That's because there's no reason for most people to buy another TV. The majority of people who would want one already have a TV, and there has been no technological advancement in the last decade or two that would entice anyone to throw away their already perfectly acceptable large LCD/OLED/whatever television just to buy another one just like it.
The only thing anyone has been able to come up with is making all TV's internet connected and "smart," which is a feature that approximately nobody except the MBA's in charge of the companies cranking them out seems to actually want.
This. Nowadays people mostly buy TVs when their old ones break. There's no marginal improvement. The industry is here to stay, but its high growth days are in the past.
We have also seen the budget range improve in quality and affordability. There will always be cheap junk TVs and overly expensive TVs, but that midrange, where most people buy, has become rock solid. There just isnāt much region to upgrade at the moment.
And we've mostly hit the limit of usable maximum sizes. For like the last two decades you could upgrade your TV to the next bigger size every few years for the same money you paid for the last one.
I remember starting with a maybe... 21" LCD TV back in 2005ish, and for that money today I could get like 70" TV.
I don't have space to fit one that large, nor do I have any need for it even if I could.
This tends to track with what I see in my family and friendās homes. People tend to do couch streaming via the smart TVās apps.
Personally, I think a fast, separate HDMI CEC device is a MUCH better user experience, and itās still one remote. But for whatever reason, a lot of people arenāt opting to go with a separate AppleTV, GoogleTV ChromeCast, Roku, game console, etc.
But do they use it because itās there, or do they actually go out and buy a TV because of the smart features? Iād much rather have a separate device (and do) than use the built in smart features. I would greatly prefer to buy a TV with no smart features and just continue using my AppleTV than have to buy a new TV every time the built in system stopped getting updates.
There was a time when people were buying the smart TV because Netflix and Apple were then apps on the TV and used the same remote.
But the apps are old and crunchy, the tv shovels ads at you, and the steamers are no longer offering the value required to make smart TVs a prime consolidation target.
I am looking forward to the contraction of the market and a shift back to "just a TV with 4 HDMIs" models. No tuners even.
The one thing I disagree with is the technological advancement. I feel like there has been advancement, but the problem is the cost of those advancements. No one is pining to drop thousands/tens of thousands of dollars on OLED, Micro-led, or whatever the hell else they have come out with over the years. On top of that the crappy interfaces of these TV's as well as privacy problems. See the recent roku debacle.