smart menus webOS used to use. Pretty much every brand has now moved to a full-screen smart interface now, though, to try and cope better with the ever-growing mountains of content sources available these days, and LG’s voice control shortcuts work well.
I’m also a fan of LG’s second generation AI Chatbot system, where you can interrogate a built-in AI assistant about everything from potential faults with your TV to the best settings to use to improve aspects of the picture or sound.
WebOS remains impressively customisable, too, and there are now more lifestyle features than ever, including a boost in screen saver choices and a dedicated gaming hub that brings together all your connected and streamed gaming sources.
Image Quality
All LG C5 TVs, regardless of their size, look exquisite with standard dynamic range (SDR) sources. Seriously, there’s pretty much nothing negative to say about them.
The brilliance starts with the stellar black level response that self-emissive OLED screens are renowned for. Dark SDR scenes across all of the C5s’ many picture presets enjoy black and dark colours that are essentially perfect in terms of both the depth they achieve, and their freedom from the sort of near-black instability and noise that was once a common OLED issue.
Even the darkest shots and scenes contain plenty of shadow detail. Yet at the same time the C5s don’t accidentally bring out more dark area detailing than you’re supposed to see, like some rivals can, especially standard LCD TVs.
Colours with SDR content are gorgeous, too. Tones look beautifully rich and vibrant by SDR standards, especially in the TV’s Standard and Vivid modes, yet the richness is joined by what feels like almost infinitely subtle tonal blends and shifts, even in the brightest and darkest areas. This provides a reminder in these HDR-obsessed times of just how much nuance and, for want of a better word, beauty that can be extracted from the relatively limited light and colour range of SDR material.
Naturally, the LG C5 TVs look their best with native 4K SDR content. In fact, 4K sources look pristine with almost all picture presets; only the Filmmaker Mode leaves things looking a touch softer than I’d have liked. Even then, this feels like a deliberate representation of how SDR content is considered to have been designed to look.
The LG C5’s new processor earns its corn in spectacular fashion, with HD and even SD sources, upscaling them to the screen’s native resolution with a combination of authority, clarity, and colour consistency that’s not only the best I’ve seen from a C series TV, but lifts LG right up there with the very best upscaling brands around.
Even in their most aggressive picture presets, the C5s don’t inject as much brightness into SDR content as LG’s G5, Samsung’s S95F and many LCD TVs. I didn’t mind this at all, though, as it actually leads to all presets bar Vivid mode delivering SDR images that are full of nuance and never feel too far removed from their original ‘as the director intended’ look.
It comes as zero surprise after all of the above to find the LG C5 hitting extreme levels of colour accuracy in Filmmaker Mode. Tests using our resident Portrait Displays test rig of Calman Ultimate software, G1 signal generator and C6 HDR5000 colorimeter right out of the box, with no calibration required, the C5 Filmmaker Mode delivered exceptional Delta E 2000 error numbers.
Tests in the Gamut, Colorchecker, Saturation Sweep and Luminance Sweep test returned average 2.9, 2.4, 2.3 and 2.1 errors respectively, where any figure lower than 3 can be considered imperceptible to the human eye. The LG C5 covers 99.9% of the Rec 709 colour gamut, too, as well as 98.9% of the sRGB range.
Two-point and multi-point greyscale tests reveal slightly higher numbers of 4.2 and 4.9, but that’s still a degree of error that only a trained professional might be expected to spot with real world content.
HDR Image quality
Things get a little more complicated with the C5 series HDR performance, with one or two issues creeping into at least some presets, and the different specifications of different C5 screen sizes also coming into play.
Let’s start with the good news, though. Which is that, for the most part, the extra brightness and light range associated with HDR content is delivered without compromising the rich black levels that are arguably the C5 OLED TVs’ single most appealing feature.
Colours generally look stellar on the C5s with HDR, too. In fact, HDR’s expanded colour gamut and volumes make much more comprehensive use of the screens’ innate colour capabilities, unlocking an excellent, measured 98.78% of the UHD-P3 colour spectrum and a strong 77.4% of the wider BT.2020 colour spectrum in Filmmaker Mode. These figures only drop by a fraction of a per cent in Standard mode.
The C5 hits these impressive colour extremes without becoming cartoonish, either. In fact, the pixel by pixel light control of the OLED panel together with improved processing contributions from the latest Alpha 9 Gen 8 system, helps HDR colours enjoy even more tonal subtleties and refinement than you get with SDR sources.
Even better for home cinephiles, in Filmmaker Mode the LG C5 hit Delta E 2000 average errors with our Calman Ultimate ColorMatch and ColorChecker tests of just 2.4 and 2.21 –a truly outstanding result for such an affordable OLED TV. And these are pre-calibration, out of the box results, too.
Greyscale tests to monitor how accurately the C5 can handle HDR’s expanded light range yield equally excellent results in Filmmaker Mode. The TV’s EOTF curve lies almost exactly over that of the industry standard, while DeltaE 2000 average errors are just 3.75. Greyscale errors are less likely to be noticeable to the human eye in HDR on the LG C5 than they are in SDR.
And it’s clear with both full-screen bright HDR content and small peak bright highlights that the C5 as a whole is a handy bit brighter than the previous C4s. Not nearly up there with the G5s, but enough to make the C5 more of an upgrade over the C4s than the C4s were over the C3s.
The only fly in the ointment here is the fact that the 48in C5 isn’t as bright as the bigger models. This is obvious from a subjective range overview, and backed up by measurements that find the 55in and 65in C5 models hitting brightness peaks of essentially 1,300 nits, while the 48in OLED48C5 tops out at around 770 nits in Filmmaker Mode and a bit less in Standard.
That’s an appreciable brightness difference, and one that, for me, makes a full mark of difference to the final score I can give to the OLED48C5 (and OLED42C5 by extension). Especially as, on the evidence of the 48in model’s performance, the relative lack of brightness appears to cause one or two knock on issues too.
In its Standard preset, for instance, every now and then a very dark HDR sequence can exhibit floating blacks – where shifts in the screen’s baseline brightness can cause the usually impeccable black levels to briefly turn grey.
A green tone can occasionally sneak into very dark scenes in the Filmmaker Mode and, less often, Standard picture presets, too. And when it turns up, this green undertone can actually reveal a bit of excess noise in dark areas that contain lots of fine detail.
Some colour tones in dark scenes in Filmmaker Mode can occasionally look a little coarse, too, on the smaller C5 TVs, although happily this issue largely disappears in the brighter Standard, Cinema and Cinema Home modes.
I need to stress as I wrap this section up that the 48in OLED C5 I focussed my tests on still serves up lovely images the vast majority of the time. But they just haven’t kept up with Joneses – including its own larger range siblings – as well this year as I’d have liked.
Gaming
The LG C5 OLEDs are pretty much exemplary gaming displays. This starts with their ability to handle pretty much all the goodies PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X and high-end PC owners are looking for now, including variable refresh rates (in both the AMD FreeSync and NVIDIA G-Sync formats), auto game mode switching, and support for 4K/120Hz refresh rates.
In fact, the LG C5 TVs can all push up to 144Hz with sufficiently powerful PCs. This isn’t quite up there with the 165Hz support of LG’s G5 OLEDs, but it’s an excellent effort for such affordable OLED sets. It’s worth remembering, too, that these features are available across all four HDMI inputs.
The black levels, rich colours and pixel-level light and colour control that serves the C5 so well with video sources pay off at least as well with video game sources, too, delivering images of phenomenal precision and vibrancy. They’re exceptionally responsive, too, with the screen taking just 12.8ms to render 60Hz images in the TVs’ regular Game mode, or 9.2ms if you activate the available Boost mode.
The 48in and 42in C5s may not be as bright for gaming as the bigger C5 screens, but they’re still outstanding by the standards of the wider small-screen TV world.
Sound Quality
How good the LG C5 sounds depends substantially on whether you’re using the TV’s AI Sound Pro feature or not.
If you don’t use it, the C5s can sound really quite disappointing. In particular, Dolby Atmos tracks appear too quiet and trapped inside the TV, even at high volume settings. Low frequency effects tend to sound rather soupy and unclear, too, and deep bass rumbles can sound as if they’re on the brink of collapsing into major distortions, while treble details lack clarity and weight. This can all leave film soundtracks feeling a bit distant and uninvolving.
Enable the feature, however, and almost immediately the sound pushes away from the TV, creating a much bigger and more immersive sound stage. Treble details in that bigger soundstage have more clarity and potency, and volume levels increase exponentially. Perhaps best of all, the entire dynamic range of the sound expands, giving every element in a soundtrack more room to breathe. This includes low frequency sounds, which are delivered with significantly more impact and weight.
Even the AI Sound Pro mode can’t completely disguise a lack of core power and dynamic range in the LG C5’s sound system compared with the very best-sounding TVs out there. But in AI Sound Pro it at least gets the job done without making you immediately reach for the nearest soundbar.
LG OLED C5 TV review: Verdict
LG’s latest C5 range delivers a good step forward over its popular predecessors, with new processing and increased brightness, unlocking even more of LG’s legendary mid-range OLED quality.
Based on my experience with the 48in model, though, things do become a little complicated with the two smallest C5 TVs. An increasingly noticeable lack of brightness relative to their bigger siblings, together with one or two seemingly related issues mean we can’t quite arrive at the full 5/5 overall score that LG OLED TVs usually warrant.
