Your phone might not try to blind you as much with this new update

Google is changing how Android behaves when you unlock your phone in the dark. But it's unclear when it will release the change to the public.

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Have you ever turned on your Android phone and been immediately blinded because the screen brightness was set too high? We're willing to bet that you have, but now it looks like Google is working on a fix for that infuriating problem.

According to a new report, Google has a fix in the works via a future Android software update but it will be a while before you can actually install it on your phone.

The problem comes when you first wake your phone because it doesn't yet know how bright the room is. The ambient light sensor doesn't kick in until after that point, meaning it doesn't have time to turn the brightness down if you're in a dark room in the middle of the night, for example.

Now, a new report on Twitter suggests that code found in the Android 13 QPR2 source code might show that Google wants Android to behave differently. That code shows that Android will soon use the brightness sensor to choose how bright to make the screen on initial unlock.

That's the definition of a small change that will make a huge difference for people who unlock their phones in the dark and we're looking forward to it landing. However, it's unclear when we can expect this software to be made available to everyone - it might be part of Android 14 which isn't going to be released until much later in 2024.

Hopefully, this change will hit Android before then however. But then most people will have to wait for their phone makers to roll it out to them, too.

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Based in the UK, Oliver has been writing about technology, entertainment, and games for more than a decade. If there's something with a battery or a plug, he's interested. After spending too much money building gaming PCs, Oliver switched to Apple and the Mac - and now spends too much on those instead.

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