Apple launched its iPhone X featuring an OLED display as one of the key selling points of the handset, The Android OEMs had made the switch to OLED displays years ago, but Apple took its sweet time to make this switch. Folks over at Apple are known to be the perfectionists who ensured the quality of OLED panels on iPhone X to be the best in the market before introducing it. However, the iPhone X OLED display panels have turned out to be a source of a headache for many.
Apple has made use of Pulse Width Modulation (PWM) in its iPhone X’s OLED display that makes it flicker at varying frequencies. This is fine because a human eye cannot discern such flickering. However, the folks who are sensitive to such flickering have started experiencing a headache and a throbbing pain behind their eyes.
In case you are not sure what OLED display Pulse Witch Modulation is, please have a look at the video below demonstrating PWM flickering on iPhone X’s OLED display:
Only the iPhone X is affected by this issue due to its OLED display. The iPhone 8 and iPhone 8 Plus or any older iPhone model is not affected by this issue since they make use of an LCD display which does not make use of PWM.
The OLED panels in iPhone X are heavily dependent on the underlying PWM technology, there’s nothing much Apple can do about it. It is highly unlikely that Apple will be able to address this issue in 2018 OLED display panels. In fact, every other Android device with an OLED display suffers from the exact same issue.
This also indicates the implications of Apple completely switching to the OLED displays for its complete iPhone lineup. While this may eventually happen in the future, the company is highly likely to launch at least one LCD model in 2018. If you’re one such user who is sensitive to PWM flickering can opt to buy an LCD iPhone that Apple launches later this year.
[Reddit]