OLED longevity/aging, real world experiences?

One of the technical hurdles regarding OLEDs have been questions about how they age compared to LCD screens, mostly regarding the uneven lifespan of the various colors (particularly blue) and burn-in/screen retention issues (associated with the individual aging of each sub pixel?).

So now that we have had several generations of mass consumer OLED devices with some rather popular and common devices (such as the Galaxy S2) this might be something that can actually be looked at now out in the real world.

Since the most common sample and experience at this point of time is likely with phone displays I thought I'd put this discussion in here first as opposed to the display forum. Although a challenge of asking this question on a forum like this might be an issue depending on how fast people go through phones (likely faster update cycles) and whether or not they've kept their older ones and/or if they have been actively used for this long.

So what are peoples experiences with OLED aging/longevity?

I've had two phones with OLED displays; the Gnex and Note 2. I had the Gnex for exactly a year and the Note 2 for about 18 months.

Gnex display was a first gen HD (720p) SAMOLED pentile display and it was obvious that it was a 1st gen display as it definitely had its flaws; severe ghosting at lower brightness levels, pentile pixel arrangement was pretty noticeable despite a pixel density of 315 PPI, and there were several reported cases of bad burn-in on phones less than a year old (which I never experienced - only temp burn-in at lower brightness levels). But despite all that, I still thought the display was adequate and loved the infinite contrast ratio/deep blacks and saturated colors.

Note 2 display was significantly better than the Gnex despite being the same resolution at a lower pixel density (267 PPI), probably due to the (non-pentile) RGB pixel arrangement of its display and it could get much brighter. I also never had any ghosting on this display and never saw any burn-in of any sort on it after 18 months, though I have seen people report burn-in on these phones a few times. It probably helps that I've had the habit of turning off my phone's display manually (as opposed to letting it time out) every time I stop using it, so it never sits on a static image for long. The display on this phone actually seemed sharper then the Gnex too due to the RGB pixel arrangement. I really had no issues with this display and loved it, the only small issue with it was that it didn't really get bright enough for usage in direct sunlight, but that's still an issue with most newer phones as well.

Right now I have a One M8 and the Wife as a GS4. I really miss the AMOLED on my M8. The SLCD is definitely nice still, but the blacks and colors are nowhere near SAMOLED levels and you can see the backlight on the edges of the screen which is slightly distracting for me. The whites on it are a lot whiter than my wife's GS4 or my old Note 2 though. Not sure how that compares to the newer GS5 and Note 3, which seem to be significantly better than previous SAMOLED panels in Samsung's phones from the reviews I've seen on Anantech and a couple other sites. The newer SAMOLED displays are pentile too, but at over 400 PPI, the pixel density is so dense it's virtually impossible to see with the naked eye, at least I can't see it at all on my wife's GS4. I wish OEMs would start putting AMOLED displays back into their phones again, I'm not sure if Samsung is pricing them too high for OEMs to use or just don't want other OEMs using them (other than Moto so far). I remember the HTC Incredible had an AMOLED display and I think that was the last HTC phone to have them, which if I remember right they actually switched the Inc over to LCDs after a few months due to some complication Samsung had with the AMOLED displays at that time, but I haven't seen them in another OEM's phone since then other than Motorola's.

This is the reason I haven't taken the plunge yet into OLED TV. They killed my favorite display medium, plasma, which has displayed the best image I've ever seen. eek:

One of the best examples of color fading and burn in for people who don't see the problem (yet) is just go to a Best Buy and take a look at the GS's... Ouch!

Last I recall, it's Samsung not selling the amoled screens without a big Samsung logo on the bezel...

or is this only about phones? if so...my bad

CHANG3D said:

One of the best examples of color fading and burn in for people who don't see the problem (yet) is just go to a Best Buy and take a look at the GS's... Ouch!

Last I recall, it's Samsung not selling the amoled screens without a big Samsung logo on the bezel...

Click to expand...

This is very true for me. I have the S3 and the keyboard and messaging app just happens to be burned into the screen. I only just recently noticed it but I was still taken aback by it. I figured this was a long dead problem.

menace2society said:

or is this only about phones? if so...my bad

Click to expand...

Not specifically about phones it is just that phones are really at this point by far the most common implementation of OLED screens and that you would also use (relatively) a lot of screen time viewing content. As such this category would be where you'd actually be able to get real world experience on the subject from.

The current Tab S releases from Samsung haven't really been out long enough while the previous OLED Tab was hardly popular from what I understand. It will be interesting looking back at this category 1year+ from now however.

I'm guessing not many people (very few) likely have or have access to the OLED TVs released so far. If you have used one for the last years share your thoughts

The only major non phone example I can think of which is relatively common and people would have experience with would be the first gen PS Vita's.

CHANG3D said:

One of the best examples of color fading and burn in for people who don't see the problem (yet) is just go to a Best Buy and take a look at the GS's... Ouch!

Last I recall, it's Samsung not selling the amoled screens without a big Samsung logo on the bezel...

Click to expand...

There are non Samsung devices with OLED screens however. Although Samsung is by far the most popular and common, as such it's likely what most people would have experience with.

I can't wait for OLED TVs, as soon as I can get a 55"+ for a reasonable price, I'm getting one. The Samsung LED TV I have now blows pretty hard (horrible backlight bleed at the corners, uneven backlight across the panel, dead pixels in the center, software freezes a lot while using Smart Hub, etc.).

I still use my original 2010 Galaxy S Epic 4G on WIFI and the screen is fine with no degradation nor burn-in.

No issue either with newer 2012 Note II or 2013 Note 3.

Store demos represent the worse case condition and not normal use for any display since they usually have the brightness and time out maxed out. LCD suffer in this condition too.

SAMOLED isn't perfect but it has by far the fewest compromises. Not a fan of LCD's back light bleed, grayish black, loss of detail in dark scenes, bad pixel(s), screen uniformity issues, etc. so will continue to buy SAMOLED until something better comes along.

My AMOLED version Nexus One screen is dimmer now but still looking fine although the phone has been retired from all but roaming service for a year now.

My GS4's screen is still perfect.

I still use my Galaxy S and I don't "notice" any difference but I'm sure if you put it side-by-side with a brand new one you could find something to complain about.

Overall I'm completely happy with it though.

My own Galaxy Nexus with the Super AMOLED screen has absolutely no 'burn in' or other issues except the huge crack across the screen it got on a drop to a tile floor about a month ago. It's definitely seen more usage than your average phone over the last two years since I bought it from Google.

My aunt's GNex, bought at the exact same time, has horrible burn in... especially where the status bar and on screen home keys are. I think it's because she keeps the brightness turned up to maximum constantly.

My mother's old Galaxy Note is the worst of all. My mother plays 'Scramble With Friends' constantly and the Super AMOLED screen on it literally has the play tiles burned into the screen. It's crazy.... she's got a Galaxy Note 3 now and it will be interesting to see how long it takes for the same thing to happen....

I have had a lot of OLED screens in phones going all the way back to the galaxy S1 which predates the nexus. For me the wear has been pretty limited. By the time the phone sees any wear its at least 2+ years old and is being pushed off to kids or sold. In my case there was no obvious markings they just became dimmer. But over time the location and arrangement of icon has moved around.

Ultimately I am surprised that Samsung and others have not given this more thought and implemented some burn in protection like is used for plasmas, CRTs and so on. But if worse comes to worse you can replace the screen. I think on a TV the problems won't be as bad because you shouldn't have static images on it almost all the time. You will just need to treat it like a plasma.

I have had pretty much all the galaxy phones since the original galaxy s, as well as some previos oled phones. The only one which lost any screen quality i noticed was the tmobile version of the galaxy s2. The screen used a new screen technology which made it really nice but it was a little too ahead of its time if i remember correctly. That phone had some serious power though for its time

So what are peoples experiences with OLED aging/longevity?

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I've only used OLED on phones and it's not pleasant. Burn in happens and you need to be extra cautious on what you display on the device. Then there's aging of the pixels that will give the screen a yellow tint as time goes on. I don't like it at all and try to avoid it, but when there's really only one reliable manufacturer that offers removable battery, microsd, and hardware keys... I really just have to give in.

Galaxy s - washed out colors. (i guess because blue faded). Didn't even use it for that long, switched to s2 after it released.
Galaxy s2 - Had it for much longer than the s1, and no problem. (i think this has rgb stripe?)
Galaxy tab 7.7 - used it a _lot_ for reading books, no problems whatsoever. (also has rgb stripe).

Yep, seems the above is correct according to the table here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AMOLED

Does rgb stripe somehow increase longevity? (the screen on the old 7.7" tab is still really great, bought in february 2012, heavily used).

::leaves screen at 100% brightness all the time::

Hay guyz, how come my OLED screen has burn-in?

Galaxy S3: Burn in and terrible uniformity with some backgrounds. Right now, it's like Plasma 2.0.

Megalith said:

::leaves screen at 100% brightness all the time::

Hay guyz, how come my OLED screen has burn-in?

Click to expand...

Not really a valid point unless you have insane static screen times on your device. Nowhere in the manual does it warn about leaving 100% brightness on. The phone also did come out of the box with 100% brightness if I recall correctly.

Not a Samsung hater here, loving the AMOLED on my 15 month old GS4.

Edit: No apparent burn-in on my GS4. It has been on the lowest brightness setting for over 90% of it's screen time though.

Amoled gs2, 32 months no burn in. Changed to used screen, no burn in.

AMOLED depends on how you use the phone. If you are like me and like to have the screen on while driving, you don't want it. I had a GNEX that developed burn in within 6 months doing that.

AMOLED capacitive touchscreen, 16M colors 800*480 Lumia 810 here. Creeping up on 2 years old and it still looks like the day it was new

I have the color saturation turned down to normal levels and I have the brightness set to medium. The device is running windows phone 8.1 Developer Preview.

The Samsung Galaxy S5's display is rated as the best smartphone display by Displaymate:

Samsung Galaxy S5 Display Technology Shoot-Out

Samsung Galaxy S5, Best Display Ever

Comparing my old Samsung Galaxy S4 to the Galaxy S5, I can see a huge difference. The Galaxy S5's display is much brighter, that is the main difference. This means that sunlight visibility is enhanced, while it's not too bright which can also be an issue.

LED display tech is aging poorly. Backlight bleeding and some of the displays tend to have poor blacks that look like grays and low contrast ratio.

OLED or AMOLED is the future. The advantages of AMOLED include:

• Infinite contrast ratio
• Higher color vibrancy
• Superior response time & input lag (better motion performance)
• Superior black levels (technically 0cd/m^2)
• Current-gen AMOLED displays have about the same brightness levels as LED displays

Brightness is no longer an issue with current-gen AMOLED displays. Previous-gen AMOLED displays like the Samsung Galaxy S1/S2/S3 had bad brightness. The Samsung Galaxy S5 has a very bright display, even brighter than some LED panels. So it seems like the brightness problems have been corrected. I'm not sure who supplies Nokia's AMOLED displays though. Anyone know?

I think you should probably correct your post when you talk about "led display technology is aging poorly." You're actually referring to LCD display technology.

And about aging poorly, I would still disagree. I don't doubt that oled displays is superior, but, with local dimming and a fourth subpixel as in Sharp Quattron, lcd has closed the gap greatly in terms of contrast and color quality and continues to make the displays cheap. Vizio is coming with a $1000 4K screen with local dimming that gives it a high contrast ratio. Sure it's not infinite radio, but when black is black enough and brightness is high, the biggest difference you'll see is in your credit card statement... Until oled is cheap enough, lcd will still rule the TV world. I think a wired magazine article earlier this year calls oled tv's dead on arrival and the point is that oled will possibly never close in on performance and price ratio. I would like to believe wired is wrong however, but I do see their point.

No issues on my gnex, note 2, or droid maxx. Though honestly companies treat phones as disposable since you're probably going to replace it in 1 to 2 years. I'd be more worried about an oled tv, there is a ton of tv content with static information bars, and tv's are generally turned on more.

Love the image but wary of the issues which have been widely reported