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  • What worked for me after many years of trouble with eye strain

Hello everyone,

I've been, like many of you, having a lot of trouble with eye strain (pain in the eyes, headaches, brain fog, etc). In. 2015, I bought a 2015 MacBook Pro with retina display that I returned for a 2015 Air without retina display because of eye strain. I was able to use that computer but in the last 5 years I've had severe eye strain if I tried retina display Mac's and also with all external monitors I tried.

I've gone to many ophthalmologist, gotten multiple prescriptions (I don't use any glasses otherwise), tried blue light glasses and tried many many external monitors.

Last year my 2015 Air was just getting too slow and I had to find a solution. Tried buying a ThinkPad but got eye strain and returned it. Earlier this year, desperate for a faster computer, I bought a new MacBook Pro M1. I got severe eye strain and headaches. Tried it with multiple external monitors that also resulted in severe eye strain.

Being desperate I decided to try to see if I could get used to it. I used it an hour a day at first (which lead to headaches that I managed with Tylenol if needed), then gradually increased it to 2 hours, then 3 hours per day. Over the course of 2 months I gradually got more used to it and now I can use it virtually without any problems for a full workday! I wouldn't have believed it going in but somehow my eyes or mind has adjusted.

Your milage may vary, of course, but it may be worth it to some of you to see if you can adjust to a new computer by sticking it out.

    journeyman

    This is fantastic to hear. I've actually been trying this with smartphones. I have a few that I've made tolerable by gradual increases in exposure. If might ask, how old are you? I think the reason these adaptions are possible is growth of new brain cells to better process flickering / unstable / otherwise bad imagery. Now that I am in my 30s I find it takes a lot more time to adjust to a new device compared to my 20s - which correlates to a slow down in new brain cell growth as we age.

    Were your headaches the normal kind or migraines? (migraines also feature nausea and sometimes visual changes)

        There have been some reports from folks here that they "got used to" problematic devices. I certainly find that I go through tolerant phases and intolerant phases, and that I adapt to some screens but not others. I also find that once I've been triggered, even things that were ok for me can be bad for a while.

        Tried it with the 2015 13' MBP retina screen, didnt work, Sold it.

        Tried it with a Lenovo T460, didnt work, Sold it.

        🙁

        So as to be not so negative! (I hope I can overcome these issues myself somehow) - using it for 1 hours a day - myself and many others get symptoms (eyestrain / dry red eyes / headache / then migraine) within often minutes of exposure to a 'bad' device, was this the same for you? - if so this 1 hour of use was it pushing through the pain?

        Did you then try again next day even with the headache still there? - or take a break for a few days then try another hour etc?

          I had to push through discomfort with my LG monitor

          journeyman This is really interesting, congrats on finding a solution! I have a few questions if you don't mind:

          -What kind of symptoms did you initially have from the M1? (Dry eye, pain in temples, migraine, etc)

          -Have you had similar issues with any iPhones/iPads?

          -How do you feel after using your M1 for a full day? You mentioned "virtually without any problems", do you still feel any eye strain or headaches?

              HAL9000 -- Yes, I had symptoms essentially immediately. What came first was a feeling like there was somehow a shadow behind the screen that made it hazy / hard to look at. Made it hard to concentrate, a sort of brain fog. Then once I kept at it for some minutes it turned into pain in the eyes and headache. I pushed through out of desperation because I had important work that needed to get done and my old laptop wasn't able to handle it. I kept at it every day. The headaches were relatively mild so that may have made it easier (I've never had problems with migraines and essentially never have headaches except for this reason or due to dehydration).

                bkdo -- Symptoms were pain in the eyes, mild headache (never migraines), feeling like the screen was hard to look at, hard to concentrate on the text, mild brain fog type symptoms.

                I've never had problems with phones.

                I am able to use the M1 without significant problems these days. I have some eye strain sometimes but that's in the territory of what I experienced with my old computer. It's not affecting my productivity during the workday I think. I feel the eye strain sometimes if I'm working at night (though might be the Flux color scheme). My schedule is to not work in the evenings/at night so it doesn't bother me too much.

                  a month later
                  21 days later

                  It is random for me, in my life there have been 3 devices (out of literally hundreds) that I have actually become used to after a few days and used long term without issue. Usually it just starts bad and gets worst, sometime it starts bad, gets a little better, and after a couple days it fails again

                  Dominic

                  Some, when looking at the screen. Not very blurry. More that I experienced that I felt I couldn't focus on the text and sort of spaced out / just got tired in the eyes trying to focus.

                    journeyman

                    The update on this one is that I have no problems these days. Use the computer probably 12 hours a day without any issues. Can hardly believe it. As I said earlier, YMMV, but if you're at a loss I think this is worth the try for many.

                      4 months later
                      2 months later

                      ryans

                      Still going strong, working every day long hours on the laptop without any eye strain.

                      However, I've been dealing with neck/upper back pain now for 6+ months and need to set up a more ergonomic setup. So need to find an external monitor that will work so I don't have to be hunched over the laptop all the time. I have not been able to use external monitors for over a decade due to eye strain. Not sure how I'm going to solve this but it will probably be a combination of buying a very high quality monitor and suffering through the eye strain until (hopefully) I'll get used to it.

                          journeyman Great to hear you are doing well. Out of curiosity, were you ever tested for binocular vision dysfunction? You may find this blog interesting; this person had bad eye symptoms until they got special chiropractic care for their neck (NUCCA Upper Cervical Chiropractor). After a single chiropractic adjustment, this person no longer needed their prism glasses.

                          I was able to get "used" to my LG G7 phone. At first, it gave my muscle twitches/sound sensitivity with minor eye strain, but after 2 months it started to get much better. Used it 30 minutes a day. A year later no symptoms at all and use it 1 hour a day.

                            a month later

                            gone for a while- came back to schill for "limited RGB" - low blacks setting

                              jpark28 its a software display setting. for radeon it's under color depth/pixel format - 4:4:4 limited RGB

                              for Nvidia it's "LIMITED" under "output dynamic range". Try it out- nobody really responded when i posted before, but it's immediate relief for me.

                                dev