Philips 50 Inch Smart TV 4K: 50 inches Philips - Review 🏆

The Philips 50PUS8506/12 50-inch 4K UHD LED TV is an excellent mid-range option for those looking for a high-quality television with smart capabilities and Ambilight technology.

This Philips model features a sleek, minimalist design and provides a vibrant 4K viewing experience. With High Dynamic Range (HDR) support, you'll enjoy enhanced contrast and vivid colors when watching HDR-enabled content from services like Netflix and Amazon Prime Video.

The Android TV operating system gives you access to popular apps, voice control through Google Assistant, and Chromecast built-in for easy streaming. Philips' unique Ambilight technology creates an immersive viewing atmosphere by projecting colored light onto the wall behind the TV.

Overall, the Philips 50PUS8506/12 pairs high-performance 4K visuals with handy smart TV features at an affordable price point compared to other 50-inch sets. Keep reading for a more in-depth look at what this model offers.

Design

The Philips 50-inch 4K UHD LED TV has an attractive design with thin bezels and a silver finish on the back panel. It has fairly compact dimensions of 111.6 x 7.3 x 64.6 cm and weighs approximately 12.7 kg, making it easy to place on most TV stands or mount on a wall.

The TV comes in a dark gray color that blends into the background when watching content, so you can focus on what's on the screen. It's not the slimmest TV on the market, but still has a nice low-profile look. Overall the design is modern and minimalist, avoiding any flashy or over-the-top styling.

If you are looking for a slightly smaller option, consider the Philips Ambilight PUS8108: 43 inches. This model features the same 4K UHD resolution and sleek design, with the added benefit of Ambilight technology that enhances your viewing experience with immersive lighting effects. At 43 inches, it fits well in smaller rooms while still delivering excellent picture quality and modern aesthetics that Philips is known for.

Display

The Philips 50PUS7506/12 50-inch 4K LED TV features an excellent display with crisp, vivid visuals. It has a 4K UHD resolution of 3840 x 2160 pixels, providing four times the detail of Full HD 1080p. Images look sharp and defined, with excellent clarity in fast-moving action scenes and sports.

The TV supports High Dynamic Range (HDR) including HDR10, HDR10+, and Dolby Vision. This expands the color gamut and contrast range significantly. HDR content shows vivid and realistic colors, with enhanced brightness for highlights and detailed shadows. It makes images come to life with greater depth and dimension.

The LED panel delivers bright, uniform lighting across the screen. It has high peak brightness levels to make highlights pop. The panel has good viewing angles so the picture remains accurate when viewing from the sides. Overall, the display provides an immersive viewing experience with realistic, true-to-life picture quality.

If you're looking for a larger screen size, consider the Philips PUS7608: 65 inches. This 65-inch model offers the same outstanding 4K resolution and HDR support, with even greater screen real estate to enhance your viewing experience. This larger size brings a more cinematic feel to your living space, providing immersive picture quality and vibrant colors for your favorite movies, shows, and sports.

Sound

The Philips 50-inch 4K LED TV is equipped with a decent 20W speaker system that provides sufficient volume and clarity for everyday TV watching. It supports common audio formats like Dolby Digital and Dolby Digital Plus, allowing you to enjoy surround sound from sources that provide it.

The built-in speakers deliver clear dialogue and a moderately wide soundstage. Sound effects and soundtrack music have decent presence, though bass lacks some punch compared to having a dedicated subwoofer. The maximum volume should be plenty for most living room setups.

While the speakers get the job done, to get a truly immersive home theater experience, you'll want to pair the TV with a soundbar or surround sound system. The TV provides various audio output options to connect external speakers, receivers and soundbars.

Overall, the sound capabilities are about average for a mid-range 4K TV. The speakers will work fine for everyday TV shows, movies and gaming, but audiophiles will want a more powerful external audio system.

Smart TV Features

The Philips 50-inch TV runs on Android TV, providing access to a wide range of apps and services through the Google Play store. It comes preloaded with popular streaming apps like Netflix, YouTube, Prime Video, and more.

For voice controls, the TV has support for both Google Assistant and Amazon Alexa. You can use voice commands to launch apps, search for content, control playback, and more. The TV has a built-in mic to pick up voice requests.

Some key smart TV features include:

• Android TV operating system
• Built-in Google Play Store for downloading media apps
• Works with Google Assistant for voice controls
• Also supports Amazon Alexa
• Chromecast built-in for casting content from mobile devices
• Dedicated buttons on remote for Netflix and YouTube

The Android TV interface is intuitive and easy to navigate. Overall, the smart features offer a great streaming experience and hands-free voice control options.

Connections

The Philips 50-inch 4K TV offers ample connectivity options to hook up your devices and accessories.

HDMI

The TV has 4 HDMI ports to connect 4K Blu-ray players, gaming consoles, streaming devices, and other HDMI-enabled devices. The HDMI ports support HDMI 2.1 for high bandwidth up to 48Gbps. This allows you to enjoy uncompressed 4K 120Hz video and eARC for high quality audio pass-through from TV to soundbar.

USB

There are 2 USB ports on the TV to connect hard drives, USB sticks, keyboards, gaming controllers, and other USB accessories. The USB ports are USB 2.0.

Other Ports

Additional ports on the TV include - Ethernet for wired internet connectivity, Digital Audio Out (Optical) for connecting a soundbar or home theater system, 3.5mm headphone jack, and a CI+ slot for adding a conditional access module. There is no composite video input on this TV.

The plentiful ports allow you to connect all your media devices and game consoles for an immersive home entertainment experience.

Remote Control

The Philips 50-inch 4K TV comes with a stylish and ergonomic remote control that makes it easy to access all of the TV's features and settings.

The remote has a minimalist design with just a few essential buttons like power, volume, channel change, home, back, and shortcuts for popular streaming apps like Netflix and Prime Video. There's also a microphone button to activate voice commands.

Voice control allows you to search for content, change settings, and more using your voice and Google Assistant. The TV remote has a built-in mic to pick up voice commands.

The remote also has a useful finder function. Pressing the finder button makes the TV remote emit a sound so you can quickly locate it if it gets lost in the sofa.

Overall, the remote is intuitive and easy to use with all the necessary controls while maintaining a simplistic and uncluttered design. The voice control and finder feature add extra convenience.

Performance

The Philips 50PUS7506/05 offers very good overall performance, especially for its price range.

Picture Quality

This 4K LED TV delivers vibrant colors and good contrast. It supports HDR10 and Dolby Vision for enhanced detail and expanded contrast in HDR content. While blacks could be deeper, the TV still produces nice shadow detail. Bright highlights also look quite impactful.

Upscaling

The Philips TV does an excellent job upscaling HD content to 4K. Lower resolution videos appear sharp and detailed on the large 50-inch screen without excessive noise or artifacts. This allows you to get great picture quality from non-4K content.

Motion Handling

Motion handling is also very good, with the TV's 50Hz panel and Pixel Precise Ultra HD engine delivering smooth, fluid motion. Fast action scenes come across clearly with minimal blur or judder. Gamers will appreciate the low input lag and responsiveness. The TV also supports FreeSync for tear-free gaming with compatible devices.

Additional Features

The Philips 50 inch 4K TV has some nice additional features that enhance the viewing experience.

One is Ambilight, which is Philips' patented ambient lighting technology. It uses LEDs around the edges of the TV to project colored light onto the wall behind, immersing you in the content on the screen. The lights react dynamically to what's happening in the scene, giving an extra layer of immersion. It looks great in a darker room. Ambilight has several settings to tweak the experience.

For gamers, this TV also has some nice features. It has low input lag, which is important for responsive gameplay. The HDMI ports support up to 120Hz refresh rate at 4K resolution, allowing you to take advantage of higher frame rates from newer consoles and GPUs. There's also Auto Low Latency Mode, which automatically switches the TV into a low latency setting when you start up a compatible game console. The TV also supports variable refresh rate technologies like AMD FreeSync Premium and Nvidia G-Sync for smooth variable frame rates without screen tearing.

Pros and Cons

Philips 50 Inch Smart TV offers many benefits but also has some downsides.

Pros

• Beautiful 4K UHD display with HDR for vibrant colors and sharp detail
• Ambilight feature creates immersive viewing experience
• Runs on Android TV for access to apps like Netflix and YouTube
• Works with Google Assistant and Amazon Alexa
• Good sound quality from 2.1 channel speakers
• Plenty of HDMI and USB ports

Cons

• Higher price than competitors
• Mediocre viewing angles compared to other LED TVs
• Remote control feels cheap and flimsy
• Smart TV interface can be slow at times
• Only 60Hz refresh rate, not best for gaming

Overall, the Philips 50" 4K TV delivers gorgeous visuals and handy smart features but costs more than some comparable models. The immersive Ambilight technology is a neat extra if you want a more cinematic experience. For shoppers focused purely on performance and value, there may be better options.