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TVs and monitors · Bravia

Bravia 5

Owners keep the Bravia 5 for a picture that reads as top tier in person, trading occasional firmware headaches for image quality they say beats sets they have owned before.

Read from 576 owner accountsUpdated September 23, 2026Compare it

What keeps coming up

Picture quality draws clear praise, with owners describing contrast, color volume and viewing angles as a step up from previous displays, including other OLEDs.

Recurring in 50 of 576 accounts · See accounts

What keeps coming up against it

Customer support is a clear complaint, with owners describing firmware bugs met by unhelpful or dismissive responses from Sony when they tried to get them fixed.

Recurring in 35 of 576 accounts · See accounts
Life with it

Once the newness wears off, the image itself keeps delivering: owners keep pointing to contrast and color as the reason they are glad they bought it, whether the set is used for movies, gaming or as a secondary monitor. Day to day viewing in mixed lighting, streaming apps, and PS5 or Switch gaming sessions, is where people say the panel keeps earning its keep.

What owners have had to adjust to is firmware. Updates have caused real disruptions: audio dropping out of sync with Apple TV boxes, Dolby Vision going to a black screen, and in some cases picture quality itself degrading after an update installed overnight. Several owners describe holding off on updates or bracing for a fix after each one, which has become a routine part of ownership rather than a one-time surprise.

Reliability & repairs

The panel itself holds up well for most uses. Owners who use the TV for video and gaming, where the image is rarely static, report little to no burn-in concern, and several who have run OLEDs for years describe them as stable in that kind of use. Brightness and burn-in risk overall are described by owners on both sides, some satisfied with the light output and panel longevity, others weighing it against mini-LED alternatives for static-content use like desktop work.

Where things break, it is mostly software, not the panel. Firmware updates account for the bulk of the negative reports: audio sync problems with outboard AVRs and Apple TV, Dolby Vision content going dark, and in a few cases resolution or picture quality regressing after an install. Owners' main workaround is delaying updates when they can and troubleshooting after the fact, since a fix from support was not reliably forthcoming in the accounts collected here.

More detail
What owners praise, where they are split, and the follow-up timeline

What owners praise

  • picture quality58 of 80who raised it
  • value for price26 of 40who raised it
  • longevity23 of 28who raised it
  • screen cleaning18 of 23who raised it
  • gaming performance13 of 18who raised it

Where owners have concerns

  • firmware update issues55 of 62who raised it
  • audio sync issues35 of 44who raised it
  • customer support24 of 38who raised it
  • privacy concerns9 of 11who raised it
  • app usability6 of 7who raised it

Where owners are split

  • burn-in risk41 for · 26 against · 15 mixedof 82 who raised it
  • brightness10 for · 3 against · 9 mixedof 22 who raised it
  • screen size6 for · 1 against · 6 mixedof 13 who raised it
  • reliability3 for · 6 against · 3 mixedof 12 who raised it
  • motion clarity4 for · 5 against · 1 mixedof 10 who raised it
  • hdr performance4 for · 3 against · 2 mixedof 9 who raised it
  • resolution preference2 for · 2 against · 5 mixedof 9 who raised it
  • frame rate performance2 for · 4 against · 3 mixedof 9 who raised it
  • text clarity2 for · 4 against · 2 mixedof 8 who raised it
  • black levels4 for · 1 against · 2 mixedof 7 who raised it
  • sound quality3 for · 3 against · 0 mixedof 6 who raised it

Counted from the owners who raised each subject, not from everyone. A subject is judged once at least 4 owners raise it.

34 more subjects came up from fewer than 4 owners each, which is not enough for a fair reading. To see how it stacks up, compare it with another machine.

Does it still kick?

2 weeks3 months6 months1 year2 years

The same owner, asked again at each point. Fills in as owners answer.

Where this came from

Where this came from

Public discussions we read and summarised in our own words. Nothing here was submitted to Still Kicks.

Counted from public accounts by people who said they own it, and summarised by Still Kicks in its own words. Not a manufacturer claim, a lab test or an estimate.

Nothing here asks for anything about you unless you write to us.