Over the last few years, relative newcomers to the North American TV space, Hisense and TCL, have been developing affordable models that consistently outperform the budget TVs offered by bigger brands. TCL really impressed us with its 6-series, and now Hisense is catching up with the first genuine competition TCL's Editors' Choice televisions have faced. The Hisense H8F series shows incredible contrast and color range, along with powerful voice assistant and streaming features thanks to Android TV, all for a very reasonable price ($699.99 for the 65-inch 65H8F we tested). Some light bloom holds the H8F series back slightly from matching the more expensive TCL pixel-for-pixel, but it's still a fantastic budget option.
Design
The H8F looks striking, with an almost-bezel-less build reminiscent of LG's high-end LCD TVs. The screen dominates the design, with an edge-to-edge panel that incorporates a tiny 0.2-inch black border around the active part of the LCD. A matte gray metal shell runs along the edge of the sides and top of the screen, matching the back panel. A 0.7-inch glossy gunmetal bezel runs along the bottom edge, with a small infrared sensor protruding from the bottom left side and a silver Hisense logo in the center.
The TV rests on two V-shaped gunmetal legs, which feature a unique aspect for anyone with limited surface space—they can be mounted in either of two sets of holes on the bottom of the H8F. The two far holes give the TV a wide footprint of about 56 inches, meaning you'll need a table or stand at least that wide. The two holes closer to the center give the TV a footprint just 32 inches wide, requiring much less table space to stand. The two distances don't seem to affect stability, and using the narrower footprint the H8F felt secure in testing. Of course, you can also wall mount the TV if you wish.
Most connections sit on the left side of the back of the TV. Three HDMI ports, a USB 3.0 port, a USB 2.0 port, an antenna/cable connector, and an optical audio output face left. A fourth HDMI port (one more than the TCL 6-series), an Ethernet port, a composite video input, a 3.5mm audio output, and service ports face back. The power cable connects to a port facing right on the other side of the back panel of the TV. A single power/source button sits hidden under the infrared receiver on the left side of the bottom edge.
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While the H8F itself looks very striking and minimalist with metallic accents, its remote is much more basic and plain. It's a conventional black plastic wand covered in rubber buttons, with a direction pad in the center, a number pad above, and volume and channel rockers below. Dedicated service buttons for Google Play Movies & TV, Netflix, Vudu, and YouTube sit below the rockers and playback controls. A pinhole microphone lets you use Google Assistant with the Android TV interface, with a dedicated Google Assistant button between the volume and channel rockers. The remote connects over Bluetooth as well as infrared, so you don't need line of sight once it's paired.
An Android TV remote app lets you control the H8F with your phone. It's a simple and functional app that provides a navigation pad, a touchpad, and a keyboard for interacting with the TV. It also has a microphone button for accessing Google Assistant, though if you already have your phone in your hand, you'll more likely simply use the voice assistant there than through the TV.
Android TV
As mentioned, the H8F uses the Android TV interface, giving it a powerful selection of features out of the box. Google Assistant stands high on that list, accessible with the aforementioned button and pinhole microphone on the remote. The voice assistant can provide information like weather and sports scores, control smart home devices, and of course search for movies and TV shows to watch.
You can ask Google Assistant questions and give it commands more casually and with less concern for proper syntax than you need for Amazon's Alexa. It isn't hands-free here like it is on the Google Home Hub, the Lenovo Smart Display, or higher-end Sony models that also use Android TV, though; you need to press the button and speak into the remote. Because of that, you can't use two-way communication features like making calls with Google Duo.
Because it's an Android TV device, the H8F is compatible with Google Cast. You can stream media from Google Cast-compatible apps on your phone or tablet to the TV, just as if a Chromecast Ultra was connected to it. You can also send Chrome tabs from your computer to the TV, just as easily.
Android TV has a strong selection of streaming apps, including Crunchyroll, Google Play Movies & TV, HBO Now, Hulu, Netflix, Vudu, and YouTube for on-demand video; PlayStation Vue, Sling TV, and YouTube TV for cord-cutting live television; Google Play Music, Pandora, SiriusXM, Spotify, Tidal, and TuneIn for music; and a wide variety of network-, channel-, and interest-specific smaller apps as well. Amazon and Google still don't play nice together so there's no Prime Video or Amazon Music, and of course there are no Apple services, but it's still a strong selection of apps.
Performance
The Hisense H8F supports high dynamic range (HDR) video in HDR10 and Dolby Vision.
We test TVs with a Klein K-10A colorimeter, a Murideo SIX-G test pattern generator, and Portrait Displays' CalMAN software using methodology based on Imaging Science Foundation's calibration techniques. In HDR Theater mode, the H8F shows a peak brightness of 254.71cd/m2 with a full field test pattern and a remarkably bright 796.84cd/m2 with an 18-percent test pattern.
Using that same test pattern, the black part of the screen shows a very low 0.02cd/m2 black level, producing an effective contrast ratio of 39,842:1. This puts the H8F in the same impressive performance range as the TCL 6-series (497.15cd/m2 peak brightness and 0.01cd/m2 black level for a 49,715:1 contrast ratio). These contrast levels are rare across all LCD TVs, not just budget models, and to see two sub-$1,000 screens offer them is fantastic. The extreme contrast does produce some light bloom with pictures that have very bright sections next to very dark sections, and black levels reach up to 0.09cd/m2 near those borders, but it's still strong.
The above chart shows DCI-P3 color levels as boxes and the H8F's color levels as dots. Out of the box, in HDR Theater mode with the color temperature set to the warmest preset (which is perplexingly labeled Low, with cooler color temperatures labeled Medium, Medium/High, and High), the TV shows spot-on whites, blues, and cyans, with reds and greens coming close to but not quite hitting the mark. The H8F reached 91.6 percent of the DCI-P3 color space in our tests, which is in line with the company's promise of "greater than 90 percent DCI-P3." Only magentas are slightly skewed, running more red than they should.
The first H8F we received had two small, bruise-like dark patches on the screen. They didn't seem to interfere with most movies, shows, or games, though; any texture or pattern seemed to render the patches invisible, and they only appeared against very flat colors or consistent color gradations like on some menu screens. According to a statement from Hisense, this issue was caused by a packaging issue specific only to 65-inch models of the TV shipped before June that has since been corrected with redesigned packaging. Hisense sent us a replacement 65H8F with the new packaging, and the TV had no uniformity issues, so the issue appears to have been solved.
Viewing Experience
Unsurprisingly, BBC's Planet Earth II looks very good on the H8F, but its excellent contrast on paper doesn't quite come through in execution. In the "Islands" episode, the greens and blues of plants and water look saturated and natural. However, the light bleed between very bright and very dark parts of the screen is apparent when looking at the fine details of tree bark and sloth fur in the shade. In HDR Theater mode, the shadow details appear slightly washed out by default. Turning up the Active Contrast setting improves the details, but it often goes too far in the other direction and makes highlights appear slightly stark and harsh.
The burning lab fight in Deadpool surprisingly doesn't show this issue quite as much. The oranges and yellows of the flames look accurate and the fighters are generally well illuminated, and the shadow details don't appear nearly as washed out. However, very dark corners of the frame appear slightly muddy, with little detail coming through. In the rest of the movie, Deadpool's red costume looks balanced, and the other, more evenly lit scenes look natural.
The stark whites and blacks of the party scenes in The Great Gatsby are also represented nicely on the H8F. The TV seems to deal well with very dark sections of the frame against a handful of bright points of light, but shows less finesse with a few scant shadows against an otherwise bright frame. The cuts and contours of black and dark blue suits in the film come through clearly, even against the bright lights and white balloons of the scene. Skin tones also appear natural.
Input Lag
Input lag is the amount of time between when a TV receives a signal and the screen updates. In the Theater (Day) picture mode, the H8F shows an input lag of 57.9 milliseconds according to the Leo Bodnar lag tester. That's uncomfortably high, but using the Game picture mode drops that down to an excellent 15.1ms at the expense of some picture quality, putting the TV under the 20ms threshold we use to consider the best TVs for gaming.
The HDFury 4K Diva 18Gbps HDMI matrix, a new device with its own input lag tester, measured a very low 4.3ms lag in our tests. As we incorporate the Diva into our testing process, we will be monitoring the results from both lag testers to better identify and understand any discrepancies between them based on their hardware and methodology.
Impressive and Inexpensive
The Hisense H8F TV line is the first genuine competition TCL's 6-series has seen. It offers nearly as strong contrast performance as the 6-series, along with excellent color range and the myriad benefits offered by Android TV. It doesn't quite hit TCL's levels of quality in contrast and clarity due to some light bloom, but it still offers far more bang for your buck than most TVs we've seen in this price range.
If you want an excellent picture and you're really willing to splurge, LG's OLEDC8 series is our current Editors' Choice among high-end TVs for its superlative, OLED-driven contrast, and the Sony Master Series Z9F remains one of the brightest LCD TVs we've seen, and also features Android TV with the addition of hands-free Google Assistant.
Hisense's H8F line of TVs offer terrific contrast, color performance, and loads of Android TV features for a very reasonable price.
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