Over the past several years, companies like Vizio and TCL have pioneered making that tech accessible to the masses, and with it the associated leaps in color accuracy and contrast. Today, any quality TV that’s over $500 and 55 inches has both. In 2021, we could all have (maybe) enjoyed that heinously dark Game of Thrones episode, before David and David ran the series into a wall.
Vizio’s local dimming processing has always been some of the best. Even the 90 zones on our 65-inch review model always seemed to react perfectly to what was occurring onscreen.
The M-Series Quantum also includes variable refresh rate (VRR) for gaming, which allows the TV to sync up better with game consoles and PC graphics cards (AMD Freesync is also supported). It doesn’t harness the full 120 frames per second, like the Xbox Series X or PlayStation 5, but it does give you a smooth 60 frames per second. That's pretty good!
The M-Series also isn’t as bright as some other LED models, but it still supports contrast and color standards with HDR10 and Dolby Vision. The colors aren't as vivid as the TCL 6-Series, but the TV did highlight the bright Ferrari Red onscreen during Netflix’s Formula One: Drive To Survive.
The colors also seemed accurate, especially in the TV's Calibrated mode, which is where I’d keep it in all viewing environments except for gaming. A lot of TVs don't always look ideal right out of the box, but Vizio did a great job.
Looks Like a TV
Physically, there’s not much to talk about. The M-Series Quantum has slim, black bezels and is just a couple inches thick. Like most of Vizio’s modern models, it has sleek pedestal feet that stick out to the edge of the TV, which means you’ll want to either wall-mount it or make sure that your TV console is beefy enough.
I actually like that the M-Series doesn’t feel as thin as some other modern TVs. In my opinion, the only time you notice a TV's thickness is when you're mounting it. I like being able to get a good grip on the sides of the M-Series.
The remote is equally utilitarian, a rounded candy bar with easy shortcuts to Netflix, Amazon Prime Video, Redbox, and two other services you’ll probably never use. Like many remotes, it has more buttons than it needs. Conveniently, of the TV's four HDMI ports, one is an HDMI eARC port, where I plugged in a Vizio Elevate soundbar. That makes the TV's controller instantly capable of adjusting the volume, so you don't need a remote for your sound system.
Vizio’s Smartcast interface has grown into a pretty great ecosystem over recent years, thanks in large part to wide integration with Google Chromecast and Apple Airplay. Everything you can’t find in Vizio’s app store you can nearly always cast to the TV from an app or browser using these systems.
