Leonida Press
GearUpdated September 25, 2026

The best TV for GTA 6 is probably the one you already own

Anyone selling you a television for Grand Theft Auto VI is working from the same information you are, which is none. Rockstar has published no display specification for this game. No resolution, no frame rate, no performance or fidelity modes, no HDR, no ray tracing, no 120Hz, no VRR. We read both store listings directly today and neither carries a single figure of that kind.

What the platform holders publish is thinner than it looks. Sony’s listing carries a PS5 Pro Enhanced badge, and Sony has never published a page saying what that badge changes for any individual game. Microsoft’s carries Optimized for Xbox Series X|S, a compatibility label rather than a number. Neither is about the picture.

So a “best TV for GTA 6” list would have to be invented. This is the other version: what your console actually asks of a screen, which of those things you can fix for free this afternoon, and the one genuine risk worth thinking about before launch week. Our TV settings guide goes deeper on the picture menus once you have the signal working at all.

The single most common fault is a setting, not a cable

If your console is connected with the right cable to a port that can carry 4K120, and it is still outputting 60Hz, the reason is usually that the television has not been told to accept the better signal. Most makers ship that switch turned off, per port, and give it a name nobody would guess.

On an LG set it is called HDMI Ultra HD Deep Color, it lives in Detailed Settings under General, and LG’s own instructions are per-port and end with a reboot: “Check if the currently connected HDMI port is set to Off. If it is set to Off, change it to On so that the TV can support 4K images. Press the Restart button again to restart the TV and finish the settings.” LG also documents that its Game Optimizer mode depends on it, telling owners to “set the HDMI Ultra HD Deep Color function of the HDMI port connected to the device to On to enable the game optimization mode.”

On a current Sony BRAVIA the same idea is called HDMI signal format, under Channels & Inputs, External inputs, with three choices: Standard format, Enhanced format, and Enhanced format (Advanced). Sony’s instruction for a console is specific. “If you connect a video game console that supports 4K 120 Hz video output, set to [Enhanced format (Advanced)].” Sony adds that “Available HDMI signal formats depend on your model and the HDMI input”, which is the next problem.

On other brands the setting exists under a different name, and your maker’s support pages will name it. Worth ten minutes before launch night rather than during it.

Not every HDMI port on your TV is the same port

This catches people who did everything else right. On many sets only some of the HDMI inputs carry full bandwidth, and the console does not warn you when you picked the wrong one.

LG publishes an actual table for this, listing which of its models run full bandwidth on All Ports and which run it on Port 3 / 4 Only. Across the model years LG documents there, 22 entries take any port and nine are restricted to two of them, and the restriction lands on the cheaper model in a range more often than not. LG’s table stops at 2021, so treat it as proof that the asymmetry is real rather than as a lookup for a set bought since.

Sony does not publish a per-model table and instead tells you to go and look at the back of the television: “When connecting a video game console that supports 4K 120Hz and VRR, check the label of the HDMI input ports on the TV and connect to the HDMI input port that is labeled 4K 120Hz or connect to the HDMI input port that is displayed as [VRR (Variable Refresh Rate)] for [HDMI signal format].”

Sony Interactive Entertainment says the same from the console side. Its troubleshooting list for a missing 4K120 signal asks whether “the PS5 console [is] connected to an appropriate HDMI port (2.1) on the TV”, and notes that “HDMI 2.1 support may require that you change settings via the TV.”

If you own a soundbar it is probably occupying one of these ports already, because the eARC input is usually a specific numbered port too. Check what your set reserves before assuming you have a spare good one.

“HDMI 2.1” on a box is not a promise, and HDMI says so itself

The clearest statement on this comes from HDMI Licensing Administrator, the body that runs the specification. Asked whether the features are mandatory, it answers: “Support for each HDMI 2.1 feature is optional.” Asked whether a version number describes a feature set, it answers: “Specification version numbers are not feature sets as the features are optional.”

A manufacturer may legitimately market a product as HDMI 2.1 while supporting none of the things you want from it. What HDMI does require is disclosure: “If the manufacturer promotes compliance with the HDMI 2.1 Specification, the manufacturer is required to list the HDMI 2.1 features supported by the product next to that messaging.” The feature list beside the badge is the part to read. The badge itself tells you nothing.

The same logic applies to the HGiG setting in your TV’s HDR menu. HGiG is a real group, and it has publicly disowned the menu item bearing its name, stating that “HGIG mode” is “not a product function defined in the HGIG guidelines”. Its own published position is blunt: “HGIG is not a standardization body” and “HGIG does not have acertification program” [sic]. Nothing certifies it.

Microsoft’s own pages disagree about the cable in your box

Cables are the one place where a certification genuinely means something, because the Ultra High Speed HDMI Cable category is defined by bandwidth and the testing is compulsory. HDMI describes it as “applicable for system configurations supporting up to 48Gbps maximum bandwidth and 8K@60 and 4K@120 formats”, and says of the certification behind it: “It is a mandatory certification program.” The packaging carries a label you can check yourself, since “the labels can be scanned by standard QR code apps.”

Both consoles ship with a cable, and here Microsoft contradicts itself. The Xbox Series X and Series S product pages each say the box contains an “Ultra High Speed HDMI cable”. Microsoft’s own support FAQ says something different: “The XBOX Series X uses a 2-meter (6.56-foot) HDMI 2.1 cable, while the XBOX Series S uses a 2-meter HDMI 2.0 cable.” Those are not the same claim. One says both consoles ship the fastest certified category, the other says the Series S ships a slower cable.

Note what Microsoft has done there. It describes its own cables by specification version, which is exactly the shorthand HDMI Licensing Administrator says carries no meaning. Its “What’s in the box” support page does use the categories, and sides with the FAQ: an “Ultra High Speed HDMI cable” for the Series X and a “High Speed HDMI cable” for the Series S. We cannot resolve which page is current, so a Series S owner should read the jacket of the cable in the box, where the certified category has to be printed, rather than trusting any one page.

Sony never names a category for its own bundled cable, recommending “the cable included with the PS5 console” and otherwise “an Ultra High Speed HDMI™ Cable”. Sony’s TV division sets the bar in numbers: “To display 4K 100/120 Hz or 8K picture, an Ultra High Speed HDMI™ Cable that supports 48 Gbps is required.”

If you have lost the original, or you are running a longer cable across a room, a certified Ultra High Speed cable is the one purchase in this guide that reliably fixes something. Buy on the certification label, not the listing copy, and scan the code on the packet. We will be straightforward about our own position here, because HDMI Licensing Administrator raises it first: it warns that “many websites may recommend cables only based on receiving affiliate payments.” This page carries affiliate links. It also tells you the free checks come first, and that a cable is worth buying only once you have ruled them out.

The console settings, by their real names

On PS5, everything lives under Settings, Screen and Video, Video Output. Turn on 120 Hz Output, described by Sony as enabling “120 Hz video output for your TV and games that support 120 Hz frame rate”. Turn on VRR, where Sony’s own hedge is worth keeping in mind: “Results vary depending on the TV you’re using.” Apply to Unsupported Games extends the smoothing to games that do not implement VRR, and Sony says to turn it off if anything behaves oddly.

The trap is Video Transfer Rate. It fixes flickering by limiting output, and the limits include the mode you probably want: Sony lists 4K 120 Hz first among the outputs that the -1 and -2 settings restrict. If a past troubleshooting session left it there, 4K120 will not appear and nothing on screen will explain why. On PS5 Pro there is also a plain trade rather than an upgrade, because “VRR is disabled during 8K output”.

On Xbox, Microsoft’s settings are named plainly: Allow auto low-latency mode, Allow variable refresh rate, Allow HDR10 and Allow Dolby Vision. Microsoft states the requirement as “for 4K @ 120hz, you’ll need an HDMI 2.1 compliant display”, which, by HDMI’s own rules above, means checking the feature list rather than the badge.

The one real risk: a permanent HUD on an OLED

This game will put a minimap, a weapon wheel and a health bar in the same pixels for hundreds of hours, and people leave games paused. LG’s own troubleshooting page lists the causes of burn-in, and the second item is “Pausing a video game and leaving the TV on for prolonged periods”, alongside static channel logos and running the panel bright.

LG is not hiding from it. Its sets run a pixel-cleaning routine automatically “after every 4 hours of cumulative use” plus a longer pass at 2,000 hours, there is a screen saver that engages on a paused video and “cannot be turned off”, and a logo-dimming setting. Sony’s guidance on the manual refresh is a caution rather than a feature: run it “only when image retention is particularly noticeable” and “avoid performing it more than once a year because it may affect the usable life of the panel.”

The part to read before buying is the warranty. LG’s published US television warranty lists what it does not cover, and the list includes, as its own line item, “image burn-in”. The same exclusion appears in LG’s OLED-specific warranty document. The manufacturer that publishes the most detailed burn-in mitigation also declines to cover the outcome.

None of that means do not buy an OLED. It means: if you buy one, turn the screen saver on, leave logo dimming on, and do not leave Vice City paused overnight. An LCD-based set has no such failure mode and is the safer choice for someone who genuinely does pause and walk away.

If you are replacing a TV anyway

Buy the set for the next six years of everything you watch, not for one game with no published specification. In priority order: a panel that accepts 4K at 120Hz on the specific inputs you will actually use, VRR stated as a feature rather than implied by a version number, and a low-latency game mode. If your budget stops before all three, take the game mode and forget 120Hz, because Rockstar has not said this game offers a 120Hz mode on any console.

A search scoped to 4K 120Hz televisions is a reasonable starting point, but read each listing’s feature list against the rules above rather than its headline badge.

And if you are not replacing a TV, the answer is the honest one. Check the port, turn on the deep colour setting, confirm the cable, set the console menus, and spend the money on the game.

Sources

Every one of these was opened first-hand on 23 September 2026, except the “What’s in the box” support page, opened on 25 September 2026.