What is the appropriate number of nits brightness units that your phone should have for outdoor use?
Today's smartphones are so superior in performance that the biggest difference between a cheap phone and an expensive one isn't its power, but the quality of the camera and the screen. The deciding factor in screen quality is its brightness, which is measured in nits. The more nits a phone has, the brighter its screen becomes and, therefore, the better it looks outdoors.
Now, although we've already explained to you what nits mean , we've never talked about how many nits are required for a display to be fully readable outdoors in sunlight.
- Between 500 and 700 lumens is the minimum you need for outdoor areas, but it all depends on where you live.
To ensure good outdoor visibility, it is recommended that your mobile phone screen has a brightness of at least 500 to 700 nits. This amount of brightness will make the screen readable outdoors in moderate sunlight.
However, you should keep in mind that sunlight does not affect you in the same way all over the world. For example, in the UK, where the weather is usually cloudy and there are clouds almost every day that dim the sunlight, a 500 nit screen is sufficient and looks absolutely great outdoors.
However, in countries like the Arab world, 500 lumens is too low because we usually have very sunny days, without clouds that cast a little shade. If you live in a country with this type of climate, the ideal is a screen that provides 1000 lumens or more so that you can watch it outdoors without much difficulty.
Yes, more nits are better, but there is a limit to everything. It is acceptable to buy a phone with a very high maximum brightness, but that does not mean that you should always use it at maximum brightness. Having the brightness all the way down has a negative impact on the autonomy and health of your phone's battery.
Not only does max brightness consume more battery, it also causes it to heat up. So make sure to only use full brightness on your phone when necessary (outdoors and in the sun). Of course, it is not recommended to use your phone for a long time in sunlight as it will eventually heat up.
Ideally, you should keep the auto-brightness feature enabled, which dynamically adjusts the brightness level based on ambient lighting conditions, helping to conserve battery life while maintaining good screen visibility. In fact, most phones only display the actual maximum screen brightness when the brightness is set to auto, which is another reason to never disable this feature.
- Read also: What do nits mean in a screen and why are they important before buying any phone?