Nothing downgraded the Phone (3) display to make it look better at low brightness
In a statement sent to Android Central, Nothing says the change is in effect only when the display operates at lower brightness. The Phone (3) display is still technically capable of supporting a 2,160Hz PWM rate, though the company hasn't confirmed at what brightness level the change kicks in.
— Nothing spokesperson, 18 July, 2025 Nothing hasn't explained in detail why the change was necessary, but apparently it'll be part of the final retail software.PWM is one of those things that, if you know about it, there's a good reason, but if you've never heard of it, you're not alone. The abbreviation stands for pulse-width modulation, which plays a key role in how OLED displays control brightness. What PWM does is to rapidly turn pixels on and off, tricking your eyes into thinking the display is dimmer. For the vast majority of people, PWM is an innocuous technology, but others aren't as lucky. Most often, the negative effects of the lower flicker rates are limited to eye strain. However, more PWM-sensitive people can experience more severe symptoms, like headaches, nausea, and vertigo.Due to those negative effects, a high PWM rate is considered not only something special by some users, but also necessary. The issue can be so severe that there's a whole subreddit dedicated to PWM sensitivity.
Nothing isn't the only smartphone brand that's paying attention to the PWM rate, though. Rumor has it that the Pixel 10 series might have a higher PWM rate. Other brands, like Honor, are stepping up in that regard with phones like the Magic 6 Pro, which supports a 4,320Hz PWM dimming rate when brightness drops below 30%.
I think Nothing should be more transparent about the change, and maybe even give the option to prioritize the PWM rate instead of the image quality. Accessibility is very important, especially when we're talking about devices as essential as smartphones. For many people, a little worse image quality is a good trade-off for being able to use a smartphone without negative effects.
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Phone Arena
a day ago
- Phone Arena
Verizon getting on customers' nerves by pulling promised discount
Verizon is known to dangle discounts at customers contemplating a switch. These loyalty discounts let customers lower their monthly bill and are often enough to stop them from leaving. The company appears to be randomly removing the discount for some subscribers. Some Reddit users have complained that the loyalty discount has been taken away. User tangodownrookie says that Verizon offered them a discount of $20 per line when they were about to leave, making them not only stay but also add another line. On top of that, they also got a new phone through the carrier, which has a financing term of three years. The discount has been pulled. —tangodownrookie, Reddit user, July 2025 Verizon has effectively left them in the lurch. They wouldn't be a Verizon customer now if it weren't for the loyalty discount, which doesn't even apply to their bill anymore. And since they haven't paid off their phone yet, they can't leave right discount usually ranges between $10 and $40 and is offered for up to 12 months, after which they may or may not be renewed. It's not known if the 12 months are up already for the affected users. It's also possible that changes made recently to their accounts have made them ineligible for the discount, or they have applied a new promo that isn't stackable with these discounts. It could also be an error. Either way, Verizon should be able to provide clarity, but tangodownrookie isn't willing to reach out to them, claiming customer service has proven inept in the past to help them sort out similar issues. They have been with Verizon for more than 20 years, so we can't be dismissive of their claims, although it's worth pointing out that the carrier has overhauled the customer service experience and and contacting the company is worth a shot. Other customers have had similar issues in the past. Verizon abruptly removes discounts sometimes, without a forewarning. This leaves a bitter taste in the mouths of customers. While Verizon may have its reasons, the company should ideally be transparent and forthcoming about all the terms and conditions to prevent any misunderstandings. We have reached out to the company for clarity on the issue and will update the article if we hear back.
Phone Arena
2 days ago
- Phone Arena
Apple pressures Samsung and LG to help it combat tariffs by reducing their profits
*Image credit — Bloomberg Apple is reportedly ( translated source ) pressuring display suppliers Samsung and LG to lower their prices so that the iPhone 17 isn't impacted too heavily by U.S. tariffs. The new iPhone lineup will likely see price increases, but the company is determined to lower the sticker shock as much as it can before Display is apparently trying to negotiate with Apple about the latter's demands. LG Display, on the other hand, has accepted the new terms as its revenue was too dependent on this year's orders for the iPhone 17 . To further complicate matters, Apple had to exclude Chinese display manufacturer BOE from this year's supply. The iPhone 17 series is seeing a long-awaited upgrade, with even the base model finally featuring a 120 Hz LTPO display: what Apple calls a 'ProMotion' display. BOE was apparently unable to meet the company's standards, though it has secured some orders for the Chinese stock very recently. President Trump has specifically targeted the iPhone with tariffs if Apple continues to manufacture its phones abroad and imports them Stateside. The tariff policies affect a lot of products, but the president has repeatedly named the iPhone personally, insisting that its production be shifted to the U.S. iPhone 16e uses displays provided by BOE. | Video credit — Apple This pressure from the president has been tough on CEO Tim Cook, but the company has deemed the tariffs to be more acceptable than shifting production to the U.S. That hasn't stopped Apple from trying to reduce manufacturing costs wherever it can, however. The iPhone 17 series, with its upgrade to 12 GB of RAM for Apple Intelligence and the aforementioned 120 Hz displays, will almost certainly be more expensive. This price is only going to keep going up as Apple shifts to 2 nm chipsets next year with the A20 processors. Samsung — Apple's largest smartphone rival in the States — also manufactures its phones outside the U.S. However, it hasn't been the direct target of Trump's insistence for smartphones made in America, and is quietly coasting Display, in my opinion, will likely succumb to Apple's demands this year, or at least reach a compromise. How that affects the final retail price of the iPhone 17 models is still unclear, though an increase is almost guaranteed.
GSM Arena
2 days ago
- GSM Arena
Kuo: Galaxy Z Fold8 to introduce crease-free display before Apple Comments
I Great, crease is out. Only took 8 generations. Maybe by the the 16th iteration, the screen won't face catastrophic damagefrom a finger nail,scratches at a level 2! ? breaking news, companies using the same display, and the same outsourced parts manufacturer, are going to introduce a technology at the same time......... T kdss, 4 hours ago There is reason in your words. But I have a different opinion. First, I think that Samsung w... more I think you put too much stock in Samsung trying to beat Apple, especially since Apple tends to almost never do anything first, instead they refine other people's breakthroughs and make them easier for Apple's buyers to use. Samsung being first also wouldn't appeal to Apple buyers anymore than Apple doing something first appeals to most Android or Linux users. Doing something exclusively like flip/fold might, and even then it's an uphill battle. In general who puts much stock in such claims as their motivation for buying? Very small number/segment of consumer innovators, hardly the segment from which you expect large sales figures, let alone large migrations from sticky Apple users. As for battery, as I mentioned before, they're not then one to do that, It's also not a requirement to succeed in my scenario, as large volume sale is not the goal, but it is in yours, which alone tells me their motivation wasn't the same. Most importantly if Samsung was looking for wide & wild success in the Edge, then why wan't there a marketing campaign even closs to match? There was no fanfare about it, heck I've seen more ads, fanfare & news segments about each of the refreshed foldables than there was about this supposed 'we're yelling from the rooftops we did it first' product Edge. Look at last year's Samsung ring marketing, that's more what to expect at least if the Edge were intended to be a wide success IMO. It's like even to Samsung's marketing team it barely existed either. Of course we both could be wrong. 🤷🏻♂️ Maybe in a coupla years an insider will spill the beans, it'll be a story that gets no press and of interest to a handful of people, that's usually how we find out the truth of these things. PS, you mention in your reply to Anon about big companies and risk/security, the Edge product IS a risk, not making it is the safer thing to do, just keep making S25 with spec changes, the Edge is more of a risk. There's risk and then there's risk, and the battery thing y'all focus on is not the same risk as a new product, as mentioned/explained before. And contrary to the statement, Apple isn't the bigger fish, they're equal and that's despite, as you acknowledge, Apple spending more on marketing than pretty much all other mfrs combined, The difference being that Apple sales also benefit Samsung immensely, some years when the profit from display sales to Apple outweighed the profits of their own mobile segment. C Well crease or not as long as main screen will not feature GG victus or better foldables are no for me. k Anonymous, 3 hours ago I mean, they've been the biggest smartphone maker in the world for nearly 20 years. I thi... more I'm not saying they won't be good. I'm more than sure of that. Samsung is not just about smartphones. But the stupid things that the biggest companies can do when they are driven by security in their users are really big. I'm just trying to show them. And Edge shows exactly that. And there are always bigger fish in the ocean than you. In the case of Samsung phones - Apple. That's what I'm saying. And not because Apple phones are better. Apple is just on a different level in terms of marketing compared to everyone else combined. ? kdss, 4 hours ago There is reason in your words. But I have a different opinion. First, I think that Samsung w... more I mean, they've been the biggest smartphone maker in the world for nearly 20 years. I think, they'll be just fine despite your strange alarmism. k Tazman, 6 hours ago Well there is a market for it, even if it isn't yours or mine, so that alone justifies it... more There is reason in your words. But I have a different opinion. First, I think that Samsung was too sure that they would achieve unprecedented success, whatever device they released on the market. Well, it didn't work out exactly like that, since they even had to reduce the production of Edge, since demand did not meet their expectations. Second, they thought that by being first, they would be able to steal customers from Apple with this product. Well, it didn't happen. This will not happen in general, no matter what alien product they release on the market. Apple fans are so consolidated that even if they gave them an Edge as a gift, 99 percent of them would not even turn it on to look at it. Some call this a cult, for me it is more like stupidity. Third, they definitely wanted to be first before Apple. And that's why we got an unfinished product. And no matter how diehard Samsung fans are, they still have more sense than Apple's and wouldn't blindly buy something that costs as much as the Ultra, but in terms of specifications it's below the pure S25. Fourth, even with all its shortcomings it could have attracted a lot more customers if they had simply put a bigger battery in it, which is probably the most important requirement for people who are looking for a thin and light phone anyway. It's definitely clear to everyone that a thin phone can only offer a big screen and a big battery. Well, Edge offered only 50 percent of TWO, which is ONE. And the fact that they're stopping the S+ variant because of EDGE shows how confident they are in their sales. And even from the moon everyone can see that if they had simply put at least 1 top camera on the S25+ and even on the S25, they would have broken the market with sales. But to me, they purposely keep these models so limited so that everyone can pay a little more and buy an Ultra. Y Why not have two motors on each side of the device that will roll outwards in order to stretch the panel & straighten out the crease? (motors will have to roll every time you unfold/fold) It's similar to the rolling LG TVs, except you have two motors rolling in opposite directions. S Typical Scamsung. Always waiting for Apple to become a threat for them to finally do what fans have been asking for years. ? Anyone using current gen of foldables can tell you, crease is no longer an issue. Price is. They should release foldables for lower tier chipsets with reduced prices. Like Sn 8 Gen 1 or Snapdragon 7 $1k Fold FE. T kdss, 7 hours ago I was joking a little with the previous comment. Honestly, I've never cared about who di... more Well there is a market for it, even if it isn't yours or mine, so that alone justifies it's release. However I think I can explain a reason for the Edge to you (other than truly some people just want the thinnest phone possible [ like they might want a Zoolander smallest phone possible]). It mirrors Apple's own reasoning for an iPhine Air in a similar time frame just before their Fold launch... They are both large scale R&D feedback projects, leading ups to other designs... like the thinner foldables and portless phones. The later being the lesser current focus, but offers learnings for that application too. While you can test design prototypes in the company even with a wide alpha distribution of internal devices, nothing beats a product in the wild for testing in ways you couldn't guess/imagine, and it requires that you figure out the production/mfr challenges a concept/prototype device doesn't. Making these small volume niches devices that push the boundaries help them figure out the limits of their mfr process for things like stacking PCBs/components/connectors, etc to fit into the thinner space under a more ideal situation that better isolates the mis-steps and areas that need to be worked on than putting it into a cramped foldable. It also means that you don't risk the development/production of your successful product, and can instead have an offshoot codename project that if it fails can simply be delayed or never see the light of day, admittedly at a greater cost than just a prototype. If they weren't fully satisfied with their results in the production phase, you either wouldn't have seen it come out at all, or it would've been spun-off into a separate quietly released niche product (like the Fold6SE) for a limited market that gets less mainstream press, as a 'were getting close' product that we're not ready to have people focus on, but we do want people to use/test for us. That we got a full product launch means they were successful through most/all of their milestones and they felt it was worthy. IMO, that it launched quietly and before Unpacked with less fanfare to me means that it was less about screaming " we're thinnest first " (especially as seen by the Fold vs Honor debate that title is contested and last a weekend depending on definition), and more about 'we have a product that we can learn from that we think enough people might buy to make it worthwhile'. Then they can improve on that form factors in the areas that customers say is lacking with the next model That's my take on it, finance & improve you R&D with a production model that can be applied to other models. J What I truly want Samsung to do is what LG have done before: making some dual-screen case for their S Series models D Once again, Samsung proves they don't give a damn about their customers. They only lift a finger when the competition kicks them in the teeth! k Akarius, 7 hours ago But you see, when I used the old Z Fold 4 and its hinge, I could not feel any looseness, the w... more Of course, you will feel everything smoothly. It's just that the human body is not designed to notice/feel something as weak as the forces that act on the folding of the screen. Even more so, a difference in forces. But that doesn't mean they don't exist. Sometimes even a difference of 1 micron can lead to an imbalance in the system. You won't feel it, but at a micro level it is there. And that's why after a while you will see the final result on the screen as a crease. Anonymous, 10 hours ago Maybe try improving the screen? You can still ruin it with a fingernail 7 years in Well, a glass screen still gets scratched by anything too so go an complain about that aswell. k Tazman, 7 hours ago The only way I could see that happening, is a scenario similar to the Vision Pro using Sony�... more I was joking a little with the previous comment. Honestly, I've never cared about who did something first in the world of phones. I care about who did it better. That's why I'll never understand why Samsung, for example, released Edge so hastily, which is simply a thin compromise of a phone. Just to say that they were before Apple, or anyone else. A kdss, 8 hours ago Because the more precise the drilling, the more precisely the hinges will fit. Better position... more But you see, when I used the old Z Fold 4 and its hinge, I could not feel any looseness, the whole mechanism was tight, precise and you could feel when operating it that it absolutely gives no way in any axis. So just where does this precision that they speak of come into play? What does it do differently than the already existing mechanisms of all the other manufacturers? Don't get me wrong, I have a pretty good mechanical imagination and can work out the forces working among components. All I'm saying is their press releases is full of very vague phrases that explain absolutely nothing with the highest amount of words possible. T kdss, 9 hours ago If they really release a foldable phone where you can't see where the screen bends, then ... more The only way I could see that happening, is a scenario similar to the Vision Pro using Sony's micro OLED displays for their Vr headset and Sony doesn't for their own. Where the cost of production requires a considerable increase in price, so much so that Apple think their fanba... customerbase would pay a factorial premium for the privilege whereas Samsung does not. Although knowing Samsung it would likely still do something like the very limited run Fold6SE just to get a 'first product' title even if it only shipped a handful. As the cost difference is supposedly only about $10/~40% ($25 v $35) of a much larger BOE, it's not as much of a barrier as Sony's OLEDs. That K-Tec is supposedly building a separate factory in Vietnam to meet the Trumpian Tariff concerns means that regardless production would lag their other facility, so it's almost assured Apple will be at least 2nd to market with the new hinge if not further down the launch list/order.
