The Philips 65OLED937 offers the best picture quality that Philips can deliver and impressive sound performance thanks to a sophisticated speaker bar from the renowned Bowers & Wilkins. That’s enough to grab the attention of any movie fan. But how good is that combination really?
Philips 65OLED937/12
Price: 3,499 euros
What: Ultra HD OLED TV
Screen size: 65 in (165 cm), flat
Connections: 4x HDMI (2x v2.1 48 Gbps, 2x v2.0 18 Gbps, ARC/eARC, ALLM, 4K120 HFR, VRR, AMD Freesync, NVIDIA GSync), 3x USB, 1x optical digital out, 1x headphones, subwoofer pre-out , 2x antenna, 1x Ethernet, Bluetooth
Extras: HDR10, HLG, Dolby Vision, HDR10+ Adaptive, Dolby Atmos, WiFi built-in, Android 11.0, DTS Play-Fi, USB/DLNA media player, DVB-T2/C/S2, CI+ slot, 6th Gen P5 AI Dual Picture Engine, four-sided Ambilight Plus
Dimensions: 1,444 x 929 x 268 mm (incl. foot)
Weight: 40.4 kg (incl. feet)
Consumption (average): SDR 112 (G) / HDR 108 watts (G)
10 Score 100 
- Pros
- New OLED panel with excellent brightness
- Beautiful HDR images, thanks to Advanced Tonemapping
- Excellent image processing, with smart light sensor
- Universal HDR support
- Superb audio performance, Dolby Atmos
- Four-sided Ambilight Plus
- HDMI 2.1 with all game features
- Rich Android TV environment and DTS Play-Fi
- Negatives
- Remote sometimes causes wrong keystrokes
- Only two HDMI 2.1 connections
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You can’t possibly say that the OLED937 looks ordinary. That is not due to the screen, it looks like we have known OLED screens for a long time. It is slim, with a fine metal edge, the word frame is out of place here. No, it is the large speaker bar that also serves as a foot that makes the device so remarkable.
This design is undoubtedly not for everyone. Those who really want a home cinema may swear by an AV receiver and speakers. But those who want to get as close as possible to cinema sound without extra devices should definitely put this Philips on their list. In any case, the finish is top notch.
The slim but sturdy chrome neck connects the device to the speaker bar. Philips provides two different versions of that neck in the box, one for wall mounting, and one for furniture installation.
New Ambilight
It goes without saying that Ambilight should not be missing on a top model. The four-sided version on the OLED937 is also the renewed Ambilight Plus. Each LED is controlled individually, on ordinary Ambilight this is controlled in a group. This allows Ambilight Plus to project a much more detailed glow onto the wall that more closely follows the action on the screen.
Ambilight not only spreads the atmosphere of the film over the entire wall, it is also a feature of which you have to discover the possibilities. You can use Ambilight as a bias light with a soft white glow, or as an atmospheric lamp. You can make it react to the music of your party. And thanks to Aurora, you can now put built-in atmospheric images on the screen, with Ambilight framing, so that the TV brightens up the room when you’re not watching TV.
Sparkling images with the latest OLED panel
Only the best is good enough for this topper, so Philips opted for the latest OLED-EX panel with heatsink. And the results do not disappoint. This TV achieves 843 nits peak brightness on a 10% window (and even 970 nits on a 2% window). Those numbers are good but don’t show a big gain. However, that changes if you look at the completely white field, there the OLED937 achieves a smooth 203 nits, and that is very good for an OLED panel, and for example 10% more than the 55OLED807.
The color range also scores excellent, but we see no significant improvement there, 97% P3 is excellent in any case. So expect good HDR images, you do not have to worry about the standard used, there is support for HDR10, HLG, HDR10 + and Dolby Vision.
The Filmmaker mode is well calibrated, both in SDR and HDR, with a lot of shadow detail and excellent white detail, and above all very accurate colors. If you want that last extra bit of accuracy and want to get your device to film studio reference level, you can have a calibration performed. The OLED937 supports automatic calibration with Portrait Displays’ Calman software.
Top image processing
The Philips OLED+ top models, recognizable by the 6th Gen P5 AI Dual Picture Engine, enjoy a number of exclusive advantages in the field of image processing. That means that you can already count on the good results that we already saw on the OLED807. A smart light sensor (Ambient Intelligence) that can adjust brightness, tone curve and color temperature, excellent upscaling, and good noise reduction.
As extras, the OLED937 offers AI-based sharpness that uses different settings within one image. In this way, he brings out extra detail, without the typical artifacts of too high a sharpness setting. The processor also eliminates one of the weaknesses of the OLED807, as it has a good anti-banding solution that does a good job of smoothing out color bands in soft gradients, without cutting out too much detail.
An extra special treatment for HDR
The image processor of the OLED937 also has an improved approach for HDR images, called ‘Advanced HDR Tonemapping’. In doing so, each frame of the video is fully analyzed and the processor determines how best to display that specific frame. So the tone curve can vary from frame to frame. That has several advantages. Dark and moderately bright scenes are not darkened. And in bright scenes, clipping of white detail is avoided.
The results of that approach can be seen. The Philips brings out a lot of color in clear images, it emphasizes light accents and preserves white nuances very well. Philips may need to refine the algorithm a bit, because once we also saw the white detail disappear, but we like to overlook that.
To really get the most out of the new OLED screen, you can also activate HDR Perfect. With this, the TV uses the light reserves it has in moderately bright scenes to make the image extra clear. That is a handy trick if you watch HDR in a lot of ambient light.
Bowers & Wilkins audio to enjoy
That speaker bar at the bottom of the TV is not only an eye-catcher, it is also an impressive audio solution. You recognize the Bowers & Wilkins signature ‘Tweeter-on-top’, which ensures crystal clear dialogue. In addition, the British manufacturer built on last year’s design, with three tweeters, four midrange speakers, a powerful woofer, and two upward-firing Dolby Atmos speakers. That was further expanded with two extra side-facing speakers.
Together good for a 5.1.2 system with 95 Watts of power, and a sound quality that actually makes us quiet. Because whatever you play, subtle soundtracks, powerful, epic film scores, but also hard metal or subdued voices, this speaker bar delivers great sound. Plus, it’s really capable of putting you right in the middle of the action with excellent surround and clear Atmos effect, with sound coming from above you.
Android TV and gamer fun
This Philips has four HDMI connections, two of which provide the full HDMI 2.1 48Gbps bandwidth and support for 4K120, ALLM and VRR (HDMI VRR, AMD Freesync and NVIDIA Gsync). The input lag of 21.7 ms in 4K60 and 11.0 ms in 2K120 is very good. Philips supplies ARC on all connections, but those who want eARC have to sacrifice one of the two HDMI 2.1 connections.
Philips will remain with the Android TV interface for the time being, but you may still make the step to Google TV with a next software update. The difference between the two decreases, and you get the widest range of apps on the market anyway. Those who want to incorporate the TV into a multi-room audio system can do so with DTS Play-Fi. Unfortunately, Philips does not provide Airplay 2 on its devices.
We recognize the remote control from the OLED807. It has a stylish appearance with illuminated keys and a Muirhead leather back that gives the remote a nice luxurious touch. Our only complaint is that the close-fitting keys are so completely flat that it’s easy for your thumb to wander off and hit a wrong key.
Conclusion
We already said it at the start of this review: the Philips 65OLED+937 is not for everyone. But, if you’re looking for a true home cinema, a device that delivers top image and sound quality, then this one should, perhaps, be at the top of your list. The combination of the new OLED panel and the Philips P5 AI Dual Picture Engine provides popping image quality with splashing light accents, lots of shadow nuances, and intense but natural colors.
The Bowers & Wilkins speaker bar puts many sound bars to the fore. Feel free to turn up the volume and immerse the room in music. No savings have been made on features either, from HDMI 2.1 to Android TV and of course Ambilight Plus, this TV has a lot of fun in store for you. All that beauty is contained in a sleek and luxuriously finished design. It’s not cheap, but it’s worth it.
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