Philips is a leader in the development of electronic devices and home appliances. The world-renowned company has tens of thousands of patents and invests a lot of money in new products, especially those related to medical diagnostics. It is a pity that it left the market of home video equipment; yes, it is; I will tell you more about it in this article.

Philips TV models number explained

In 2012, Philips’s management decided to exit the TV business. It was a difficult period, the revenues from TV sales were declining, but a lot of investments in new developments were needed, especially in screens; Philips considered it advisable to stop producing TVs. But as you understand, in today’s world, a name has value; yes, Philips TVs had a name, so the brand was licensed, and Philips TVs continued to be sold. But they were only Philips televisions with the Philips name. The Philips TVs are on the official Philips website; this is also one of the policies of the licensing agreement; Philips presents the TV models on their website, which gives a positive impression to the customer.

Who makes Philips TVs

In North America, the rights to the brand were bought by the Japanese company Funai. Funai has factories for assembling various devices, including televisions. The company is not involved in the technical development of televisions; it only makes finished televisions from components in its factories. Sales of Philips televisions in the U.S. and Canada were low. The company stopped investing in this market in 2017, and in 2020 and 2021, there was an attempt to return to the market with several new TV models, but judging by the fact that these models are marked as new on the website, this attempt was again unsuccessful.

Europe – The Philips TV brand is owned by the Chinese company TP Vision, which bought the brand from Philips and the TV assembly facilities. As I said before, Philips has decided to stop manufacturing televisions. Since 2012, all Philips TVs have been manufactured by Chinese companies. TP Vizion is a large company that also assembles TVs to order. Given Philips’ very high name rating, the company has remained in the market. The line of TVs in Europe is constantly being updated.

Now about TV model numbers: in 2012, the assignment of model numbers to TVs was retained. But you should know that the lifecycle of Philips TVs is divided into two phases until 2012 – these are genuine Philips TVs. After 2012 – these became licensed televisions. I will now tell you how to understand the technical characteristics of TVs, find out the year of assembly, the type of screen that is installed in the TV, and understand the model number of the TV.

Philips TV model number lookup

How to find the model number of your TV. If you want to buy a TV and are researching available TVs, you can find the model number on the retailer’s website or the Philips website. If you already own a TV and you need to find the model number and a serial number of the TV, look for this information in places like this:

• You can find the model of your TV by looking at the label on the back of the TV. This will have basic information about the TV, including the serial number.
• If you cannot see the sticker or it is missing, which is very unlikely, but it happens that the TV is mounted on the wall and the mount covers the sticker, you can find the model number from the TV menu. Since there are many variants of TVs with different operating systems (Android, Roku, etc.) I will describe in brief how to see the model number of TV on Android

Find the model number and serial number of Philips OS Android TV only (2015-2017)

Press the Home button on the remote control. Select the [Help] option on the bottom line of the screen, then press “OK.”
Select the [Contact info] option and press “OK.”
A screen showing the model and the TV serial number appears.

Searching for model numbers on other years’ Philips TVs

• While watching a TV channel, press “1 2 3 6 5 4” on the TV remote control as quickly as you would if you wanted to change the channel; this is just a code that activates a particular subroutine of the operating system.
• A menu will appear with the model number on the first line.
• Exit the menu with the home button.

There is also a box from the TV; if you still have it, it also has a sticker with information about the TV.

TV Philips model number  2012-2022 decode

Model number  Philips TV mean

The model number of a Philips TV consists of several information groups. And the model number of your Philips TV has this information:

• 50 – diagonal screen size inches
• P – TV this model number belongs to the TVs

The following three symbols (PUS) apply to LED TVs, in OLED TVs replaced by OLED, e.g., 65OLED706/79. This is so the customer can immediately recognize this is an OLED TV model.

Screen Type on Philips TV

The fourth symbol is the type of display; until 2021, it was the screen resolution. Then came the letter M, which indicates that the TV used a mini LED backlight; the back of the screen is several hundred mini LEDs, in fact, nothing special; you can just slightly better control the TV backlight. To put it simply, the principle of backlighting of the screen is changed; there are more LEDs, but they are smaller in size. And, of course, the marketing how not to stand out such a TV among all other televisions.

• U – resolution
  • H – HD,
  • F – Full HD,
  • U – UHD,
  • O – OLED until 2019
  • M – mini LED

Type of digital tuner on a Philips TV

Digital tuners in TVs are installed depending on which standard is adopted in the country. In the USA, for example, ATSC is the standard in Europe, DVB. The fifth symbol is the type of tuner.

• S – type digital tuner
  • H – DVB – T/C,
  • K – DVB – T/C/S/S2,
  • T – DVB – T/T2/C,
  • S – DVB – T/T2/C/S/S2,
  • L – ATSC (US, Canada)
• 7 – Series
• 6 – model in the series
• 5 – design
• 7 – year of development 

How to know what year Philips TV is

Now a little about how to determine what year Philips TV is. You can use the model number to determine your Philips TV’s year. Philips uses a ten-year cycle for its televisions. That doesn’t mean that, for example, a 2022 and 2012 TV will have the number 7 at the end; you have to look closely at the TV serial number for other features. For example, in 2012, there were no 4K resolution TVs; the TVs were made with Full HD screens, so the model numbers are 50PFK5677, but in 2022, there are almost no Full HD TVs, and the 2022 model numbers are 50PUS6787.

• 7 – 2012, 2022
  • 8 – 2013, 2023
  • 9 – 2014, 2024
  • 0 -2015, 2025
  • 1 – 2016, 2026
  • 2 – 2017, 2027
  • 3 – 2018, 2028
  • 4 – 2019, 2029
  • 5 – 2020, 2030
  • 6 – 2021, 2031
• 12 – Country or region for which the TV was produced.

How old is my TV Philips

Now let’s see if you have a Philips TV and want to know what year it is. As I said earlier, you can use the model number to find out the year the TV was designed. But that doesn’t mean it’s the year the TV was made. The TV model is manufactured in one year, e.g., Philips TVs are manufactured from Q2 to Q2. So, for example, 2022 year model year, the production cycle is Q2 2022 to Q2 2023. The same goes for the other years. If you have trouble identifying a TV, you can ask a question in the comments, and I will try to help you.

2022

In 2022, Philips TVs will come in three flavors: LED, Mini, and OLED. The TVs traditionally use the Android operating system. When it comes to OLED screens, the screens are purchased from LG and LEDs from other manufacturers, which is the norm in today’s world. Philips 2022 TVs might have been more progressive in specifications, but they are better than dozens of new TV brands. But of course, if you want a TV with a full range of advanced technical features, look to LG or Samsung.

2019

2019 Philips TVs have mostly stayed the same; they use Android OS, and several models of TVs with OLED screens are presented. Unfortunately, Philips TVs are losing their market position after the change in brand ownership; new technology development has slowed.

2018

TP Vision The Chinese company, which acquired the right to use the Philips brand in the name of the TV in 2011, was recently clearly outperforming the leading Korean and Japanese TV manufacturers as an innovative platform. In 2018, the intelligent platform (interface) was updated and was called Saphi Smart TV. It is a TV management visualization program that runs on the Android operating system used by Philips. In some countries, the name Smart TV may be different; for example, in the US, such a platform is NetTV.
As before, televisions use the backlight of the room behind the Ambilight TV.
Otherwise, there are no innovations; all have the same HDR and UHD screen resolution.

2017

In 2017, Philips began production of TVs with OLED screens. As with other TV manufacturers, the main advantages are support for HDR video and 4K screen resolution. And also patented in due time system Ambilight, backlights from the back of the TV depending on the image on the screen.
Philips TV 2014 model number decode
22PFK4109/12
P (PFK) – TV
Н (PHK) – screen resolution Н-HD, F-Full HD, U- UHD
H (PFH) – digital tuners H-DVB-T/C,К-DVB-T/C/S/S2,T-DVB-T/T2/C,S-T/T2/C/S/S2,L-ATSC/
4 – series
10 – model in the series
9 – year (7-2012, 8-2013, 9-2014, 0-2015 )