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15 Jan 2025
Analyst company expecting annual shipments of nearly 35 million in 2031.
A new report from market research company Omdia suggests that microLED displays are finally set to gain a commercial foothold over the next few years, but will remain a niche technology.
The London-based consultancy reckons that annual shipments will grow from a near-negligible level thus far to reach half a million units in 2026, rising to nearly 35 million by 2031.
However, even that latter total will only represent less than a 1 per cent share of the total display market by then, as the technology only becomes competitive in a few select applications - typically either very small or very large displays.
Defect challenge
The firm’s latest forecast comes as the microLED sector looks to recover from last year's shock decision by Apple not to use the technology in its latest smart watches, a move that prompted its key supplier ams Osram to exit the sector, at a predicted cost of €700 million.
In principle microLED technology, which typically means individual red, green, and blue emitters measuring up to 100 µm in size, offers a number of advantages over current organic LED and LCD displays - including significant improvements to brightness, color gamut, contrast, response time, lifetime, and energy efficiency.
However, because of their tiny size a huge number of LEDs are needed to create each display. And while the production yield of defect-free emitters has improved dramatically, even a near-perfect manufacturing process will still produce some “dead” pixels, ultimately making current microLED displays extremely expensive.
That challenge was highlighted in another recent market report on the topic, with Eric Virey from Yole Intelligence saying: “The [microLED] industry now faces the challenge of moving from proof-of-concept to mass production.
“It must prove it can deliver high-performance, defect-free displays at scale while achieving economies of scale to remain viable.”
XR momentum
Having made significant downward revisions to its forecast following the Apple bombshell, Omdia now expects the initial growth of the market to come from applications in ultra-small-scale displays for extended reality (XR) hardware.
In particular, it sees potential in smart glasses for outdoor use where brightness is critical, with its analyst Jerry Kang stating: “Smart glasses require lightweight designs, low-power consumption, and high readability under sunlight.
“A few LEDoS [i.e. LED-on-silicon] suppliers have already achieved diagonal sizes as small as 0.15 inch, making them more suitable for lightweight smart glasses compared to other display technologies.”
After initially dominating the emerging sector, Kang reckons that XR devices will go on to account for around a quarter of the microLED display market in 2031.
MicroLED TVs
According to Omdia a number of display manufacturers unveiled new micro LED display prototypes in 2024, mainly targeting automotive, public displays, and virtual studios. “This trend suggests that suppliers are anticipating greater adoption of microLED displays in niche applications,” it reported.
“Due to the low-cost competitiveness, many display suppliers are focusing on penetrating product segments where OLED or LCD struggle to meet customer demands for specific display sizes and performance,” added Kang.
“Simultaneously, several component and equipment suppliers are proactively introducing advanced technologies to enhance the manufacturing of microLED displays.”
Last week’s CES event in Las Vegas saw some further developments in microLED TV displays, with Samsung reportedly showing off an 8K all-RGB-backlit model measuring 98 inches in size, and indicating that it could launch commercial versions later this year.
Rival Hisense showcased a giant 136-inch microLED TV, deploying what it called a "consumer-ready" technology featuring some 25 million individual emitters that it claimed would “set the stage for the next decade of display advancements”.
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