iOS 13 Dark Mode Significantly Extends OLED iPhone Battery Life, Test Shows

Dark Mode improved the iPhone XS battery life by as much as 30 percent.

By Aditya Shenoy | Updated: 22 October 2019 14:52 IST

iOS 13 Dark Mode Significantly Extends OLED iPhone Battery Life, Test Shows

Photo Credit: PhoneBuff

Dark mode improved battery life on the iPhone XS

Highlights

iPhone XS was used for this test
With Dark Mode, the phone had 30 percent battery left
The difference only apparent on phones with OLED displays

Dark mode has slowly started making its way onto smartphones. Apple has introduced this feature in iOS 13 and Google is doing the same with Android 10. Even app developers are doing their bit to include a dark mode in their app. Popular smartphones apps have already implemented the feature while a few others are working on implementing it. iOS 13 dark mode it seems has a massive impact on the battery life of an iPhone with OLED screen, and the iPhone XS, for example, shows as much as a 30 percent improvement in battery life.

The Dark mode is known to be easier on the eyes while using a smartphone at night or in a dimly-lit environment. But based on the tests carried out by PhoneBuff on an Apple iPhone XS, it is safe to say that it has a positive impact on the battery life of a smartphone. PhoneBuff carried out tests on an iPhone XS, with and without night mode to measure the impact it has on the battery life of this smartphone and the results were interesting, The display of the iPhone XS was set to 200 nits of brightness for the test.

This test included two hours of messaging, two hours of scrolling through Twitter, two hours of watching YouTube videos in portrait mode, and two hours of scrolling through Google Maps. These tests resulted in the iPhone XS with 30 percent battery life still left in Dark mode compared to the regular mode. This is a huge difference considering the phone still had almost one-third of its battery still left.

It isn't surprising that Dark mode has such an impact on AMOLED and OLED displays as these panels switch pixels off completely for a black background resulting in battery saving. PhoneBuff also repeated the Twitter scrolling tests at 100nits of brightness to simulate indoor conditions which resulted in 5 percent battery-saving thanks to dark mode. The same test at 300 nits resulted in a bigger battery-saving of 12 percent.

So, if you do have a smartphone with an OLED display, you can expect better battery life with the Dark mode enabled. An LCD panel does not show a huge difference as the backlight still stays on at all times resulting in similar battery drain irrespective of Dark mode.

Apple iPhone XS

REVIEW
KEY SPECS
NEWS
Variants

Design
Display
Software
Performance
Battery Life
Camera
Value for Money

Good
Best-in-class performance
Excellent cameras
Superb display
Dual SIM support is finally an option
Regular, timely software updates

Bad
Expensive
Dual SIM support is limited
First-party apps not great in India
Fast charger not bundled

Read detailed Apple iPhone XS review

Display 5.80-inch

Processor Apple A12 Bionic

Front Camera 7-megapixel

Rear Camera 12-megapixel + 12-megapixel

Storage 64GB

OS iOS 12

Resolution 1125x2436 pixels

More Apple mobiles Apple mobiles price in India

Choose a variant

Comments

For the latest tech news and reviews, follow Gadgets 360 on X, Facebook, WhatsApp, Threads and Google News. For the latest videos on gadgets and tech, subscribe to our YouTube channel. If you want to know everything about top influencers, follow our in-house Who'sThat360 on Instagram and YouTube.