TCL S551G Reddit Verdict: Acceptable Budget TV, Barely

Goddamn that's a lot of TV for under $400. For reference, a 75" screen has nearly twice the area of a 55" screen.

There's a reason why it's under $400. I have a couple of TCL TVs and I wish I'd bought something better instead. They cut corners on the motherboard inside the TV, leading to a notably sluggish UI, and other issues like the TV refusing to turn on unless you unplug it then plug it back in. At least the old analog TVs turned on when you pressed the power button on the remote.

They are offering 3 year manufacturer warranty on this through Sam's Club at no additional cost. Also this TV does 120hz with VRR at 1440p.

There is a slight difference in the model number so I don't know if Best Buy will match. Just tried in Best Buy chat and was told member only deals are excluded from price match.

A lot of screen for that price, but keep in mind we're getting to 'holiday model' season with TVs. You'll start to see what looks like a good deal on a tv but there will be fewer HDMI inputs, sometimes lower quality panels, etc.

It's $75 cheaper than the next cheapest 75" and decently better than that as well, so it's pretty damn good deal if you just want a bigass TV.

For those who don't have a membership, I believe Best Buy will match prices. RTINGS rating of 7.2.

My Roku TCL just died last month after only 6 years of service. When it still worked it was just a mediocre experience. These are of course super budget TVs, but they still crank 4K HDR so we have no complaints.

Is this an unusually good deal? I'm heading out for work and I don't want to feel like a fool for ignoring this one and hoping that I'll be able to find a competitive deal in the weeks leading into black friday.

We have a 65" 6 series from 4 or 5 years ago that's great.

This looks to be a PFS phosphor panel, not quantum dot phosphor, so the color isn't as vibrant, and there's going to be a bit more motion blur edges on red. No local dimming, 6000:1 contrast. For the price, it's pretty decent.

Have a Black Friday Hisense from 3 years ago. Picture is still good, but that UI/processor really is awful. Slapped a Roku 4k box on it and it's been a good value ever since.

It's not a TCL thing - it's a budget TV thing. The quality control on these sets at this price point is not great from all manufacturers.

No it's different. the S551G is a 2024 model with no local dimming.

Best for $300 isn't a thing. It's a ridiculously low budget for a TV. Like going to buy a car and saying what's the best I can get for $3,000. The lowest level recc'd here is the TCL Q7 and that's like $500. Doesn't mean it's great or the best at anything, but it's the minimum to actually get something where you're not throwing your money away at junk.

This is likely dirty screen effect. TCL is kind of known for shipping panels like this. If it bothers you, return it for a refund and go with another brand, or try another panel and hope you get lucky.

I wanted another one for the bedroom and not knowing any better we got a 3rd TCL but this one has the google UI and it sucks so hard I'm on the verge of just putting it out on the street. It's virtually unusable. Random ads all over the place, slow slow slow. Have to unplug it and plug it back in again to get it to work.

I actually have a TCL 43 inch S551G, it's pretty good so far. I'm currently waiting for RTINGS to post the calibration settings but so far it's been good. It doesn't have local dimming but HDR is still pretty nice on here when gaming. HDR Movies look good too but it's obviously not the best. This TV does get very bright in dark rooms and is pretty good for well lit rooms too.

It's one of their cheapest 4k tvs. I would look at reviews of the S450g, it will be very similar and just a bit brighter. I would definitely look for deals on a 2023 Q series or Hisense u6k.

I just went through this a couple weeks ago, ended up getting the 551f because the spec sheet was just slightly better. If you go to TCL's official website you can go to their UHD tv section and filter by size to be able to directly compare each version. They have the 551G, 551F and a few others.

S551G refers to the Google platform it uses, I believe the F in the S551 refers to the OS it's using — the Amazon Fire TV. You'll see it in TCL's different models ending with G for Google, R for Roku, F for Fire TV.

I should clarify that this is supposed to be a black screen. It's showing along with this that the corner of the bezel is misaligned, so it's not giving a square image, and the screen is cut off a little bit. Honestly, this, along with the box itself having damage, I may just exchange it.

I'm mixed on this. I've seen many many TCLs with dead backlights. Far far more than any other brand. They have a crap kind of backlight edge lighting that burns out a lot. To repair this, you have to disassemble the panel, not just replace a board.

S5 the deal one at Sam's Club is better. The Sam's Club one has game mode with 120hz with VRR on.

IPS Panel, No local dimming, dim, no wide color gamut, 60hz. I don't need to own it to know it's not good.

The best settings are the ones you like the most, provided that the black is deep and the colors are not over-saturated. Many people make the mistake of going with the black as black as possible and then the image becomes quite lacking in dynamics.

I just got the 50 inch version of this TV for under $300, it won't give you that wow factor that a qled or OLED TV would but for the price I think it's good enough for just a decent 4k tv. Unless HDR quality is super important to you then this would be a fine choice for what you need.

I had to take back my 55" TCL S551G back to target because I wasn't able to turn it on. I did the power cycle, I tried different outlets the only thing I didn't do was the reset. But I returned it and got another one. And my new one (its a week old) started to not turn on. I unplugged it and left it off for a few minutes then tried turning it on and it worked, but my 1st one did that about 3 times and it just wouldn't turn on.

I mean it's not really normal, that is excessive, badly excessive. Return it and get a different TCL, go with the Q5 if you want a budget tv that doesn't do this at least not to this degree. My TV has one little dot that I can only see in certain situations but honestly I barely notice it at all.

I think the S551G is the same as the P755K here in the UK. My son has the 75" version which exhibits the same issue as you describe. You'll need to change to a model higher in the range if this bothers you unfortunately.

UI problem is real. Slow start and everything. Plug in an external cast like Chromecast, Firestick, Apple TV. I personally have Apple TV, was really big against spending so much money on it, but I can turn on my TV with my Apple TV and it works smoothly. Never went back to old UI.

I got this TV for $318 with a promo and I can say that the 75 inch has a great picture for the money. I just bought the S5 55inch too, but this TV sucks compared to the 75. No idea why.

Had a TCL when I was young, stopped working after a year, exactly when warranty is out for a week, then customer service refuse to do anything.

Not impressed with TCL to be honest. I have a Sony that's 15 years old that does better than a TCL 2 years old. I always get screen tearing on the TCL and the Sony doesn't.

S546 is good that's long been discontinued. The new models — anything less than a Q7 or QM7 is trash.

S551G is the 2024 Model. The TCL Q750G is what you actually want.

It's cheap and not good. It's the Costco version of the S551G if I'm not mistaken.

This seems to be pretty different from the S551G. S571 has 1 more HDMI, 2.1 35W sound system vs 2.0 10W, and a larger screen. I'm not sure they are comparable.

Use the RTINGS settings as a guide and tweak them until you get a picture you are happy with.

My TCL does that whenever the resolution changes, it's gotta be some visual setting that's on 'auto' causing it.

Yep pretty normal for that panel.