Many people may have already purchased an OLED display and are reading this article on an OLED screen. You will probably be impressed by the OLED picture quality and feel that it is not a waste of money. But you may be missing one important thing you need to optimize your OLED experience. The point is that you need to use ‘dark mode’.
Why Dark Mode Is Better on OLED
To understand why dark mode is more advantageous on OLED screens, you must first understand OLED display technology. The biggest difference between OLED and traditional LCD is that it does not rely on a backlight to illuminate the entire screen. When an image appears on the screen, each individual pixel lights up on its own.
Therefore, if a specific pixel needs to be brighter, only that pixel becomes brighter. To do that, those pixels need more power. Conversely, pixels that do not need to be bright darken themselves. This means that white (bright) pixels consume more power than black (dark) pixels, and black pixels use almost no power. OLED screens consume less power when displaying dark images than bright images.
This feature is especially important in OLED laptops. When using the device on battery power without a power source, you need to save as much power as possible, so it is helpful to use dark mode, which darkens the screen pixels. Of course, dark mode doesn’t make all windows and backgrounds completely black, but it turns most of the pixels dark. Even if they are not completely black, dark colors consume less power than light colors.
The benefits of using dark mode on OLED displays aren’t just about power savings. Longer battery life is a big advantage, but OLED screens have consistently raised issues with image retention and burn-in. Burn-in occurs when pixels in OLED wear out over time. This usually occurs when fixed elements such as logos, banners, or Windows taskbars are displayed for a long time.
Using dark mode reduces the time that pixels remain in an extremely bright state, making them relatively less susceptible to this burn-in phenomenon.
Use dark mode in Windows
In Windows, dark mode converts most bright pixels to black or dark gray. Black is ideal, but dark gray also consumes less energy than light or light gray. Switching to dark mode in Windows 11 is simple.
First, search for ‘Settings’ in the Start menu or press the Windows + I shortcut to open the Settings app, and click ‘Personalization’ in the left navigation menu. Here, find the ‘Select Mode’ option and change the drop-down menu to ‘Dark’. You can follow almost the same procedure in Windows 10. However, instead of the ‘Mode Selection’ option, it is displayed as ‘Color Selection’.
Some apps and browsers may require you to enable dark mode separately. For example, in Chrome, you can change the settings to match your system theme. If you set dark mode in Windows, Chrome will also switch to dark mode accordingly. If not, go to Settings > Appearance, find the ‘Mode’ option, and select ‘Dark’ from the drop-down menu. If you want to match the Windows system theme, select ‘Device’.
editor@itworld.co.kr
Source: www.itworld.co.kr
