For most consumers, a TV screen is just a TV screen. It might get bigger over time and the picture quality may improve over time due to new technology like OLED or QLED, but there’s just not many ways you can re-invent the traditional TV screen, right? Wrong. A number of top TV makers – including the likes of Samsung, LG and Panasonic – are working on futuristic TV screen technology that will boggle your mind (and have you desperately speed-dialing your local Best Buy to see if they have it in stock).
#1: The Rollable TV screen
Imagine a TV screen so flexible and so thin that you can roll it (and unroll it) a limitless number of times. This almost sounds like a scene out of “The Jetsons,” right? Well, it’s real, existing technology that LG is bringing to market. LG has unveiled “the world’s first 65-inch rollable TV.” It’s designed to sit flat on a wall, just like any other mounted flat screen TV. However, here’s where things get interesting – with just a single touch of a button, that TV will shrink down, finally disappearing as it wraps itself around a slender hidden coil. It works much like the way wrapping paper or aluminum foil works.
And, wait, it gets better than that. You have the option of keeping a small part of the screen unrolled. In this format, the tiny screen acts as a small smart display for information widgets. It’s a way to keep up with sports scores or weather updates. And then, when you’re ready to leave the house, you can roll it up all the way, and tuck it under your arm as you head off on your next big screen adventure.
#2: The Wallpaper TV screen
We’ve all heard of TV sets that are so thin and flat that, when mounted on a wall, look like a piece of art. Well, it gets even better than that because LG has ingeniously figured out a way to create a Wallpaper TV. This is a TV screen so thin (just 1 millimeter thick) that it looks like a poster on your wall. It stays connected to your wall via a magnetic wall mount.
When you are done watching TV, you can unpeel it from the wall. This could make for some fairly amusing scenarios in the future. Instead of asking your spouse, “Honey, did you remember to turn off the TV?” you might soon be asking, “Honey, did you remember to unpeel the TV?”
#3: TV screens everywhere
Most likely, you’ve spotted TV screens just about everywhere – standing in line at the supermarket or on the back seat of airplane seats – that you can’t possibly imagine any more places where TV manufacturers could place their TV screens. Well, here comes the smart home and the Internet of Things, and that’s leading to a host of clever ways to embed TV screens on everyday objects.
At the 2018 CES Show, for example, GE showcased a stove with range hood – and a 27-inch TV screen. Watch TV as you cook your dinner! And both LG and Samsung debuted refrigerators with TV display screens.
#4: Modular TV screens
How about stackable modules that you can assemble into the screen size of your choosing? Samsung has you covered with a futuristic concept they are simply calling “The Wall.” The idea here is that you can stack so many TV screen modules together that you can eventually form a giant wall. And Samsung wasn’t kidding around either. They showed off this Wall concept with a giant, 146-inch screen that was optimized for a regular home with 8- to 9-foot ceilings. Yes, the floor-to-ceiling TV screen is coming to a home near you!
#5: Window TVs
If walls aren’t your thing, what about windows? Panasonic has demonstrated a new type of OLED screen technology that will turn your TV screen transparent. When the TV is turned on, it’s just a regular TV. However, when the TV is turned off, it becomes a transparent window that blends into other furniture or shelving units. In other words, it’s a TV that’s practically invisible when you aren’t using it.
#6: Bezel-free TVs
One part of the TV that continues to shrink over time is the bezel – the frame that surrounds the screen. The bezel is important not just for aesthetic purposes, but also because it hides all the electronic components that make your TV work. But TV technology is becoming so sophisticated that the amount that needs to be hidden from view continues to shrink, and that has almost led to the creation of the bezel-free TV. In the future, a TV might be “all screen” and nothing else.
#7: TV screens with so many pixels that content providers can’t keep up
And, finally, a word has to be mentioned about the upcoming debut of 8K TV screens with an amazing, head-turning amount of pixels. Today’s 4K TV screens have more than 8 million individual pixels. But tomorrow’s 8K TV screens will have four times that number, nearly 33 million individual pixels. And, to properly display all those pixels, TV screens are getting big. Really big, in fact. In order to really enjoy 32 million pixels, you will need to have a 70-inch TV screen, and preferably, one that measures 85 inches or more. Something has to give here, right? Either we need to start building houses bigger, or we need to come up with some really creative ways to view those TVs.
So, if you thought the TV screen couldn’t possibly become any more innovative, these are 7 mind-bending examples of how TV manufacturers are (literally) thinking outside of the box to create a new generation of TV screen technology that is super-thin, bendable, rollable, peelable, and capable of being placed on just about any piece of furniture or appliance in the home. As WIRED magazine recently pointed out after an epic visit to the 2018 CES trade show in Las Vegas, “The future of TV is just screens all the way down.”
