Apple Introduces New 'Night Shift' Feature in iOS 9.3

[anshuvorty]

Hallelujah! FINALLY! I should've known that there was a good reason why Apple prevented Flux from letting people side load its app onto iOS devices! Can't wait to try out this feature next week when the public beta of iOS 9.3 is released!

So happy right now!

 

[scapegoat81]

There goes my main reason to JB

You ain't kidding. iOS 9 is the 1st OS that I haven't jailbroke. I don't miss it & it doesn't look like I will in the future. Awesome addition to iOS

 

[freepomme]

I'm genuinely excited about this.

 

[manu chao]

Hallelujah! FINALLY! I should've known that there was a good reason why Apple prevented Flux from letting people side load its app onto iOS devices!

In particular since they generally allow side-loading of apps. Not.

 

[novacane_3]

It's hard not to call you stupid, when the answer to your question is in the article! It's the blue wavelength of light that affects sleep patterns. Dimming the light doesn't do away with the blue light, but changing the color of the screen would.

I'm very excited about this. iOS devices are always the last thing I look at before I go to bed.

haha ! thanks for the reply, sounds interesting .. i'm always on my phone too before sleeping cant wait to try it

 

[CaTOAGU]

Fantastic, a completely original and innovative idea from Apple. I can't wait for them to implement this....

So because they didn't think of it, they shouldn't implement it at all?

 

[Rafagon]

With Night Shift mode enabled, when the sun goes down, the iPhone's screen will automatically change towards the warmer (yellower) colors in the spectrum, reducing blue light. In the morning, the display automatically turns to its normal temperature color, mimicking natural daylight.

What happens if you live somewhere where the sun doesn't go down? Will the feature still function as expected (i.e., not kick in at all)?

 

[oneMadRssn]

I wonder if Apple estimated the cost of developing this feature in-house, and then offered that amount to buy f.lux? I feel a bit bad for the f.lux team, their idea is definitely being used here. But I'm not sure there is any form of IP that can protect their idea at this point. They say they have a patent pending, but I can't imagine getting a broad patent on this, even if it was filed years ago.

 

[zone23]

Night Shift coming to OSX? I'm thinking it will.

 

[KPOM]

To activate it, go under Settings>Display & Brightness, and select Blue Light Reduction.
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This is the single best iOS news update ever! Any way to install this without having a dev account?
Has anybody tested it and can confirm that the warmth level (color temperature) can be adjusted?

Yes, there is an adjustment lever.

I'm in a dark office right now and can tell the difference when I toggle it on and off.

 

[C DM]

Night Shift coming to OSX? I'm thinking it will.

Probably, but with f.lux already available there for a long time, it's not really something all that asked about or awaited.

 

[jmh600cbr]

If they implement this in OS X as well, it'll be even more mind-blowing.

no need, f.lux can easily be downloaded on a mac

 

[pat500000]

So....apple is becoming more useless company as days goes by, huh? I see....especially with this latest gimmick they trying to put up.

 

[J. Jizzle]

Why not just implement an actual Dark Mode for iOS?

 

[OldSchoolMacGuy]

How do you know it's superior? Have you tried it even though it's not officially released? I use flux and it works fine on the desktop.

There's nothing superior about Apple these days.

I have tried it in the beta released today.

Even if it were exactly the same functionality as f.lux it would still be superior as it's integrated into the OS, which f.lux is not. This means less resource usage than f.lux and better integration across all apps. It also means millions more will use it, compared to the relatively few that use f.lux. Right there Apple has won when comparing the two.

 

[budselectjr]

Why not just implement an actual Dark Mode for iOS?

Not the same thing.

 

[C DM]

Why not just implement an actual Dark Mode for iOS?

Both would be good, but dark mode on its own wouldn't provide the benefits that blue light reduction would.

 

[OldSchoolMacGuy]

Pretty excited about this one.

This will really benefit me if it actually works how it says.

I think I do have issues falling asleep because the phone is the last thing I see before I go to sleep, I mean who doesn't like a final check up on something before going to sleep?

There are countless studies that show the usage of electronics has a huge impact on our sleep quality. Not using them at least 30 minutes before bed can have a huge impact on increasing the quality of sleep and ability to fall asleep.

 

[KoolAid-Drink]

Can someone screenshot the settings screen where the new setting is?

 

[OldSchoolMacGuy]

What happens if you live somewhere where the sun doesn't go down? Will the feature still function as expected (i.e., not kick in at all)?

It's based not just on location but time of day. Those that live in places where the sun doesn't set still attempt to go to bed at normal times so this will function just fine even in those areas. They also do things to increase the ability to sleep at those times like closing the shades and taking melatonin.

 

[vmachiel]

Now I can justify even more time checking my phone before sleep!

 

[oester]

Can someone screenshot the settings screen where the new setting is?

See post #42 in this thread.

 

[J. Jizzle]

Both would be good, but dark mode on its own wouldn't provide the benefits that blue light reduction would.

I wear glasses. The lenses I have are said to block out the harmful blue light from electronics. If I have Night Shift enabled would I notice a difference with already having lenses that block out the blue light?

 

[TP18]

anybody know what temperature color "warmer" is? like is it 3400k or more/less?

 

[ApfelKuchen]

So, the amount of light that emanates from a smartphone display is sufficient to significantly disrupt human sleep patterns?

Truthfully, according to that oft-visited Harvard web page (isn't that the same school that gave us Facebook?), as little as 8 Lux can have a measurable effect.

Hint: "Measurable" is not the same as "materially significant."

The Harvard article focuses on workplace and household illumination, which is generally far more pervasive and powerful than any TV, computer, or smartphone screen. If you use a computer/tablet/smartphone in a darkened room and dim/auto-adjust the brightness accordingly (after all, when there's little or no ambient lighting, your screens don't have to be as bright), we're not talking about a whole lot of light. If you use them in a well-illuminated room... first job is to attend to the rest of the room's illumination.

However, the Harvard article has spawned more than a few pseudo-news reports that, in more than a few cases, used it to advance the "Using computers and smart phones is bad for you" narrative. Why don't we do a better job of filtering out the blue light of bias when we read stuff on the web?

What keeps me up at night is musing (or fuming) over the folly of my fellow humans. Eliminating the local TV news from my evening diet was very helpful. It's probably also helpful to only draft replies to threads like this during the daylight hours.

Further, reducing blue in my display would totally disrupt the color rendition of my photos, and I certainly couldn't edit photos effectively if I changed the color balance of the display.

Hey, if it makes you feel better to enable this feature, go for it. The placebo effect is real, after all.