OLEDs are used to create digital displays in devices such as television screens, computer monitors, portable systems such as mobile phones, handheld games consoles and PDAs.

There are two main families of OLEDs: those based on small molecules and those employing polymers.

Polymer OLEDs are quite efficient and require a relatively small amount of power for the amount of light produced.

; Outdoor performance: As an emissive display technology, OLEDs rely completely upon converting electricity to light, unlike most LCDs which are to some extent reflective ; e-ink leads the way in efficiency with ~ 33 % ambient light reflectivity, enabling the display to be used without any internal light source.

There are by now thousands of patents associated with OLEDs, both from larger corporations and smaller technology companies.

Organic light-emitting diodes ( OLEDs ) are normally used instead of a back-light for flexible displays, making a flexible organic light-emitting diode display.

An example of non-SLM system are OLEDs.

OLEDs and SEDs are similar to FEDs in power terms.

Regular OLEDs are usually fabricated on a glass substrate, but by replacing glass with a flexible plastic such as polyethylene terephthalate ( PET ) among others, OLEDs can be made both bendable and lightweight.

Although ITO is the most common and best understood anode material used in OLEDs, research has been undertaken into alternative materials that are better suited for flexible applications including carbon nanotubes.

Phosphorescent organic light-emitting diodes ( PHOLED ) are a type of organic light-emitting diode ( OLED ) that use the principle of phosphorescence to obtain higher internal efficiencies than fluorescent OLEDs.

Due to their potentially high level of energy efficiency, even when compared to other OLEDs, PHOLEDs are being studied for potential use in large-screen displays such as computer monitors or television screens, as well as general lighting needs.

Active-matrix OLEDs ( AMOLED ) require a thin-film transistor backplane to switch each individual pixel on or off, but allow for higher resolution and larger display sizes.

Molecules commonly used in OLEDs include organometallic chelates ( for example Alq < sub > 3 </ sub >, used in the organic light-emitting device reported by Tang et al.

This high flexibility in layer design, enabling distinct charge transport and charge blocking layers to be formed, is the main reason for the high efficiencies of the small molecule OLEDs.

Applications of OLEDs in solid state lighting require the achievement of high brightness with good CIE coordinates ( for white emission ).

The use of macromolecular species like polyhedral oligomeric silsesquioxanes ( POSS ) in conjunction with the use of phosphorescent species such as Ir for printed OLEDs have exhibited brightnesses as high as 10, 000 cd / m < sup > 2 </ sup >.

; Lifespan: The biggest technical problem for OLEDs was the limited lifetime of the organic materials.

In particular, blue OLEDs historically have had a lifetime of around 14, 000 hours to half original brightness ( five years at 8 hours a day ) when used for flat-panel displays.

In 2007, experimental OLEDs were created which can sustain 400 cd / m < sup > 2 </ sup > of luminance for over 198, 000 hours for green OLEDs and 62, 000 hours for blue OLEDs.

; Efficiency of blue OLEDs: Improvements to the efficiency and lifetime of blue OLEDs is vital to the success of OLEDs as replacements for LCD technology.

Such portable applications favor the high light output of OLEDs for readability in sunlight and their low power drain.

The company, originally a split-off from the Hoechst AG, and headquartered in the Höchst Industrial Park, produces organic light-emitting materials for OLEDs.

From the mid-1980s onwards, VFDs were used for applications requiring smaller displays with high brightness specifications, though now the adoption of high-brightness organic light-emitting diodes ( OLEDs ) is pushing VFDs out of these markets.

However multilayer OLEDs can be fabricated with two or more layers in order to improve device efficiency.

; Transparent OLEDs: Transparent OLEDs use transparent or semi-transparent contacts on both sides of the device to create displays that can be made to be both top and bottom emitting ( transparent ).

; Lower cost in the future: OLEDs can be printed onto any suitable substrate by an inkjet printer or even by screen printing ,< ref > theoretically making them cheaper to produce than LCD or plasma displays.

; Wider viewing angles & improved brightness: OLEDs can enable a greater artificial contrast ratio ( both dynamic range and static, measured in purely dark conditions ) and viewing angle compared to LCDs because OLED pixels directly emit light.

; Response time: OLEDs can also have a faster response time than standard LCD screens.

Flexible OLEDs may be used in the production of rollable displays, electronic paper, or bendable displays which can be integrated into clothing, wallpaper or other curved surfaces.

The use of OLEDs may be subject to patents held by Eastman Kodak, DuPont, General Electric, Royal Philips Electronics, numerous universities and others.

Active camouflage may now develop using organic light-emitting diodes ( OLEDs ) and other technologies which allow for images to be projected onto irregularly-shaped surfaces.

Hence it would be expected that in fluorescent OLEDs only the formation of singlet excitons results in the emission of useful radiation, placing a theoretical limit on the internal quantum efficiency ( the percentage of excitons formed that result in emission of a photon ) of 25 %.

The different manufacturing process of OLEDs lends itself to several advantages over flat panel displays made with LCD technology.

Considerable research has been invested in developing blue OLEDs with high external quantum efficiency as well as a deeper blue color.

), Highly Efficient OLEDs with Phosphorescent Materials.

By 2004 Samsung was the world's-largest manufacturer of OLEDs, with a 40 percent market share worldwide, and as of 2010 has a 98 % share of the global AMOLED market.

Organic light-emitting diodes ( OLEDs ) with graphene anodes have also been demonstrated.

Due to its optical and mechanical characteristics in relation with cost, BK7 is a common substrate in OLEDs.

Originally, the most basic polymer OLEDs consisted of a single organic layer.

Many modern OLEDs incorporate a simple bilayer structure, consisting of a conductive layer and an emissive layer.

Efficient OLEDs using small molecules were first developed by Dr. Ching W. Tang et al.

; Graded Heterojunction: Graded heterojunction OLEDs gradually decrease the ratio of electron holes to electron transporting chemicals.

This results in almost double the quantum efficiency of existing OLEDs.

; Stacked OLEDs: Stacked OLEDs use a pixel architecture that stacks the red, green, and blue subpixels on top of one another instead of next to one another, leading to substantial increase in gamut and color depth, and greatly reducing pixel gap.