Element 55-Inch Amazon Fire TV Edition - Review 2022

We've seen Roku TVs before, simply Amazon Fire TVs are new. Rather, televisions with the Amazon Fire TV platform integrated are new. Amazon's Fire Television receiver media streamer has been around for a few years, and now Chemical element Electronics has incorporated that technology directly into its latest Television. At $649.99 for the 55-inch model nosotros tested, it's certainly a wallet-friendly style to get a connected 4K television. But it lacks HDR, and its functioning only doesn't compare with our Editors' Option, the Roku Television-based TCL P-series, whose 55-inch model is the same cost.

Design

The Element favors dark grayness over the typical blackness pattern of most TVs, with a apartment, gunmetal-colored plastic bezel that measures just a quarter of an inch on the sides and top, and half an inch on the bottom of the screen. A notable crash-land in the middle of the bottom bezel holds the Element logo. The TV sits deeply on a pair of thin, V-shaped metal legs.

Element 55-Inch Amazon Fire TV Edition

A minor four-management joystick sits on the lower right corner of the dorsum of the TV, letting y'all navigate the Amazon Burn down TV menu organization (though the included remote is of course much easier to use). A few inches further in from the edge of the TV, four HDMI ports, a USB 2.0 port, a USB 3.0 port, and an SD card slot face right. An Ethernet port, antenna/cable connector, component and blended video inputs, optical audio output, and 3.5mm headphone jack face downward, from the same section of panel as the other ports.

Voice Remote and Alexa

The included remote holds an Element logo, just will otherwise be familiar to Amazon Fire Television device users. It'due south a slim, six.iii-inch wand with a prominent, circular navigation pad flanked past card and playback controls. The ability button and microphone button sit above the pad, forth with a hole for the built-in microphone. Pressing the microphone button lets y'all use voice search or the TV'southward Alexa features. A volume rocker and three defended service buttons for Amazon Prime number Video, Netflix, and Amazon Music sit beneath the management pad. The remote connects wirelessly to the Idiot box, letting you control everything without pointing at the screen.

Every bit an Amazon Fire TV device, the Element too features Amazon's Alexa vocalization assistant, which you tin can utilise by pressing the microphone button on the Voice Remote and speaking into it. You tin enquire Alexa to tell you about upcoming appointments, the weather, and fifty-fifty guild items from Amazon. Alexa's voice search feature also lets you lot bring upward content from Amazon Video and Prime Music using your voice. If you lot have smart domicile devices that are uniform with Alexa, you can also control them using the remote. TV controls are available through Alexa as well, letting you modify inputs or adjust the volume using your voice.

Element 55-Inch Amazon Fire TV Edition

Amazon Fire TV

Nosotros've seen the Fire TV interface in a variety of Amazon-fabricated media streamers like the Fire TV and the Fire Boob tube Stick, but this is the first time nosotros've seen it congenital right into a television. Information technology'due south a similar execution to the Roku Boob tube platform, taking a familiar menu arrangement and installing it directly, with a handful of additional menus and connectedness options for accessing TV-specific features non used in media streamers.

If you've used an Amazon Burn down Television receiver device before, the Chemical element's interface volition be like shooting fish in a barrel to pick upwardly. Apps, services, and connections are displayed every bit large tiles bundled in a series of rows including Recent, Your Apps & Games, Inputs, and On At present.

Recent and Your Apps & Games are standard lists for Burn Idiot box streamers, providing like shooting fish in a barrel admission to your favorite apps and content. All the large streaming names you lot tin can use on a Fire Television device are available here, including Hulu, Netflix, Sling TV, YouTube, and of grade all Amazon content. The Fire Television set platform is about as robust every bit Roku'southward, with hundreds of apps and services. Because the system is based on Android, you can sideload your own APKs if you can't find what y'all desire in the Fire TV App Store. Don't count on sideloaded apps to work reliably, though; nearly Android APKs are designed for bear on-screen use, and won't function properly on a Television set.

Element 55-Inch Amazon Fire TV Edition

On Now and Inputs are TV-specific. On Now shows you what live Idiot box is currently bachelor over the air or through your ClearQAM Cable connection. We plugged in an OTA antenna and picked up a few dozen channels, some in high-definition. We tested in Manhattan, and the channels available in your area might greatly differ. The Inputs row simply lets y'all access the HDMI, component, or composite video inputs, forth with whatsoever OTA/cable programming available.

Pressing the Home button on the remote takes you to the Element'south Burn down Goggle box principal menu, letting you access connected features and media. Holding the Habitation push for a moment pops up a more TV-specific side menu. This lets you access a conventional program guide for live goggle box and change display settings; the Settings tab in the master menu is only for Fire TV settings like network data and firmware updates. Information technology lets you lot access brandish settings quickly, but like Roku TVs, the actual picture settings y'all tin can work with on the Element experience a bit sparse. You can make basic adjustments like effulgence, contrast, and choose from one of three color temperature presets, but across that there are no deep calibration options.

Performance

Nosotros test TVs using a DVDO AVLab 4K test pattern generator, a Klein K-10A colorimeter, and Portrait Displays' CalMAN 5 software on a Razer Bract Pro notebook. Afterwards a basic dark room calibration adjusting brightness and contrast using PLUGE charts, the Element showed a proficient 344.03cd/one thousand² summit brightness and a middling 0.07cd/1000² blackness level for a 4,915:1 contrast ratio. This is solid performance for a upkeep television, but the TCL 55P607 blows information technology out of the water with a 507.85cd/mⁱⁱ superlative brightness and 0.02cd/grand² black level for a contrast ratio over five times greater. And different the TCL, the Element doesn't back up HDR.

Element 55-Inch Amazon Fire TV Edition

The chart in a higher place shows Rec. 709 color values as boxes and measured colour levels every bit dots using the warmest color temperature preset. The TV tin can reach a chip further by standard color levels with greens, but its whites skew slightly dark-green and reds are a bit undersaturated and yellowed. The TCL 55P607 reaches well past the standard color gamut while keeping colors much more authentic than the Element. The LeEco Super4 X55 also shows a far wider range of color while remaining accurate, with contrast levels similar to the Element's.

Planet Earth 2 on Ultra Hard disk drive Blu-ray looks very skilful on the Element despite its lack of HDR. Apart from panning sky shots that grab the lord's day, the scenes don't await particularly bright, simply shadow details remain intact in the shade and you can catch fine textures of dark fur and feathers. The TV's slightly greater reach into greens makes the lush jungle pop out, and the browns and grays of the ground and blues of the sky await counterbalanced and vivid.

The slightly undersaturated reds of the Element are apparent on Deadpool on Ultra Hard disk drive Blu-ray. Deadpool's scarlet costume looks natural merely not especially brilliant, and the ruby plaid of Wade's sherpa jacket at the start of the pic appears slightly drab. Skin tones besides look just slightly yellow-red under warm lights in indoor scenes, though they generally announced natural in virtually other lighting weather.

The Dandy Gatsby on Ultra Hard disk drive Blu-ray further highlights the Element's minor colour accuracy issues and shows off the TV's mediocre blackness level. Skin tones occasionally skew slightly pink or yellowish depending on the scene, appearing natural but virtually half the time. In high-dissimilarity scenes with lots of shadow, the full general contours of the black suits can be seen, simply the texture of the material and the individual cuts and creases are sometimes lost in muddied blackness. The tinting isn't overwhelming, and the shadows aren't overly dirty, just it isn't quite as dainty a movie every bit it could be.

Input Lag and Ability Consumption

Input lag is the amount of time betwixt a TV receiving a betoken and the brandish updating. In the Custom picture mode, the Element shows a high lxx.7ms input lag. The PC/Game picture fashion doesn't do much to help, displaying a 70ms input lag. The LeEco's Game picture manner shows half as much input lag at 36.7ms, while the TCL's halves that again to fifteen.1ms.

Under normal viewing conditions, the 55-inch Element consumes 125 watts, and has no power-saving picture modes or settings to speak of. This is in line with both the TCL and LeEco's calibrated picture show settings. Y'all can manually turn the backlight downwards to 70 percent to reduce the power consumption to 83 watts, darkening the screen slightly but keeping it very watchable.

Conclusions

Element's Amazon Fire TV Edition offers 4K resolution and all of the benefits of an Amazon Fire Television media streamer, including a microphone-equipped remote that lets yous utilise Amazon'south Alexa vox assistant, all at a very reasonable price. However, the Roku Boob tube-based TCL P-series simply has a far ameliorate movie for the aforementioned price, and that's ane of the nearly of import things to consider when shopping for a Television. The Element is by no means a bad option, but the TCL is a better buy, and remains our Editors' Choice.