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Other Eye-strain while using iPhone X and up

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Re: announcement today of the new iPhone 12 models.

We're screwed.

I know nothing has been tested yet, but I saw nothing today that would lead me to believe they did anything to fix (or even just improve) the PWM issue. I guess we will just have to wait for the tests and reports to come in...
 
kerplunknet said:
I am sure you've tried this, TDDM, but make sure you use a passcode instead of Face ID (aka disable Face ID) and make sure "Require Attention for Face ID" and "Attention Aware Features" are both disabled. (Well, I guess you probably don't have your XR anymore, so nevermind!)
Click to expand...
Yeah, unfortunately, I still have eye strain on non-Face ID devices. I’ve pretty much ruled that out in my case :/

kerplunknet said:
Re: announcement today of the new iPhone 12 models.

We're screwed.

I know nothing has been tested yet, but I saw nothing today that would lead me to believe they did anything to fix (or even just improve) the PWM issue. I guess we will just have to wait for the tests and reports to come in...
Click to expand...

My only hope is that since they didn’t give us any kind of non-OLED choice this time, that they may have further increased the Hz rate from the 290 in the 11 Pro. Honestly though, I still don’t think it’s healthy to be staring at a constantly flickering screen anyway. Maybe this’ll cause more people to become aware of the issue and the industry will move towards something better? :confused:
 
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TDDM said:
Yeah, unfortunately, I still have eye strain on non-Face ID devices. I’ve pretty much ruled that out in my case :/



My only hope is that since they didn’t give us any kind of non-OLED choice this time, that they may have further increased the Hz rate from the 290 in the 11 Pro. Honestly though, I still don’t think it’s healthy to be staring at a constantly flickering screen anyway. Maybe this’ll cause more people to become aware of the issue and the industry will move towards something better? :confused:
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It's so unfortunate. I'm not ruining my eyes or negatively affecting my health for something so stupid like this. If they are still using PWM (or not using a very high frequency), I am planning to grab an iPhone SE to replace my XR.
 
kerplunknet said:
Re: announcement today of the new iPhone 12 models.

We're screwed.

I know nothing has been tested yet, but I saw nothing today that would lead me to believe they did anything to fix (or even just improve) the PWM issue. I guess we will just have to wait for the tests and reports to come in...
Click to expand...

I wouldn’t lose hope.

Since all iPhone models are OLED this year, I would optimistically assume they’ve figured out how to eliminate or drastically improve the PWM flickering. They wouldn’t address it at the keynote if they did since so few people are aware it’s even an issue.

I’m beyond ready to upgrade from my iPhone 8 Plus. I’m not opposed to pre-ordering and trying the 12 (if I could make up my mind on which model I want...), and if that doesn’t work out I’ll probably get an iPhone SE.
 
MICHAELSD said:
I wouldn’t lose hope.

Since all iPhone models are OLED this year, I would optimistically assume they’ve figured out how to eliminate or drastically improve the PWM flickering. They wouldn’t address it at the keynote if they did since so few people are aware it’s even an issue.
Click to expand...
They have three OLED panel manufacturers now: Samsung Display, LG.Display, and BOE. Probably no variation for something like this between them, but it's something to take note of.
 
MICHAELSD said:
I wouldn’t lose hope.

[...]

They wouldn’t address it at the keynote if they did since so few people are aware it’s even an issue.
Click to expand...

Since so few people are aware its even an issue, it may not be addressed is the concern. Nevermind an admission of guilt at the keynote.
 
MICHAELSD said:
I wouldn’t lose hope.

Since all iPhone models are OLED this year, I would optimistically assume they’ve figured out how to eliminate or drastically improve the PWM flickering. They wouldn’t address it at the keynote if they did since so few people are aware it’s even an issue.

I’m beyond ready to upgrade from my iPhone 8 Plus. I’m not opposed to pre-ordering and trying the 12 (if I could make up my mind on which model I want...), and if that doesn’t work out I’ll probably get an iPhone SE.
Click to expand...

I am in the same boat as the others feeling like there is no moving forward into the 12 "realm" now that they all have OLED. But maybe we wait and see how these devices test out right at launch- there are some sites that give the breakdown on the PWM of the displays, so we will know then what the rate is, if it has been improved at all from the 11 Pro.

Otherwise, yeah as someone else said, it is the SE2020 and the regular 11 and that is it for those of us that wish to remain in the Apple ecosystem. :(
 
I plan on preordering iPhone 12 mini as soon as it is available (next month) and will perform my own tests.

Hopefully NotebookCheck can get ahold of the two models that are being shipped this month sooner than later.
 
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kerplunknet said:
They have three OLED panel manufacturers now: Samsung Display, LG.Display, and BOE. Probably no variation for something like this between them, but it's something to take note of.
Click to expand...

It is possible that the PWM can vary between models, as it did on iPhone 11 Pro and Pro Max according to Notebookcheck.

I still can’t stare at my friend’s iPhone 11 Pro Max without getting a terrible headache, even if he tries to show me a video from across the room. Symptoms onset almost immediately.
 
ghsNick said:
Does the Apple Watch Series 6 have PWM?
Click to expand...

The display on Apple Watch Series 5 flickers at 60Hz, without using PWM. (So it’s a much more linear curve.) I assume Series 6 is similar.

The OLED display on Apple Watch doesn’t cause issues for me. It is possible to have an OLED display without utilizing PWM.
 
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kerplunknet said:
I plan on preordering iPhone 12 mini as soon as it is available (next month) and will perform my own tests.

Hopefully NotebookCheck can get ahold of the two models that are being shipped this month sooner than later.
Click to expand...
Yes, I hope Notebookcheck will get their hands on one before launch so we can see the results.

But if not, please do share what you find in your testing!
 
For everyone getting the 12 and 12 Pro this coming Friday - please let us know how the PWM is. 🙏

I'm really wanting to go Pro Max this year and have all my fingers and toes crossed it's better this year.......I'm truly at the end of the road! 🤞
 
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jimmy_uk said:
For everyone getting the 12 and 12 Pro this coming Friday - please let us know how the PWM is. 🙏

I'm really wanting to go Pro Max this year and have all my fingers and toes crossed it's better this year.......I'm truly at the end of the road! 🤞
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Yup, same. I *love* the look of the new phones this year (the boxy design + the blue is gorgeous). I’m really hoping that Apple changed something with PWM.
 
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I’m tempted to pre-order iPhone 12 Pro, but there’s no way of knowing what the PWM will be like on the newer models. I feel like this is the year that I’ll finally be able to upgrade since all of the models are OLED and Apple has been aware of the issue for three years.

iPhone 12 and iPhone 12 Pro have different displays (the display on the Pro is brighter) so it’s likely that the PWM will be different on them. It’s also possible for it to differ between sizes. Maybe there will be no flickering at max brightness, but that still presents its own set of issues without an option in Accessibility to automatically control the white point/brightness level.
 
MICHAELSD said:
I’m tempted to pre-order iPhone 12 Pro, but there’s no way of knowing what the PWM will be like on the newer models. I feel like this is the year that I’ll finally be able to upgrade since all of the models are OLED and Apple has been aware of the issue for three years.

iPhone 12 and iPhone 12 Pro have different displays (the display on the Pro is brighter) so it’s likely that the PWM will be different on them. It’s also possible for it to differ between sizes. Maybe there will be no flickering at max brightness, but that still presents its own set of issues without an option in Accessibility to automatically control the white point/brightness level.
Click to expand...

I am like you, I am concerned about this being an issue, but these phones look great, and I am so tempted to take a chance on a 12 Pro. I am sensitive to brightness on my phone screen, too, so I keep my brightness on my 11 down to 20% or less.... I know with OLED that is when you get the worst flicker, but my wife's XS has flicker even at 100% when recording it with my other phone in slow mo..... so the only hope is that somehow they greatly improved the PWM frequency so it is not as noticeable, and thus does not bother many of us like it did on older models.
 
I’ll wait for notebookcheck’s review on the 12, 12 pro and 12 pro max. Whichever has the highest frequency rate should (on paper) be easiest on the eyes.

Edit: I looked at notebookcheck's reviews of the 11 Pro and realized it has a much higher frequency than the 11 Pro Max. I should have been using the 11 Pro all along!
 
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AJAAY said:
I’ll wait for notebookcheck’s review on the 12, 12 pro and 12 pro max. Whichever has the highest frequency rate should (on paper) be easiest on the eyes.

Edit: I looked at notebookcheck's reviews of the 11 Pro and realized it has a much higher frequency than the 11 Pro Max. I should have been using the 11 Pro all along!
Click to expand...
It's been mentioned before so I don't want to go over all the details again but it looks like notebookcheck recorded their data wrong and there is no reason why the two phones have different pwm.
 
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Not seeing anything regarding PWM yet, though that’s not super surprising. I dunno what the reviewers can really tell us besides doing one of those slow motion PWM vid checks, I think we’ll prob have to wait until Fri for people in this thread to post their experiences.

I’m really hoping these phones are usable for us, the 12 looks so good this year.
 
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