Promising operational stability of high-efficiency organic light-emitting diodes based on thermally activated delayed fluorescence

Organic light-emitting diodes (OLEDs) are attractive for next-generation displays and lighting applications because of their potential for high electroluminescence (EL) efficiency, flexibility and low-cost manufacture. Although phosphorescent emitters containing rare metals such as iridium or platinum produce devices with high EL efficiency, these metals are expensive and their blue emission remains unreliable for practical applications. Recently, a new route to high EL efficiency using materials that emit through thermally activated delayed fluorescence (TADF) was demonstrated. However, it is unclear whether devices that emit through TADF, which originates from the contributions of triplet excitons, are reliable. Here we demonstrate highly efficient, stable OLEDs that emit via TADF by controlling the position of the carrier recombination zone, resulting in projected lifetimes comparable to those of tris(2-phenylpyridinato) iridium(III)-based reference OLEDs. Our results indicate that TADF is intrinsically stable under electrical excitation and optimization of the surrounding materials will enhance device reliability.