How to Fix a Screen-Burned iPhone or Android Phone

August 11, 2023 By Prelo Con

(Image Credit Google)

image credit - nextpit.com Screen burn-in might have happened to your phone or tablet if you can still see shadowy or ghost-like pictures on the screen. It's rare for a modern electronic device to keep showing all or part of an image when it's off or meant to show something else. Even though display technology has been getting better over the years to make screen burn-in less common, it can still happen sometimes based on how you use your phone or tablet. The good news is that it's easy to avoid if you take some common-sense steps.

What does "burn-in" mean?

The word "burn-in" comes from the old cathode-ray tube (CRT) displays, which were larger "picture tube" TV and computer screens that came before today's flat screens. CRT displays had a phosphor layer on the glass that lit up when electron beams from a "gun" at the back of the tube hit it. Over time, these phosphors would wear unevenly, leaving a "burned-in" picture on the front of the screen. This happened a lot when people used "green screen" (and amber screen) monochrome screens in the early days of computers. Tablets used as home hubs, point-of-sale terminals in stores, and smartphones often used on long commutes with apps like Waze or Google Maps are all popular places where screen burn-in happens. Basically, screen burn-in can happen when an app with fixed and unchanging screen elements is used for long amounts of time.

How common is screen burn-in on iPhones and Android phones?

Apple switched to OLED panels with the iPhone X, which came out in 2017. It kept using these panels in its higher-end iPhones, like the iPhone XS and iPhone 11 Pro, until 2020, when it almost completely went over to OLED. The iPhone SE is the only one of the new iPhones that still has an LCD screen. But almost all iPads still use LCD panels, so burn-in doesn't happen to them. The only exception is the 12.9-inch iPad Pro from 2021 and later, which uses newer tiny LED technology that still doesn't let burn-in happen. On the Android side, many more products, both tablets and phones, use OLED. For example, Samsung's tablets have had AMOLED screens since the first Galaxy Tab S came out in 2014, and its smartphones have had OLED screens for even longer. In fact, it's hard to find a smartphone with Android that doesn't have an OLED screen, especially if you want a high-end model.

How to Avoid Screen Burn-in

With OLED panels, however, most things that look like screen burn-in aren't. Image retention is usually what you'll see instead. This is a temporary ghost of a previous image that should disappear on its own as you watch other material. Also read - Android Devices Add This File Transfer Feature Which Was Earlier Exclusive To iPhone Only

Turn off your device

Since image retention is only temporary and depends on the OLED pixels not losing their brightness, the easiest answer is to turn off your device and let it rest. You don't even have to turn it off unless it has an indicator that stays on constantly. Just turn off the screen for an hour or two, and the picture should get less clear over time. If your screen is always on, you can try turning it off completely overnight or just turning it off for a few hours.

Download a corrective apps

Most of the time, turning off your screen for a few hours will fix any image retention. If that doesn't work, you can download corrective apps that will flash through different images to try to light up all the OLED pixels evenly and get things back in balance. The Google Play Store has a lot of screen correctors and tests for Android devices, such as OLED Saver. If you have an iPhone, you can check things out with an app like Doctor OLED X. If you don't want to download an app, you can try the ScreenBurnFixer website. It has a collection of movies with color slides and checkered patterns that are meant to help your pixels get back on track.

Lessen the brightness of your screen

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image credit - digitaltrends.com[/caption] You can change how bright your iPhone screen is by going to the Settings app and clicking on Display & Brightness. Here, you can turn on automatic brightness, which lowers the light when you don't need it. You can also turn on True Tone and Night Shift, which change the colors more often to avoid image retention and burn-in. Most Android phones and tablets have a Settings app with a Display section where you can change the brightness. The settings for an always-on screen are usually here as well, but this can change based on your Android phone.

Switch to dark mode

One great thing about OLED screens is that black dots are completely turned off. This is why using dark mode on your phone actually uses less power, and since you're lighting up fewer pixels, it also helps prevent picture retention. You can find the dark mode settings on an iPhone in Settings > Display & Brightness. In Settings > Display > Night mode or Comfort view, you can find these settings on most Android devices.

Set the screen timer

Since image retention and screen burn-in are caused by keeping the same image on your screen for a long time, one of the best ways to avoid them is to turn your screen off when you don't need to. Both iOS and Android have timeout settings that can turn your screen off when you're not using it. Face ID-equipped iPhones and some Android devices can even tell when you're looking at the screen, so you don't have to worry about setting a long timeout and having it turn off while you're trying to read something. Many OLED screens do have this problem, but it can usually be fixed by doing one of the things we said above, like letting your screen rest or getting an app that fixes it. If you do something as soon as you see ghost pictures on your screen, you should be able to stop them from getting so bad that they burn into the screen.

By Prelo Con

Following my passion by reviewing latest tech. Just love it.

How to Fix a Screen-Burned iPhone or Android Phone

What does "burn-in" mean?

How common is screen burn-in on iPhones and Android phones?

How to Avoid Screen Burn-in

Turn off your device

Download a corrective apps

Lessen the brightness of your screen

Switch to dark mode

Set the screen timer

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