Sony says their Live Colour LED technology delivers the deepest and most vibrant colors available on a smartphone

Who produces the best smartphone display? If you did not answer Sony, they are hoping that their new Live Colour LED technology will change your mind. Sony’s new screen tech is found on their latest flagship device, the Xperia Z2, which was announced at MWC last month. The phone represents the best that Sony has to offer, including the addition of Live Colour LED to their Triluminos screens that are powered by their X-Reality Engine.

We took the Xperia Z2 for a test run at MWC. It was an impressive phone with many improvements over its predecessor, the Xperia Z1. The Android 4.4 KitKat powered Xperia Z2 spouts high-end specifications, such as a 2.3GHz Snapdragon 801 CPU, 3GB of RAM, a 3200 mAh battery and the ability to shoot 4K video from its 20.7MP camera.

Sony’s Triluminos screen and X-Reality engine are not new, earning their stripes on Sony’s high-end televisions before making their way to phones like the Xperia Z Ultra last year. Keeping it brief, Triluminos technology uses light-emitting nanoparticles, referred to as quantum dots, that emit light in specific wavelengths – wavelengths that the human eye perceives as colors. Sony says that these quantum dots are able to produce a gamut of color 50% larger than conventional LCD technology.

Sony’s X-Reality Engine is a software process that breaks down texture, outline, contrast and color components of the video signal that is sent to the display. Each component is analyzed and processed to produce images and video that look sharper, with reduced noise, improved contrast and fine-tuned saturation levels. We took an in-depth look at Sony’s Triluminos and X-Realty Engine in the Xperia Z Ultra last year, check that out for more info, including this quick overview video from Sony themselves.

So, what makes this display better?

The display on the Xperia Z2 changes the game in two main ways: First, it replaces the old TFT display with a new 5.2-inch full HD IPS LCD, second, it adds Sony’s new Live Colour LED technology. The result is a crisper, cleaner display with brighter, more accurate and vibrant colors that are viewable at much greater angles than previous Sony smartphones.

True Colour LED

Sony is not giving up many details of their secret sauce True Colour LED technology, best describing it as the use of red and green phosphor with blue LEDs and customized colour filters to produce a brighter and more uniform light. Resulting in richer colors without saturation. They say their new Live Colour LED is a viewing experience as close to reality as possible.

François Simond and Erica Griffin have been testing out phones from MWC – they ran the Z2 through a spectrophotometer to determine the actual color output, their results are shown in the following images. The resulting color spectrum of the Z2 is represented as the white triangle, with the smaller inner triangle representing the spectrum that LCD displays are capable of producing. This also concludes that the combination of hardware and software enhancements in the Xperia Z2 renders very accurate colors – the dots in the spectrophotometer graphs below represent actual color measurements, the smooth and even linear layout indicates very accurately color rendering.

We took a little less scientific approach when we had the chance to put the Z1 and the Z2 side-by-side for a brief overview and look at the differences, why don’t you check that out as well.

Thanks to Sony’s True Colour LED enhancements in their new IPS display, it is possible that they have outshone the competition, leading to a crisper, cleaner, more colorful smartphone display future. We can’t wait for the Xperia Z2 to hit the market so that we can get our hands on it for an extended look and full review. Just as important, we can’t wait to have both the Z2 and the Samsung Galaxy S5 in hand so that we can continue the raging debates – which is the better device and who has the better display?