Sun, sun, sun. And I can't see a thing on my phone!

[slitchfield]

With the advent of summer in the Northern Hemisphere, Steve Litchfield reprises an old rant with a look at how the current crop of 2008/2009 smartphones fare on a sunny day. Does your phone turn into a hand mirror or can you see what's going on? Featured here are seven popular screen types, showing how well - or how badly - they do.

Read on in the full article.

[TheUndertaker]

awwwwww no n97 picture? lol anyway great article steve!
I gotta agree, the touchscreen technology sort of hampers sunlight visibility... look at the e75 and n96! stunning!!
and to think that 5800, a touch screen phone, has better legibility under sunlight than the innov8 thats just shocking!!

Maybe the Finns design some phones in winter when they only get about 4 hours of daylight per day, and other phones in summer when it almost never gets dark.

Think about it:
on an touch-based phone you HAVE TO use the virtual touch keyboard to write text. But outdoor you can't see it.

It might be one of the best transflective screens, but effectively my E71 is nearly unreadable in direct sunlight. There is always only one angle in which the contrast gets good, but the colours are terrible. No way to show photos.

i thought N86's AMOLED screen will be better...


















but it isn't..

Did you even try to increase the backlight level on the TyTN II? I have one of these and went outside with the sun shining directly into the screen and could see the contents of the screen very well even with the backlight set to 50%. Of course much better with 75% and more. And I have a screen protector on it too.

[slitchfield]

Yes, all backlights were at 100% in my test. I simply don't believe your TyTN 2 data point, I'm afraid. It's a bog standard TFT with touch layer on top and will be unreadable with the sun behind you.

[mattrad]

Excellent comparison Steve.

Luckily for Brits though, glare on a phone's screen is not generally a problem, owing to the lack of sunshine!

[rvirga]

Jump at 1:38 in this video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FPz6Y-y5RsE
Not bad. Not bad at all.

[Jejoma]

That's why I've always avoided cameras without viewfinders - no idea of what picture you are taking in bright sunlight (I only take snaps, I'm not a real photographer ). I can't see why the manufacturers have ever made them.

No photo here, but I can confirm: brilliant mirroring layer under (internal) E90 screen. So, no problems to see (even colours, though not great, of course) on direct sunlight!
And, of course, very visible keyboard ;-D

[snoyt]

Lovely shots. Should be a standard test. Nice kick in the teeth for OLED ;-) Maybe a fresh 100W lightbulb test in the dark at a certain distance for all phones to be tested? And where is the shot of the N97?

[sajjadashraf]

hi steve, i think u havnt done fair with omnia hd (i8910).
please post the separate picture of omnia hd in direct sunlight,
omnia hd will sure beat all including iphone.
thanks

Wow, N97 only marginally better than the TyTNII? For all intents and purposes, that [TyTNII] phone didn't even turn on when outdoors here in Florida. The N97 seems to be a dream in comparison, perhaps not as good as some of the other photos taken here, but definitely not as bad as the 5800 plays it out to be.