Series 5 Apple Watch is too dim when activated

Just clarifying... it's not that the AOD display is too dim when it's in the 'standby' mode. That's fine. It's that when it's in the 'active' mode... ie you've woken it up... it's substantially dimmer than the 4. There's even a trick to see how much they tamp down the brightness. Next time you're in a dark room, wake your watch and note the brightness. Do the same with the 4. The 5 is substantially dimmer *in the wake mode*. Again, not talking about the AOD 'standby' mode.

To prove there's more headroom in there and that it's software causing this by over-aggressively dimming it in dark rooms, take out your phone, turn on the flashlight, point it at the watch screen, and look how much brighter it gets. Point being there's plenty more room in there to 'light it up' more, but as a user who wants it brighter when 'woken up' there's no setting that lets me get it brighter, regardless of how high I crank the 'brightness' setting.'

Simply put, Apple has reduced the brightness too much in a low-light situation. Again, fine that the AOD is so dim. You should be at least able to 'tap to wake' your watch to get the brightness back up to where the 4 is. Simply put, you can't.

The 5 is too dim!!!

Just ran another test. S4 and S5 worn on the same wrist. Both have 'brightness' cranked up to 'max'. Went into a walk-in closet, turned off the lights so it was pitch-black. AOD display on the S5 kept lowering and lowering the display to the point of it almost being unreadable. Don't care about that too much. Just an observation. The issue is when I raised my wrist so both watches 'woke up'. S4 was noticeably brighter.

Following a suggestion from someone else in this thread, I turned off the AOD display on my S5, essentially making it work like the S4. Covered both watches to 'turn them off' (i.e. black screen) then woke them both up. Same result. S5 is substantially dimmer than the S4.

There's something going on here. Turning off the always-on display should make it work at *least* as well as the S4 and tell the Ambient Light Sensor to stop being sooo **** aggressive. Unfortunately, that doesn't seem to be the case. The S5 is always dimmer, even when AOD is turned off.

Cupertino, we have a problem! I too am sending mine back, and I *hate* that I have to, but this just isn't usable, especially for people like me who need reading glasses where adding brightness makes things look sharper.

Just ran another test. Same pitch-black closet. Both S4 and S5 on same wrist. S5 with AOD turned off. And again, this is talking all/only about the 'wake' mode, not the stand-by/AOD mode of the 5.

With the light in the closet on, 'woke' both watches and held them under the bulb. Turned off the light and both screens were at max brightness. **** near blinding! Couldn't tell the difference. Kept spinning the crowns upwards to indicate I was interacting with the watch but without causing anything on the screen to actually change. The S4 remained blindingly bright. The S5 started to creep down in brightness after a couple of seconds, even when interacting with it.

Left them alone for a few more seconds (but not enough to 'sleep') and eventually both screens started to adjust to the dark environment again. Sure enough, the S5 kept getting darker past where the S4 leveled off.

Covered the watch faces to 'make them sleep', then tapped them to wake them back up. Both were substantially dimmer than before, but even here, the S5 was dimmer than the S4.

So... thanks to the 'under-the-bulb' test that cranked both screens up to 'blinding', this proves it isn't a hardware issue. It's software. Apple went overboard on the ambient-light-sensor-triggered adjustments of brightness, then didn't give users a way to counter that.

Like others have said, I would *happily* give up some battery life to get better brightness, and as the watch owner/user, I should have that option.

Apple, are you listening? You are turning off your biggest supporters/fans here. The repeat buyers. The ones who always upgrade, happily spending $800 for a cellular 44 in stainless, even when it's the exact same processor as the S4, just an always-on-display and a compass and a little more memory that I'm not using anyway. That was still worth it to me.

But taking away brightness, making it less-usable to me? That's the deal-breaker.

You should have at least made it so disabling AOD would *match* the S4 since that was removing the biggest battery drain that I'm sure inspired the change.

While I want to wait for a software fix, the fact you are saying it's working 'as designed' isn't encouraging that it ever will be because you can't address a problem until you admit you have one. So unfortunately, my new S5 has to go back.

That said, I do applaud you for extending my return window past 30 days as you did today. At least you proved you do still value your customer's experience. Still, this wouldn't be needed if you just gave us the choice to say what's more valuable to us... brightness or battery life. Unfortunately, the choice you made for me was the opposite of what I would have chosen, hence the need for the return.

I agree with you...Apple needs to fix this problem with a software update quick. Thought I was going blind looking at my new Iwatch 5 I got yesterday. My iwatch 1 is super bright. May be taking the iwatch 5 back...useless if it’s hard to see.

Most people--myself included--much prefer the 4. Yes, you don't have the always-on display or the compass (or the extra memory) but you *do* have the extra money and extra brightness! Honestly, after using the 5 for two months, then going back to the 4, I don't feel I'm missing out on anything and that brightness makes all the difference in the world. Get a 4, then wait for the 6. 5 is too flawed.

My 5 was originally bright but as of today it suddenly dimmed and I can not get it to brighten. I have been trying to get it back to brighter since this morning with no luck! My software is updated and all. This is frustrating, to say the least!

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Low light and no light conditions

Excuse me. What is that suppose to mean? Please explain...