Low to mid-priced smartphones now receiving enhanced display brightness

NEW DELHI: The brightness of smartphone displays is increasingly attracting interest from users and in 2022, more than a third of premium smartphones applied brightness over 900 nits -- a 171 per cent year-on-year jump, a report has shown.

This is not only because of Apple's steady sales but also due to the increased use of this brightness band by Chinese vendors trying to strengthen their premium line-ups, such as Vivo, OPPO, and Xiaomi, according to Counterpoint Research.

The trend of increasing brightness is gradually spreading to low-to-mid-priced smartphones.

"For instance, Samsung has not only significantly increased the adoption of brightness exceeding 700 nits in its premium smartphones, but it has also brought down the share of brightness below 450 nits in its low-to-mid priced smartphones by about 20 per cent in 2022," the report said.

More than 90 per cent of Samsung's low-to-mid-priced smartphones had brightness below 450 nits in 2021.

As a result of these changes, the proportion of over 700 nits in Samsung's portfolio increased 13 per cent YoY in 2022.

Indicators like colour gamut, contrast ratio, and brightness are important for a smartphone display striving to secure proper visibility.

In addition, with the recent development of HDR, consumption of high-definition video content has soared, making good visibility more important than ever, the report added.

The display's brightness can be divided into two main categories -- typical brightness and peak brightness.

Typical brightness refers to the level of brightness when using a smartphone in a general environment, such as indoors, while peak brightness refers to the level of brightness when using a smartphone in an extremely bright environment, such as a sunny outdoor environment.

"However, due to problems like eye fatigue and reduced power efficiency, these two types of brightness cannot be improved indefinitely," the report mentioned.

Therefore, the software's role has become more important here in balancing user demands with technological enhancements, it added.