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Flexible organic light-emitting diodes (OLEDs) hold great promise for future bendable display and curved lighting applications. One key challenge of high-performance flexible OLEDs is to develop new flexible transparent conductive electrodes with superior mechanical, electrical, and optical properties. Herein, an effective nanostructured metal/dielectric composite electrode on a plastic substrate is reported by combining a quasi-random outcoupling structure for broadband and angle-independent light outcoupling of white emission with an ultrathin metal alloy film for optimum optical transparency, electrical conduction, and mechanical flexibility. The microcavity effect and surface plasmonic loss can be remarkably reduced in white flexible OLEDs, resulting in a substantial increase in the external quantum efficiency and power efficiency to 47.2% and 112.4 lm W(-1).

Enhancing light outcoupling in flexible organic light-emitting diodes (FOLEDs) is an important task for increasing their efficiencies for display and lighting applications. Here, a strategy for an angularly and spectrally independent boost in light outcoupling of FOLEDs is demonstrated by using plastic substrates with a low refractive index, consisting of a bioinspired optical coupling layer and a transparent conductive electrode composed of a silver network. The good transmittance to full-color emission (>94% over the whole visible wavelength range), ultralow sheet resistance to carrier injection (<5 Ω sq(-1)), and high tolerance to mechanical bending of the ameliorated plastic substrates synergistically optimize the device performance of FOLEDs. The maximum power efficiencies reach 47, 93, 56, and 52 lm W(-1) for red, green, blue, and white emissions, which are competitive with similarly structured OLEDs fabricated on traditional indium-tin-oxide (ITO) glass. This paradigm for light outcoupling enhancement in ITO-free FOLEDs offers additional features and design freedoms for highly efficient flexible optoelectronics in large-scale and low-cost manufacturing without the need for a high-refractive-index plastic substrate.

Because of their mechanical flexibility, organic light-emitting diodes (OLEDs) hold great promise as a leading technology for display and lighting applications in wearable electronics. The development of flexible OLEDs requires high-quality transparent conductive electrodes with superior bendability and roll-to-roll manufacturing compatibility to replace indium tin oxide (ITO) anodes. Here, we present a flexible transparent conductor on plastic with embedded silver networks which is used to achieve flexible, highly power-efficient large-area green and white OLEDs. By combining an improved outcoupling structure for simultaneously extracting light in waveguide and substrate modes and reducing the surface plasmonic losses, flexible white OLEDs exhibit a power efficiency of 106 lm W(-1) at 1000 cd m(-2) with angular color stability, which is significantly higher than all other reports of flexible white OLEDs. These results represent an exciting step toward the realization of ITO-free, high-efficiency OLEDs for use in a wide variety of high-performance flexible applications.