I installed iOS 16 today in hope of getting more comfortable eyes than iOS 15. Turns out it is worse. Will be checking for a few days. If you haven’t updated to iOS 16 then wait and see. Any of you have the same issue?

Eye strain with iOS 16 and iOS 17 - do NOT update iOS

deepflame

[deleted] which iPhone do you use? I have an iPhone 13 Pro Max and it seemed to be a bit better. If people want to upgrade and try, it might be better to do it now. In the foreseeable future Apple will revoke the signing keys for iOS 15, so downgrade would not be possible anymore. Better to try it now as long as it is easy to go back.

hansennnnn

Wrightpt1

deepflame after you downgrade ios,is eyestrain dissapear ?

[deleted]

I’m using iphone se 2020. iOS 14 and earlier are all fine for me. iOS 15 made it a bit worse, but iOS 16 brought me some headache. I will rollback soon as I’m not able to use it for long now.

pooda

I can confirm the same for me with my iPhone SE 2020. But Apple must’ve changed something in iOS 16.4 because it’s better. Still not as comfortable as iOS 15 but it’s definitely easier on the eyes.

artdyl

Recently upgraded to IOS 16.5 from IOS 15 and left without phone. I was using Iphone X, it do not gave me any serious issues(all other OLED Iphones not usable for me) until IOS 16.5, after upgrade I have same issue as from other higher Iphone OLED models. And most interesting thing here, that it not possible to downgrade.

ocean10

artdyl I saw a post on Reddit that said the 16.5 update made someone's iPhone SE 3 unusable as well. I can only use the SE iPhones so I really hope this is something they fix with future updates (I'm going to avoid upgrading as I'm on 16.1.1). I can't use any of the OLED phones including the iPhone X.

[deleted]

I suspect the temporal dithering technology was introduced since ios 15 and was much worse since ios 16.

My ipad air 2 was made useless since the upgrade to ios 15, while my iphone se 2020 got a little more uncomfortable to look at on ios 15. And ios 16 was the final nail to the coffin that made my iphone become useless (my ipad air 2 does not get to have ios 16 update, but it is already useless anyway). My devices are all LCD display ones so PWM will not be the reason of eye strain here, and I could use them comfortably before ios 15-16.

This is not the first time I’ve seen people talking about the same idea. Many devices suddenly became useless after ios 16 upgrade, according to multiple posts online.

My iphone right now is on an ios 17 beta version and I can confirm that the eye strain still persists, so anyone on any ios version of 14 or earlier should NOT try to take the risk of upgrading your ios to any newer version. Stay on ios 14 or earlier versions to be safe. Also if you want to purchase a legacy iphone or ipad, you should check which ios version it will run on. If you buy a device which has ios 16 out of the box, it is very likely to be a wrong purchase.

I can’t believe why Apple is allowed to make such a radical change to the display rendering and not make any statement about it anywhere.

earlgreymilktea09

[deleted] would you say iOS 17 is more comfortable than iOS 16? I’m thinking of updating my phone (on iOS 15.2) 😅 but like you, i also discovered that iOS 16 felt worse than iOS 15 on my iPad, hence why I didn’t update my phone

[deleted]

earlgreymilktea09 iOS 17 and iOS 16 look the same to me now, the headache is still there. I'd strongly recommend that you keep your phone on iOS 15 and wait. Or better, you can borrow an iphone with iOS 16 and see for yourself. But based on the case of your iPad, I don't think you will be happy with iOS 16 on your iPhone either.

m1ngw

[deleted] try the iOS17 RC release. Switch to grayscale mode in Accessibility and move the slider to left. You will get colour back but its less saturated and may reduce eye fatigue

earlgreymilktea09

[deleted] I updated my iPad to iOS 17. At first it felt better than ios16.5 but I felt The Eye fatigue after prolonged usage. Guess I’m probably gonna keep my phone on iOS 15. Sucks that we’re stuck on older firmware :/

Clokwork

I hate that many apps don't support me anymore. I'm on 14.8 until the screen falls off.

Lauda89

Clokwork Same situation. Let's see if i will be able to use the iphone 15 with ios17..

ocean10

Has anyone had this fixed by updating to any of the iOS 17 versions? I had the same issue mentioned on this thread when I updated one of my 1st Generation iPad Pros to iOS 16.5. Because of this I luckily did not update my iPhone SE 2022 (which I can look at for hours with no issues). If you read down the thread you'll see that someone mentioned iOS 17 Beta 6 as fixing the problem.

https://www.reddit.com/r/PWM_Sensitive/comments/14d9fzd/do_not_upgrade_to_ios_165_w_iphone_se_2022/

[deleted]

ocean10

ocean10 I was on iOS 17 Beta too but did not notice any good. That guy was lucky to find a beta version that worked for him. It seems that we may have to wait for the next iOS, the current one is clearly not usable.

ocean10

I also have trouble with what seems like most "new" screens on laptops, many cars, etc. I've been assuming that this was something to do with hardware/led wavelengths/etc. I guess the fact that a software update can make a perfectly usable phone "bad" gives me a little bit of hope in that some day someone will figure this out with a software fix.

Clokwork

ocean10 sounds like emulators. Thinking about how they emulate old games, we'll be emulating old devices heh.

DannyD2

m1ngw Thanks for mentioning this! I've wanted such a feature (greyscale with faint colors) for a very long time.

[deleted]

m1ngw thanks for the suggestion. I’m trying greyscale now to see how it turns out. It’s ironic that the damn billion-color technology thing is forcing us to reduce colors as much as possible.

[deleted]

You should feel lucky that you still have a device on iOS 15 to use. Many already updated and there are no going back now.

Clokwork

I don't believe any IOS moving forward is going to work well. Until they change screen technology to something more eye friendly, I don't think we really have a chance unfortunately.