# OLED OLED (Organic Light-Emitting Diode) is a display technology in which each individual pixel emits its own light, rather than being lit from behind by a single backlight as in older LCD screens. Because a pixel can switch fully off, OLED produces true blacks, very high contrast, thin and flexible panels, and lower power use on dark content. It is now standard on flagship phones and high-end TVs. The main trade-offs are higher cost and "burn-in," where static images can leave faint permanent ghosts over years of use. ## Why it matters here OLED is essentially neutral consumer-electronics literacy — included so other entries can reference display tech without a detour. The only faint thread to the vault's concerns is burn-in as a soft form of wear: like a degrading [[Lithium-Ion Battery]], a screen that develops burn-in becomes a lifespan limiter, feeding the [[Planned Obsolescence]] conversation at the margins. Panel manufacturing is also concentrated in South Korea and China, so it sits inside the broader display [[Supply Chain]], but it has not been a flashpoint the way logic chips are. ## See Also - [[Lithium-Ion Battery]] — the other component that wears out and limits device lifespan - [[Semiconductor]] — the adjacent chip-manufacturing world