A backlight unit has a light-guide plate and a light source optically coupled with the light-guide plate, with which light is input from a plane of the light-guide plate and white-light is output from the first principal plane of the light-guide plate. The light source has a plurality of blue light emitting diodes, red phosphor material excited by light from the blue light emitting diodes and emits red light, and a plurality of green semiconductor lasers having emission peaks at green light wavelengths. The red phosphor material is included in a phosphor sheet, and the phosphor sheet is disposed on a surface of the light-guide plate.