Samsung Electronics unveiled its 2026 TV lineup, accelerating its strategy to popularize AI-based TVs. It will apply AI features across the entire range, from premium to mainstream, while shifting its business structure to focus on subscriptions and platforms.
Samsung Electronics on the 15th unveiled its 2026 TVs and audio products at The First Look Seoul 2026 event in Seocho-gu, Seoul. The company presented a direction to expand the TV into an "AI daily companion" by equipping its entire lineup—Micro RGB, OLED, Neo QLED, Mini LED, and UHD—with AI features.
The core is the integrated AI platform "Vision AI Companion." It analyzes the content being watched in real time to provide information and answers, allowing users to check movie filming locations or sports records with voice commands alone. A key feature is that it simultaneously includes multiple AI services, such as Bixby, Perplexity, and Microsoft Copilot.
AI capabilities were also strengthened in video and audio. With "AI Soccer Mode Pro" and "AI Sound Control Pro," picture and sound are automatically optimized, and "AI Upscaling Pro" converts low-resolution content into high definition.
The product strategy led to a full lineup overhaul. Centered on the ultra-premium "Micro RGB," the range expands from 65-inch to 130-inch models, and a new "Mini LED" line was added to broaden the attack range into the mid-price market. The 98-inch "The Frame" and the "Moving Style" mobile screen expanded to 85 inches were presented as products that enhance space utility.
At the event, the company also unveiled the portable screen "The Freestyle," launched for Millennials and Gen Z. First introduced at CES 2022, the world's largest electronics show held in Las Vegas earlier this year, The Freestyle began preorders on Jan. 4 in North America and then sequentially in Korea, Central and South America, Southeast Asia, and Europe, selling more than 10,000 units.
The event also revealed a strategy to shift the revenue structure from hardware-centric to subscription- and platform-centric. The company said TV subscriptions are expanding to more than 30% across the entire lineup and described it as a way to lower consumer burdens while boosting sales. It said it has built a structure that lowers the effective out-of-pocket price through discounted subscription fees for prepayment and card-company cashback partnerships.
The company also emphasized its intention to expand its platform business. Centered on Samsung TV Plus and the Art Store, it aims to strengthen content and services to build a recurring revenue structure that continues even after device purchases. The company said it will keep enhancing platform competitiveness through content investment and global partnerships.
Regarding processor strategy, the core of AI competitiveness, the company said it will continue to develop AI Semiconductors dedicated to TVs. Rather than directly applying mobile chips, it plans to build an architecture optimized for content consumption environments to maintain differentiation.
Prices maintain the gap between premium and mainstream models. The 85-inch Micro RGB is set at 9.29 million won, the 77-inch OLED at 7.19 million won, and the 85-inch Mini LED at 3.39 million won. The strategy is seen as aiming to broaden the market base by keeping premium technologies while strengthening the mid-price lineup.
Industry watchers said Samsung Electronics is accelerating the build-out of an AI ecosystem centered on TVs. As the axis of competition shifts from hardware to platforms based on AI, content, and subscriptions, there is growing analysis that TVs are increasingly likely to become the core AI interface in the home.