iPhone 16/Plus Does anyone actually use True Tone?

[Squiggles Chitter]

I've tried True Tone on my 12 mini and iPhone 16. To my eyes, it looks way too yellow/orange.

Does anyone actually use it?

Does it get less yellow with time? i.e. does it calibrate itself?

Or do your eyes just get used to it?

I never turn it off. The yellowish tint makes the screen much more usable. For the sake of your eyes, please keep truetone on!

 

[Velin]

First thing I turn off. Screen looks like piss.

 

[WindBlast]

I can't live without TrueTone anymore. It is so much easier on my eyes to not have glaring white balance issues any more.



Your eyes get used to it. We are incredibly good at adjusting our mental white balance to our environment so that white always appears white to us. When you turn it on and off the shift in color is obvious, but once it's left on and you stop paying attention TrueTone should feel more natural.

There are two different systems that both play with the white balance of your display: True Tone and Night Shift. True Tone is meant to make your screen behave like paper does-- it makes white look like the ambient light in the room. Night Shift is different, it intentionally inhibits the blue to minimize sleep disruption. True tone should look natural for the room, Night Shift will make the display look warmer than its environment.

White surfaces reflect the light in the room. If you're in a room with a window, the light in the room is warmer (more yellow) at sunrise, then gets quite cold (bluer) as the day goes on particularly if the direct sunlight is blocked, then warmer again at sunset, and then takes on the color of your artificial lighting (warm white, cool white, etc). A truly white sheet of paper will be the same color as the light.

Have you ever noticed when you walk down a street at night that the rooms with TVs on all look blue? But when you're in a room watching TV it doesn't look blue at all? The TV doesn't care what time of day it is for you, it's presenting an image of the time of day in the movie and if it's daytime in the movie the image is cooler, and more blue. When you're in the room your eyes are adapted to the big TV and white on the TV looks white. If you're in the street your eyes have adapted to warmer artificial lighting and the white from the TV looks blue.

Same if you've ever taken a film photograph indoors without flash-- you'll get the photo printed and take it home some afternoon to look at and it looks yellow. It didn't feel yellow when you took the photo because your eyes were adjusted to the warm artificial light and white in the room looked white at the time. But now you're in cooler indirect sunlight and your eyes are adapted to it so the warmer light the film caught accurately looks yellow to your brain. Digital cameras tend to correct for this at least a bit, but film captured what film saw.

True Tone measures the light in the room and makes white on the screen match the color of that light so that it behaves more like paper would. With True Tone off, a white screen probably looks a bit cold and blue in a room at night, with it on it should more closely match everything else that's white. Turning it on and off your eyes will see the change, but if left on it should blend. There's some situations that can upset the system (if the sensor is looking at light that isn't truly ambient, for example sometimes I cover my Macbook camera with a yellow sticky note and that shifts the display color).

Night Shift is different, night shift pushes the color temp warmer than ambient specifically to reduce the blue in the image because blue disrupts melatonin. As melatonin accumulates in your body, it tells your body to sleep. In the morning the light (most specifically the blue light) breaks down the melatonin and you start to wake up. Blue light from screens can disrupt that melatonin production and impact your sleep cycle, so turning the blue light down helps (a bit). Since it's warmer than ambient though, your eyes will more easily perceive small screens as yellow in this case.

Really nice explanation.
Thanks

 

[VSMacOne]

No way I’d go back to pre-TrueTone. There have been tendencies in some models over the last few years for true tone to be more aggressive, but I think the 15 and 16 for the most part seem to be better. I still wish Apple had better quality control for more consistent color calibration across their phones, but it is what it is.

 

[ant the ninja]

If you use it for a day, you don’t see yellow anymore. Whites are pure white and it looks great. I’ve used it since it released and never looked back. I keep the slider on the lower end though so maybe that’s why I like it.

 

[nickelro]

If you use it for a day, you don’t see yellow anymore. Whites are pure white and it looks great. I’ve used it since it released and never looked back. I keep the slider on the lower end though so maybe that’s why I like it.

Are you referring to the Night Shift slider? As afaik there is no slider for True Tone.

 

[ubinko]

No way I’d go back to pre-TrueTone. There have been tendencies in some models over the last few years for true tone to be more aggressive, but I think the 15 and 16 for the most part seem to be better. I still wish Apple had better quality control for more consistent color calibration across their phones, but it is what it is.

Yea, my 12 mini screen looked orange with true tone on. The 16 is much more palatable.

 

[dantay]

I’ve always used it.

 

[Astuces iOS]

I’ve always used it.

Me too

 

[ProbablyDylan]

The work I do on my phone/ipad is color-sensitive, so it's easier for me to just leave it off.

 

[LionTeeth]

Absolutely. I use it on all my Apple devices. I use it all the time and if it happens to get turned off accidentally the screen looks very weird to me lol too hard and blue

 

[thatJohann]

I keep coming back to this thread. Surprised at how many people don’t use True Tone. It’s so good! Without it, you’re harming your eyes with blue light and unpleasant colors. Yuck.

 

[VisceralRealist]

The setting should read like this instead:

False Tone
Manually adapt iPhone display while disregarding ambient lighting conditions to make colours appear inconsistent in different environments.

Yep. Main reason I don't use it. When it gets the tone right, it can work well, but a lot of the time it's simply inaccurate and it's very noticeable that my phone appears too yellow or too blue. Rather have it just look the same all the time, with the blue light lessened in the evening (i.e. Night Shift).

 

[Amplelink]

If you use it for a day, you don’t see yellow anymore. Whites are pure white and it looks great. I’ve used it since it released and never looked back. I keep the slider on the lower end though so maybe that’s why I like it.

It doesn't even take a day for me. If I ever turn off True Tone and turn it back on, it takes me about 2 minutes for my eyes to adjust and then whites look much truer.

 

[subjonas]

(This should be a poll)
Yup can't live without True Tone and Night Shift. Only time I turn them off is when I'm sleepy but need to stay awake, then I let the blue light blast my eyes.

 

[Sami13496]

I use True Tone but not Night Shift. In my experience, True Tone only subtly adjusts the screen tone depending on the ambient lighting, and it’s been a very welcome feature. On the other hand, Night Shift noticeably changes the screen tone and makes my display look yellow. Could it be that some respondents here might have confused these two concepts?

 

[Tripps9000]

I use it on my iPhone and my iPad all the time never had any problems with it!

 

[ubinko]

Sooooo.. I turned True Tone on over the weekend to see if I could get on with it (I am the OP).

It's amazing how quickly we can change our subjective perspective on things. So before this weekend, true tone looked horribly yellowish to my eyes. Now, it looks lovely and creamy and when I turn True Tone off, the screen looks horribly blueish (although admittedly, the whites do look more like true white).

I'll probably keep TT on from now on.

 

[ubinko]

(This should be a poll)
Yup can't live without True Tone and Night Shift. Only time I turn them off is when I'm sleepy but need to stay awake, then I let the blue light blast my eyes.

I have made a poll.

 

[rizmack]

Over the years, I've become less resistant to "blue" light or a bright mobile phone screen. So I always keep both True Tone and Night Shift on. More recently, I have been extending the hours for Night Shift activation during the Autumn and Winter months, I think I've just adapted to a less harsh (more yellow and dimmer) screen.
I also think this preference owes to a better battery life 😂

 

[imanidiot]

I've tried True Tone on my 12 mini and iPhone 16. To my eyes, it looks way too yellow/orange.

Does anyone actually use it?

Does it get less yellow with time? i.e. does it calibrate itself?

Or do your eyes just get used to it?

Yes, they actually do. Next.

 

[kevcube]

True Tone is Apple's best stolen idea (F.lux plugin did it, before it was baked into the OS). Those who have it enabled probably only notice it if their home lights are a 'strong-daylight' color of blue light. A lot of homes have bulbs that are warmer colored (fire-colored) at night, and that's where the True Tone really pays off.

No, what you’re describing is Night Shift and not True Tone.

 

[orbital~debris]

Are you referring to the Night Shift slider? As afaik there is no slider for True Tone.

I think this whole thread is a great jumble of people who are responding with accuracy and full knowledge of the two distinct features… and those who are responding thinking Night Shift is/is the same as True Tone. Which it's really not! 😩

 

[CarletonTorpin]

No, what you’re describing is Night Shift and not True Tone.

You're right, and as I followed this post further, I realized the mistake. Either way, I'm a fan of both of the technologies.

 

[tarsins]

Hold up a sheet of white paper and your phone with a white background - compare.
Truetone gives you the correct colour.