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I visited LG‘s TV demo room at CES 2025, and got my eyes on its new flagship TVs, the LG G5 and M5 (our opinion on those will come later). But while there, I also got to see the LG C5 mid-range OLED TV, and to speak to LG about it. Which was useful, because LG hadn’t officially announced it until that point.
LG was able to confirm a bunch of details about the set, and the team also spoke about the more affordable LG B5 model that’s coming, although that wasn’t on display.
Here’s the headline: the LG C5 promises to be a little brighter, but don’t expect major changes compared to the LG C4 that’s currently available; and the LG B5 will take a big step back in availability compared to last year’s LG B4.
LG C5: specs and details
There are really two major changes coming to the LG C5. First, LG says it should be a little brighter than the LG C4, but refused to confirm any numbers (even as a percentage), so I suspect that it will only be a small boost, probably driven by improvements to power management in its processor.
There’s definitely not a big panel change here – for example, there’s no upgrade to MLA OLED, even though the LG G5 has moved on from MLA to another new brightness tech. The screen will still be a 144Hz 4K display too, and won’t move up to 165Hz like the LG G5 has.
The LG C5 will also get webOS 25, which will come with smart personal profiles and AI chatbot features, just like the LG G5 and M5 will have. This will include voice recognition, so if different people in your house have different profiles, when you ask the TV to do something, it’ll recognize that you’re you, and will switch to your profile while carrying out the command.
The personal profile not only includes different layouts for the home screen (ie, with the apps and services you like the most given more prominence), but can now also switch picture modes. LG gave the example that if each profile has gone through the AI Picture wizard to customize the picture for your preference, it’ll use that setting when it switches to your profile. I think this sounds kind of annoying (I much prefer consistency), but it’s a novel idea.
As last year, the LG C5 will come in sizes from 42 inches up to 83 inches.
Now, the LG B5
While the LG B5 wasn’t at the show, LG did confirm that it’s coming, that it will use an Alpha 7 processor, and that it will boast around the same brightness as the LG B4, though the team at CES again refused to give any figure (other than saying that the LG G5 will be three times brighter than it).
However, LG did confirm one element: it will be available in “limited sizes”. Despite being available in 48 inches for the first time in 2024, in 2025 there will only be two sizes of LG B5. LG wasn’t able to confirm exactly which sizes, but my understanding is that it’s likely to be 65 inches and then either 55 or 77 inches, but I’ll update with confirmation on those if I get it.
This is obviously a big disappointment – LG already stopped its A series of cheaper OLED TVs, and now it seems that the B series may be winding down too. Perhaps the price difference between the B series and C series just isn’t large enough and more people opt for the C, but I hope that the B will continue in the future to keep OLED more affordable, even if it’s only in these few sizes.
Read more from CES 2025
TechRadar will be extensively covering this year’s CES, and will bring you all of the big announcements as they happen. Head over to our CES 2025 news page for the latest stories and our hands-on verdicts on everything from 8K TVs and foldable displays to new phones, laptops, smart home gadgets, and the latest in AI.
And don’t forget to follow us on TikTok and WhatsApp for the latest from the CES show floor!
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