Samsung and LG, both based in South Korea, continued to lead in market share for the global TV market in the first half of 2021, according to new numbers from research firm Omdia, as cited by Yonhap News Agency.

The two companies “represented half of the global TV market in the first half of the year,” according to the report. Samsung accounted for 31 percent of the market’s sales revenue, while LG had 19 percent. Japan was third, TCL fourth, and Hisense fifth.

The report added that Samsung’s performance was led by surging sales of Samsung’s QLED TVs, which jumped 46 percent, while Samsung has a “dominant position” in the segment of TVs that are eighty inches and larger.

Overall, the TV market grew, with revenue of $54.2 billion, up 36.1 percent from the year before, while sales hit 99.11 million units, an increase of 7.4 percent over the second quarter of 2020.

LG, for its part, moved 13.5 million TVs for a 25.8 percent increase. Of those models, 1.73 million were OLED TVs. That included 945,600 OLED TVs in the second quarter, the most LG has ever sold since the introduction of OLED TVs.

Meanwhile, Business Korea reported that Omdia also found the global mini LED TV segment is growing, with 4.9 million units expected to move this year. While it's still only 2.2 percent of the total TV market, it was just 0.02 percent a year before.

According to RTINGS’ current rankings of the best TVs available on the market, LG dominates the top of the list, with the top three spots and four of the top five. LG’s 2021 flagship, the LG G1 OLED, currently holds the top spot, followed by the LG GX OLED and LG CX OLED, both of which are from 2020. In fourth place is Sony’s A90J OLED, with LG’s BX OLED model fifth. The highest-ranking Samsung TV, the Samsung QN90A QLED, is in twelfth place. 

Meanwhile, Samsung is reportedly getting set to introduce a new kind of TV next year, the QD-OLED TVs, which are expected to arrive at CES in January. 

“Samsung Electronics plans to receive ‘QD (Quantum Dot) display’ panels from Samsung Display next year while Samsung Display will extend its supply of LCDs to Samsung Electronics,” Korea’s ET News reported earlier this summer. “The agreement was reached as Samsung Electronics needs a supply of LCDs while Samsung Display needs a customer for its QD display panels. What is more special about the agreement is that President Han Jong-hee at Samsung Electronics and President Choi Joo-seon of Samsung Display are all in on the agreement.”

Stephen Silver, a technology writer for The National Interest, is a journalist, essayist and film critic, who is also a contributor to The Philadelphia Inquirer, Philly Voice, Philadelphia Weekly, the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, Living Life Fearless, Backstage magazine, Broad Street Review and Splice Today. The co-founder of the Philadelphia Film Critics Circle, Stephen lives in suburban Philadelphia with his wife and two sons. Follow him on Twitter at @StephenSilver.

Image: Reuters.