LG Electronics is improving the Gaming Portal on its smart TVs, adding the prospect of superior, super-fast 4K 120Hz gaming via Nvidia’s cloud-based GeForce NOW platform.
LG’s Gaming Portal was launched earlier this year within the webOS operating system, and is currently available in 30 countries. It’s available on its OLED smart TVs, LCD-based QNED televisions and many of its gaming monitors that run webOS 6.0 or above. It launched the service in partnership with Xbox, giving users access to the Xbox app and its Game Pass Ultimate library, as well as other cloud gaming services.
With this week’s update, LG said the Gaming Portal will become the first in the world to support 4K gaming at 120Hz, exclusively via GeForce NOW. The new capability won’t actually be available until next month though, but when it does arrive it will set a “new benchmark for immersive, high-performance streaming experiences,” the company promised.
In its own announcement, Nvidia explained that it has made this possible by utilising its Blackwell GPU architecture-based GeForce RTX 5080 GPUs, which now power the servers behind GeForce NOW. Those are some of the most powerful chips Nvidia builds, and they do all of the heavy lifting behind the scenes before streaming it directly to the user’s TV or monitor.
To start with, the feature will only come to its 2025 OLED TVs, such as the LG G5 and C5 models, before expanding to many other models later in the year.
Aside from 4K 120Hz gaming, there’s a new “Play with Gamepad” feature in the menu that provides quick access to user’s favourite cloud gaming services, which could be Amazon Luna, Blacknut. Boosteroid, GeForce NOW or Xbox Game Pass. It should also make it a bit simpler to play games using a third-party gamepad or controller.
Elsewhere, there’s a new “High Score Competition” that seems likely to appeal to those with a competitive streak, presenting players the opportunity to try and rise to the top of its leaderboards in the games of their choice.
A refreshed lineup of options appears in the “Recommended for You” section of the menu, though this seems like it’s going to be used mainly for promotions, rather than games that might actually interest you, based on your earlier gaming endeavors. Among the offerings, it’s touting a discount of 20% on wireless controllers for European users.
Moving on, LG said it will continue to expand its “diverse library” of available games, offering individual subscriptions to titles from Blacknut, so users can pay for only the games they want, instead of subscribing to the whole service. It also promised to keep changing up its portfolio of free-to-play streaming games through its partnership with Playworks. At present, it offers classic titles including Pac-Man, Tetris and Wheel of Fortune.
“With over 4,000 cloud-based titles and 600 free single and multiplayer games, LG’s Gaming Portal is quickly becoming an all-in-one hub for every player,” said LG’s Head of webOS Platform Business Centre, Chris Jo. “Through new UX upgrades and a growing ecosystem of partners, we are bringing every kind of game closer to users worldwide through their effortless discovery.”
The update is rolling out now to LG TV and monitor owners in the U.K., U.S., Canada, South Korea, Ireland and multiple European countries.
