LG G1 OLED TV Review

The LG G1 has a premium design meant to sit flush against the wall using the dedicated slim wall mount. The back looks a bit more robust than the LG C1 OLED, but that's just part of the design. It has thin borders with tapered edges that look like they retreat into a wall.

The LG G1 doesn't come with a stand unless you buy one separately; we used the same one we did for the LG GX OLED, so we don't know if the ones you can purchase with the G1 are the same. There's also a tripod Gallery Stand that you can purchase. The dedicated slim wall mount is pictured above, and you can see it from a wider angle here. However, we didn't test how to set it up. The feet raise the screen 2.9 inches off the table, but there are 2.2 inches between the table and the bottom of the IR receiver, meaning a soundbar may block it, so it may be harder for the remote to work. Regardless, the TV isn't meant to be used in this configuration.

Footprint of the 65" TV: 54.3" x 10.7".

Note: If you buy the feet separately, you also get the input covers.

The back of the LG G1 looks similar to the LG GX OLED. There are clips for cable management to keep your setup clean, and if you use the legs, you can route wires through them too.

Note: Unlike the LG GX, we don't have input covers with this TV because they come with the feet if you buy them separately. We used the same feet as the GX and didn't use the input covers. This is meant to hide the inputs if you place the TV on a table.

The LG G1 is extremely thin and will sit flush against a wall when mounted.

The LG G1's build quality is outstanding. It's made mainly out of metal with a bit of plastic on the vents on top. It's extremely sturdy throughout, except there's a bit of flex on the back near the VESA holes. Overall, it's very solid, and you shouldn't experience any issues with it.

Like any OLED, the LG G1 can turn off individual pixels, resulting in a near-infinite contrast ratio. Blacks are extremely deep and inky.

The LG G1 has okay peak brightness. Despite having the new evo panel, it's actually about the same brightness as the LG C1 OLED. It may not be bright enough for a room with a ton of lights, but it should be fine for moderately-lit environments. Small highlights are the brightest, but larger areas get more dim due to the aggressive Automatic Brightness Limiter (ABL).

We tested the SDR brightness after calibration in the 'Expert (dark space, night)' Picture Mode with OLED Pixel Brightness at its max, Peak Brightness on 'High', and Color Temperature set to 'Warm 50'. If you want a slightly brighter image, set the Picture Mode to 'Standard', OLED Pixel Brightness and Contrast to their max, and Auto Dynamic Contrast and Peak Brightness on 'High'. However, we only reached 427 cd/m² in the 2% window using these settings, so it doesn't make the screen much brighter and results in a less accurate image.

We also measured the test windows without the Peak Brightness setting enabled:

• Peak 2% Window: 280 cd/m²
• Peak 10% Window: 277 cd/m²
• Peak 25% Window: 274 cd/m²
• Peak 50% Window: 270 cd/m²
• Peak 100% Window: 187 cd/m²
• Sustained 2% Window: 268 cd/m²
• Sustained 10% Window: 264 cd/m²
• Sustained 25% Window: 262 cd/m²
• Sustained 50% Window: 258 cd/m²
• Sustained 100% Window: 178 cd/m²

So the Peak Brightness setting results in a dimmer image, but there's a less aggressive ABL.

The LG G1 doesn't have a backlight, but thanks to its near-infinite contrast ratio, it's equivalent to a perfect local dimming feature. There's no blooming around bright objects in dark scenes, and bright white pixels are displayed perfectly even if they're surrounded by black pixels. We still film these videos on the TV, so you can see how it performs and compare it with a TV that has local dimming.

There's no difference in dark scene behavior between the calibrated picture modes and 'Game' mode.

The LG G1 has decent HDR peak brightness. This is where the evo panel provides an improvement from the LG GX OLED. Although it's one of the brightest OLEDs available, the replacement model, the LG G2 OLED, is even brighter. It gets bright enough to make small highlights stand out, but once again, it has an aggressive ABL, so large areas are dimmer. The EOTF follows the target curve pretty well until there's a sharp roll off at its peak brightness, but some dark scenes are slightly too dark.

We tested the HDR brightness in the 'Cinema' HDR Picture Mode with OLED Pixel Brightness, Contrast, and Peak Brightness all at their max settings, with Color Temperature at '50' and all other image processing disabled. By setting Auto Dynamic Contrast to 'High' and enabling Dynamic Tone Mapping, you can get a slightly brighter image, as seen in this EOTF.

Once again, we measured the HDR brightness with the Peak Brightness setting disabled. The screen is dimmer, but there's still some variation, so we suggest leaving it on:

• Peak 2% Window: 433 cd/m²
• Peak 10% Window: 430 cd/m²
• Peak 25% Window: 425 cd/m²
• Peak 50% Window: 280 cd/m²
• Peak 100% Window: 166 cd/m²
• Sustained 2% Window: 410 cd/m²
• Sustained 10% Window: 406 cd/m²
• Sustained 25% Window: 402 cd/m²
• Sustained 50% Window: 267 cd/m²
• Sustained 100% Window: 160 cd/m²

The LG G1's HDR brightness in Game Mode is okay. The real scene brightness is less than outside of Game Mode, but the visual difference is minimal. The EOTF is the same in Game Mode as outside of it.

We tested the brightness in the 'Game Optimizer' Picture Mode using the same settings as the regular HDR brightness test.

The LG G1 has excellent gray uniformity. There's minimal dirty screen effect in the center, and the entire screen looks uniform. Like other OLEDs, there are faint vertical lines in near-dark scenes, but you'll only notice them if you really look for them.

Note: A few owners have reported seeing a grid-like pattern on their TV in uniform scenes. It's usually not noticeable with real content, but this is a manufacturing defect; if you see it on yours, you should exchange it.

Since OLEDs can turn off individual pixels, the LG G1 has perfect black uniformity, and there's no blooming around bright objects.

The LG 65G1 has wide viewing angles, so the image remains accurate when viewing from the side, great for wide seating arrangements.

The reflection handling on the LG G1 is fantastic. Even direct sunlight doesn't result in too much glare, but there's a purple tint.

The accuracy before any sort of calibration is impressive on the LG G1. Most colors are only slightly inaccurate, and white balance is great. Color temperature is on the cold side, but it's still excellent. Gamma doesn't follow the 2.2 target very well, and most scenes are darker than they should be. It's a significant improvement over the LG C1 OLED, but this varies between units, so it's likely we got a bad panel with the C1.

The LG G1 has fantastic accuracy after calibration. There are almost no virtual color or white balance inaccuracies, and gamma is perfect. Color temperature also improved and it's nearly spot-on with our 6500K target.

You can see our recommended settings here.

The LG G1 doesn't have any issues upscaling lower-resolution content like from DVDs.

720p content, like from cable boxes, is upscaled well.

The LG LG G1 displays 1080p content nearly as good as 4k content.

4k content is displayed perfectly.

This is a 4k TV that can't display an 8k signal.

OLEDs like the LG G1 use four subpixels, and all four are never on at the same time. The picture above features green, red, and white pixels. You can see the other pixels here and here.

The LG G1 displays a very wide color gamut for HDR content. It has full coverage of the commonly-used DCI P3 color space, and coverage of the wider Rec. 2020 is also decent.

The color volume is decent, thanks to the wide color gamut. It displays dark colors very well because of the near-infinite contrast, but it has some trouble with really bright colors.

The gradient handling is great. It's a bit worse than other high-end TVs like the LG C1 OLED, and there's banding in darker colors, but it shouldn't be too noticeable in most content. Setting Smooth Gradation to 'Medium' or 'High' helps remove some of the banding in the test pattern and real content, but that comes at the cost of losing fine details.

There aren't any signs of temporary image retention, but this can vary between units. Also, this isn't indicative of the long-term burn-in that OLEDs may suffer.

Even though the LG G1 OLED is likely less prone to burn-in than older OLED panels, there's still a risk. OLED panel technology has significantly advanced since our real world burn-in test, which used 2017 models, so we don't really know just how likely it is that these TVs will experience burn-in. We'll be starting a new burn-in test shortly to try to determine how effective each of these new panel technologies are at reducing the risk of burn-in, so our estimated burn-in risk score may change.

Like any OLED, the LG G1 has a near-instant response time. Motion looks smooth with nearly no blur behind fast-moving objects.

The LG G1 OLED doesn't use Pulse Width Modulation to dim its backlight. The slight dip in brightness every 8ms corresponds to the 120Hz refresh rate.

There's an optional black frame insertion feature to help reduce any motion blur. You need to set OLED Motion Pro to 'High' for it to flicker at 60Hz, or 'Medium' or 'Low' for 120Hz flicker. Keep in mind that the BFI score is based on the flicker range and not the actual performance.

The LG G1 has a motion interpolation feature, also known as the 'Soap Opera Effect'. It can interpolate lower-frame rate content up to 120Hz. It looks good on our test pattern with only a bit of artifacting, but there are more noticeable artifacts in real content.

See here for the settings that control the motion interpolation feature.

Since the response time is near-instant, lower-frame rate content may stutter as each frame is held on longer. Enabling the motion interpolation feature can help.

The LG G1 automatically removes 24p judder from any source, and there aren't any settings needed for it, which is great for watching movies. However, there's judder when setting OLED Motion Pro to 'High', but it's judder-free on 'Low' or 'Medium'.

The LG G1 TV has a 120Hz panel with variable refresh rate (VRR) support to reduce screen tearing. It natively supports both HDMI Forum VRR and FreeSync and is G-SYNC compatible for those with NVIDIA graphics cards. You need to enable VRR & G-SYNC in the 'Game Optimizer' settings for HDMI Forum and G-SYNC to work, and as the name suggests, AMD FreeSync Premium for FreeSync.

Update 01/28/2022: We retested the input lag with the latest firmware (03.25.25). Most of our measurements are within the same ballpark as the original measurements, but the input lag outside of 'Game' mode increased significantly. The new results are more consistent with our other 2021 LG OLED reviews, like the LG C1 OLED.

The LG G1 has very low input lag as long as you're in the 'Game Optimizer' Picture Mode. LG introduced a new Prevent Input Delay setting that decreases the 60Hz input lag by about 3ms, but it doesn't affect 120Hz content. If you're going to use the TV as a PC monitor, make sure you're in Game Mode with the input label set to 'PC' for low input lag.

The TV doesn't have any issues displaying 4k content up to 120Hz. It also displays proper chroma 4:4:4 with any supported resolution to help deliver clear text when using it as a PC monitor. For it to do so, simply label the input you're using to 'PC' in the Home Dashboard. For full-bandwidth signals, set HDMI Deep Color to '4k'.

The LG G1 supports all common resolutions from either the PS5 or Xbox Series X. It has an Auto Low Latency Mode that automatically switches the TV into Game Mode when a game from a compatible device launches. After a firmware update (03.15.27), it supports 4k @ 120Hz gaming in Dolby Vision from the Xbox Series X, and FreeSync works too; without the update, you're limited to 4k @ 60Hz with Dolby Vision, and FreeSync doesn't work at the same time.

The LG G1 supports eARC, allowing it to send high-quality Dolby Atmos via TrueHD sound to a compatible receiver through a HDMI connection. To do so, set the HDMI Input Format to 'Bitstream', Digital Sound Output to 'Auto', and enable eARC Support in the Sound Settings.

The LG G1 has a good frequency response. Like the LG GX OLED, it produces more bass than most TVs, but you still need a dedicated subwoofer if you want the best bass possible. Other than that, it has a well-balanced sound profile and gets loud, so it's good for listening to dialogue even in noisy rooms.

The distortion handling is okay. There's some distortion at moderate listening levels, and it gets more noticeable at its max volume. However, it depends on the content, and not everyone may hear it.

The built-in webOS is easy-to-use, and it's redesigned for 2021 with a full home page instead of the banner in past years. We experienced some bugs where some settings weren't available until we enabled and disabled the Game Optimizer or VRR settings, but we don't expect this to be much of an issue for most people.

There are ads on the home page, and there's also a dedicated shop page for the advertised apps and products.

LG's app store has a wide selection, and the apps run smoothly.

The LG G1 comes with a redesigned Magic Remote has the same great features from the past model. You still get the point-and-press feature, like a computer mouse, and it has a mic for voice control. You can ask it to do different commands like open apps and search for content, but you can't ask it to change settings. Our remote has an NFC feature that allows you to tap your phone against the remote and cast content to the TV. However, we didn't get the NFC feature with the remote we received with the LG C1 OLED, so it's unclear which models come with it. If you have it, let us know; you'll know if it has it if there's the NFC logo on the glossy plastic.

There's a single bottom below the center of the LG G1 to control the inputs, volume, channels, and to power it On/Off.

• Remote (with 2x AA batteries)
• Slim wall-mount
• Wall mount screws (and other accessories)
• Mounting instructions
• User manuals
• IR blaster