Eyestrain from OLED monitors/TV's, but not OLED smartphones: A theory

tomek Maybe you are right and it is contrast/sharpness causing the issue after all ! I went to the optician today and found out I need prism glasses due to double vision. This might explain why I have trouble focusing and get headaches from watching an OLED TV. The optician mentioned that the contrast of an OLED is much higher and sharper, which could cause my eyes to constantly try to focus, whereas they don't do this with a regular TV, as it has much less contrast and sharpness. I will receive my new prism glasses (with blue filter this time) in about 10 days time, so hopefully that will solve the issue for me. As a preliminary test I have noticed that when I sit very close to the TV, within 1 meter, I don't seem to get the eye strain. Will keep you all posted once I get the new glasses. Maybe for some of you this could be a solution as well.

tomek So I received my new glasses yesterday and tried them. I have a prism diopter of 1, which is considered a relatively small amount of prism correction. I did notice a slight improvement in my depth perception and it is easier for me to focus especially with fast movement, soccer games etc. I am also able to slightly better focus in the S95D Oled screen in general, but still get severe eye strain after about 5/10 minutes.

madmozg So to add to your comment, yes it seems there is more going on and it might well be that slight brightness dip on the refresh rate. So back to my theory above again.

from what i've read:

LED monitors have layers of light filtering material to diffuse light which can make things look "softer"

The pixel structures of IPS/VA LCD looks most correct in a raster grid. woled and qd-oled have strange pixel structures that dont look correct in raster grids. theres too much black space between qd-oled pixels for example. and forget about subpixel text rendering. Raster grids is pretty important for computer use..

Theres narrow bandwidth and broadband spectrum displays. All wide gamut displays are narrow spectrum primaries with higher energy which may cause eye strain in some sensitive people??? quantum dot has narrow band primaries, woled has a smoother spectra.

The presence of polarizer layer and different anti reflective coating can also make your brain see the light in weird way and cause stress.

Also the monitors OP tested should be tested should only be used in sRGB gamut mode. the high color saturation of native gamut on those displays can also cause eye strain.

For reference, some of Apple's LCD displays are great and designed for long use.

I started working from home full time and my Samsung G8 QD-OLED was causing instant eye strain that I had to sell it.

Back to a 32" 1440p IPS now and zero issues.

I have always found my eyes more sensitive than others, but I got other family members to try my monitor and all experienced the same instant eye strain.

It now has me worried about my LG W-OLED TV. I dont use it as long or read text. But i did some testing and found reading bright white text on black background also slightly straining.

I have always turned down brightness and contrast on LCDs i use. So i think for me it might be OLEDs contrast is just too good and bright for my eyes.

On the QD-OLED monitor i found white text on black background was far worst. So i stopped using dark theme. But was still too painful to keep.

TV2Expensive ipad pro 12.9 M1 M2 with the mini led

this screen sucks, instant eye strain and brain fog feeling when i used it in the store and another time at a random kiosk, nothing on the screen seems to have the correct flat perspective and everything constantly feels like it's shifting, it's like i can only rest my eyes on whitespace and not the actual on-screen objects themselves, and it's similar to the 14" MacBook Pro mini-LED which is literally the worst screen I've ever used

(the 14" mini-LED MBP was so bad that it made me seriously think i was developing dyslexia or some kind of severe eye spasm until i suddenly realized i only experienced that when i was using that specific laptop)

IMO apple screens are not designed for long-term use at all, they are not built for text and information-dense UI and content, they only seem to be built to show photos/videos in an "impressive" way to keep pushing the spec numbers up without any care for ergonomics

there are a couple apple screens I can use though, 2016 13" Touch Bar MBP is fine for most use cases (in fact it's the only P3 wide color gamut screen i can use for the whole day. i'm also writing this reply on it right now), 2015 12" MacBook is okayish, the original iPhone 4 is significantly more comfortable than other iPhones, and anything before 2011 like the 2009 13" MBP has a comfortable and surprisingly stable image with the exception of some PWM/pixel inversion-related strain —— but they are few and far between, and starting around 2015~2018ish new Apple screens have started to get worse and worse every year

also, I've consistently seen the 5K iMac (and probably 4.5K) reported as examples here for "the first time i experienced LED strain" so I can't vouch for those either

Assessment of the effect on the human body of the flicker of OLED displays of smartphones

This paper considers the effects on the human body of the flicker of organic light-emitting diode (OLED) displays. Related studies have been conducted due to reports of cases of adverse health effects of the use of artificial lighting. Interest in this problem recently intensified with the development of various new displays and the longer exposure time of people to them. Therefore, the previous studies on the effects of artificial lighting on the human body are described in this paper, and based on them, the dimming technique for liquid-crystal displays and OLED displays of smartphones is explained and the effect of the flicker of OLED displays on the human body is assessed.

They mention how flicker reduced by distance:

The PWM of the OLED display is similar to the PWM of the LCD display in terms of pixels, but is recognized as DC when viewed from a certain distance as in the actual use environment, as shown in Figure 13 (see below)

Interesting paper but one may argue they are missing some other factors that may contribute to strain. One might try sitting farther away from OLEDs in particular? Note the author works for Samsung Display and the paper reports no conflict of interest.

JTL

I was suspecting that conflict of interest as well. Another recent paper at least includes statements like these but also mentions not having access to oscilloscopes which sounds like a bad excuse:
https://rbh.rsmu.press/files/issues/rbh.rsmu.press/2024/2024-1_en.pdf#page=48

The method of increasing brightness to 100% can be found on many web-sites on “combating PWM”. This, on the contrary, makes the light emitted by LEDs almost continuous and reduces pulsation, while the screen brightness is adjusted (reduced) at the expense of the contrast parameter. However, such an approach is not always effective. For example, increasing brightness to 100% on the Huawei MateBook D14 laptop led to the emergence of pronounced PWM and subjective sensation of eye pain. This suggests that, despite positive feedback from the Internet users, the approach cannot be used for all screen types.

Thus, currently, LEDs are being introduced into screen designs everywhere, while the issue of the LEDs hygienic assessment remains unresolved. It is important to avoid the situations, when in pursuit of a high-quality image the technology causing visual discomfort in the susceptible population group is implemented.

The lack of information about the presence of PWM in the data sheets of devices, as well as the method for hygienic examination of this factors, has led to the emergence of forums and websites focused on “combating PWM” (RTINGS.com), where enthusiasts test screens for PWM by themselves...

Clokwork

Yep, btw for me I also owned a 2020 Intel 13" Touch Bar at one point and that one was not usable for me (somewhat better than M1, but still very bad)

So in my case, specifically the 2016 Intel 13" Touch Bar is the only "modern" Mac that is usable for me and does not cause me to see a "false 3D effect"

Also, are you sure you want to keep installing updates on your Mac? macOS updates on Intel Macs can also include "firmware" updates (similar to BIOS updates) in a way that is near-impossible to revert even if you downgrade the OS, and there's always the chance that can affect the display controller or GPU in some way.