iPhone 12 Pro Max screen has yellow tint

I bought my iPhone from the T-Mobile retailer, mine was manufactured during the 2nd week of December and I received it and saw that the contrast and the screen had a overall yellow tint. Instantly got annoyed about it, but kept thinking about it and decided to order one from Apple directly. I received it today and it seems like the new one is a lot better, the contrast and the grays and blacks look a lot darker. However, the white is still a bit warm, but is a very minor problem now. I think Apple might be fixing it slowly through the manufacturing process. I would recommend to exchange or return and purchase it again to get a different batch and try your luck

I had posted a few pages back that my brand new gold 12 Pro Max had a yellow tint that wouldn't go away by turning off Tru Tone. I had to make adjustments to the screen via Color Filters (under Settings > Accessibility), but it was making me very upset that such an expensive device needed any adjustments at all.

I'm here for an update: I went to a different Apple store earlier today (my local one closed suddenly due to someone getting COVID ☹️), and the Genius Bar guy suggested I try a brand new phone before giving up. He did see how dingy my screen was on the other phone and said it looks like I got a lemon.

I opted for a different color phone, too (white versus gold, the previous one). I did a complete return of the previous purchase, made a new purchase (to get a fresh 14-day return period) and I'm happy to report...the screen is no longer tinted yellow! 🤩

Very nice screen, very crisp. Everything the previous phone was not. Of course, I've yet to test this phone the next two weeks, but at least the screen issue is not there anymore.

I did run into a problem transferring data from my older iPhone (7 Plus) to this new phone. Apps just sat there and stuck on "waiting" or "loading". Didn't have this issue with the original (yellow tinted) iPhone I just returned. After a few times of turning the phone and Wi-Fi on/off, I decided to set the new iPhone back to factory settings and re-transfer data. (what a pain!)

That seemed to do the trick, and everything downloaded in under 20 minutes!

Don't give up on getting what you've paid for. Exchange the phone during the return period to get the phone and quality you want.

Hope others can get this issue solved, because it was a HUGE disappointment to come across such a quality control issue in a brand new phone!

I also prefer the white phone to the gold. Slate grey is also nice, but I'm trying to not always buy dark phones. Pacific Blue is cool, but I'd get tired of it quickly and have problems matching cases to it, so here's hoping the white phone is the right choice!

I must add that I think there must be an ambient light sensor on this model, because now that I'm sitting in a dark room, it is a bit off-white. But shine a bright light into the light sensor and the slight tint (the original phone was very yellow) seems to disappear.

Good luck, everyone!

Let's not go off the rails. And let's stop picking on @lobsterghost1. Admittedly, I went off on him a little myself earlier, but it's not nice to pick on each other. He didn't create this problematic phone, Apple did. Yell at them.

Let's move on.

I returned my 12PM today. The Genius Bar guy asked if there was anything wrong with the phone. I mentioned the yellow tinted screen and how even with Tru Tone off, it has a too-warm screen that is counter-intuitive to those who bought the phone for photographic purposes, and using a filter on the screen alters the tones of photos on other devices. He nodded and said he's been hearing that a lot for this specific model. I told him if Apple gets it right on the next model, maybe I'll upgrade then. Bye bye 12PM.

I also mentioned the same to Tim Cook's office. They don't care. They said, "Thanks for your feedback" and " Every phone screen has some variation" which is utter nonsense. We're not talking growing flowers here that have genetic differences; these are devices made by machines that are supposed to be correctly calibrated and uniformly the same. In other words, Apple will do nothing.

I suggest returning the phone if you hate the yellow tint as much as I did. Otherwise, enjoy your very expensive (but yellow) toy!

all i can say is that i've noticed it the 13 November whe. i got my 1st Pro max, comparing to the iphone X, of course with true tone and night shift off and auto brighness even off, ithis yeelow tint and the green or gray flicker when changing brothness are big issues, i've returned the 1st Pro mac on the 8th of januray and since ordered back to back 9 other iphones 12 pro max, 6 of them started with F2, one of them started with FZ, and the rest G0 serial.. on the lastest public version the gray flicker you can see in a pitch black room when booting the phone or canging brightness on stills is fixed, but not on video's app... its really weird, i still have two iphone 12 pro max right now both starting with F0 , and i can't really tell which one is the best to keep, but one thing is weird, with night shift and true tone on on both iphones, one of them is less orange and greener, and the others is way more orange, so i dunno which one to keep, cos when these features are off , they look and bahves identicaly ... a bit of a yellow tint on both , and i realized that apple would be able to fix the green or gray flicker on video with the 14.5 update, but the yellow tint , that's how the screen is and i'm not sure apple can do something, except you can go in accesibility and use the color picker to make the hue of the screen as bluewish white as the iphone X... but i've noticed that when this option is turned on you losse a bit of brightness ... so it's yours to choose. but on the 10 iphone 12 pro max i had EVERY one had these issues ( some more than others ) i'm not sure the serial is indicative of anything, cos even the last 2 iPhones i got since a few days were made on week 48... and before this i got some that were made on week 51 or 52...

Hello,

Following method helped correct the jaundiced glaze on my iPhone 12 mini;

Settings>Display & Brightness>

True Tone OFF

Night Shift ON

Set colour temp to absolute minimum

Set scheduled times from 03:00 to 02:59

i.e. Night Shift will stay active all day

Screen looks less yellow & less cold (due to True Tone being switched off; corrected by setting Night Shift to minimum colour temperature)

Update: I had a breakthrough, I think. I sat here comparing the whites of my 7 plus to my 12 Pro Max. Turns out that I can duplicate the whites of the 7 plus, more or less, by reducing the "intensity" at the "color filters" in addition to moving the hue. Dropping the intensity by around 10% lets me duplicate the whites of the 7 plus -- at least, in this one environment at home. Who knows what will happen tomorrow in daylight.

Settings --> Accessibility --> Display text / size --> Color Filters "on", check "Color Tint" and move the hue/intensity sliders.

All this with True Tone and Night Shift turned off.

Strange thing about that "hue" slider: it looks like it is varying the color tone from green to magenta (like "tint" in editing programs such as Lightroom) but it has the effect of reducing the yellow bias, at least to my eye. Perhaps what I'm perceiving as yellow bias is really a green issue?

(Colors can drive you crazy!)

This afternoon I began to experiment with taking photographs in Central Park, and then comparing the colors on the screen of my 12 Pro Max to what I was seeing with my own eyes in the park. At that time the colors of the 12 Pro Max were very clearly biased to yellow and very bright green, a bizarre look, as I sadly expected. Looking at the same photographs with my 7 plus was much closer to reality, and also much more beautiful as well.

Hopefully when I test this tomorrow in the park it will all come together for the 12 Pro Max.

SO, I suggest that you start to take photographs and then fine tune the screen colors to match what you see with your own eyes. At least that will provide a somewhat objective standard. (Of course this assumes that the photographs themselves are true to reality....)

Yes, I encountered a green tint on my iPhone 12 Pro Max with & without TruTone. The tint only showed in complete darkness when brightness levels were relatively low. A good way to find out if you have the issue is to go into your phone's wallpaper settings and select 'Stills', then scroll down till you see a completely black wallpaper. This wallpaper is meant to have no illumination, as all pixels on the screen will be off (OLED). Tap on it, and turn on perspective zoom. While you have this turned on, rotate the phone slightly in a dark environment and if you notice of flashes of green/yellow you can get your phone replaced.

I had this issue as well and got a replacement at my local Apple Store. It was impossible for them to reproduce it in the bright environment at the store, so I showed them a video taken on another device of the issue.

Hope this helps.

Reading some of the recent comments I get more convinced that this is a hardware issue, as I wrote and explained some time ago. It easy to verify by just change your viewing angel, side to side or up down, and the screen will go more white and even blue. Also light reflections in a completely black screen will look yellowish. Poor glas qualitiy or coating. Cannot be fixed with software. Mine is going back this week.

Hey all,

I was concerned about this myself in terms of never having worked with an OLED display before. I've done CRTs, Plasma, and LCDs this is my first OLED. Anyway way. I took what people were saying and put together a couple of basic tests to confirm if this was hardware vs software since people have been screaming from either side.

In my findings, the color tint is controlled by software, and at least for me is NOT a panel problem.

To confirm this for yourself do the following:

1. find a daylight or blue/white source of light such as an LED flashlight, or daylight or cool white bulbs.
2. With True Tone enabled, and auto brightness enabled shine your light source on the iPhone's sensors (in the notch)

if your display is working correctly, you will see it get bright and turn to a much whiter tint. If this happens you can rest assured, your hardware and panel are fine, and the color tint is strictly software as Apple has already stated.

Hope this helps. I would provide a video for documentation, however I do not have a second camera good enough to get accurate results at this time.

Have a great day!

I just reached out to Apple for the heck of it and the agent was super dismissive and came off condescending. Anyways, basically they told me I could turn off true tone, or turn off night shift (I told him I wasn't using night shift).

Also this:

Having checked our records, customers actually inquire about the same issue that you have. Most who notice this variation describe it as a blue or yellow tint. All of the displays used in iOS devices are screened against a specific set of visual criteria which contains a tolerance to account for variations in hardware. These variations are within specification, are not indicative of an issue, and fall within the range for what Apple considers acceptable. Because minor differences in color temperature are considered a matter of 'customer perception', this is not a condition for which service is appropriate.

This seems to conflict with what others have reported Apple saying... I guess without a clear answer, if nothing changes in a week I'm just going to return this thing.

Just got home from Verizon to explore return/exchange options and none work out great for me considering the promos I had applied... I left with the 12 Pro Max to consider a bit more.

I did look at their display models - 12 Pro Max, 12 Pro, 12, and 12 Mini. All of those had a more yellow tint than my iPhone XR. I also stopped at Best Buy and looked at their displays. The 12 Pro Max, 12 Pro, and 12 all had the same yellow tint compared to my iPhone XR. I made sure to put all settings the same- brightness up, true tone on (and off) and no color filters applied.

So far 100% of the 12's I've looked at exhibited a very clear yellow overtone and also blue shift at angles. I'm leaning toward keeping the phone and seeing if I get used to it. Absolute worst case scenario, if I can't get used to it- my wife doesn't even notice it and we can swap phones, or I can try to apple a color filter and see if that works out. I did try for a short time last night and I got it to match my old phone pretty closely. I just don't know how that filter would apply in different lighting conditions...

I believe this is correct. I have done various side-by-side comparisons of the 12 lineup compared to past versions. I believe we’re mislabeling this as an actual “issue” for I think Apple has done this by design. A few videos I have seen provide the reason to be to provide a more true-to-life appearance of white by toning down the blue light output by default. It is also softer on the eyes and eases the strain. It does seem to make the True Tone appear more aggressively yellowish when selected to on but that adjusts with change of lighting and environment as it’s designed to do. When in a darker setting, it will appear more yellowish. This is natural as your eyes will automatically adapt. That’s why it seems the white gets softer in dark even with True Tone selected to off. I have actually grown used to it and prefer it this way over the harsh white appearance when working on the iPhones and iPads from past generations. However, if one truly prefers to emulate the brighter white option, then by all means, adjust the color filter settings in Accessibility —> Display & Text Size to your liking as explained in prior posts.

Firstly, thanks... but I’m not an Apple employee. I’ve never worked for Apple and I probably never will have to. What I am is an IT professional and own my own business. A few of my clients who have iPhones within the 12 series line up have brought the tinted white background to my attention so I did some trials and research. Naturally, I came across this forum so I thought I’d share my findings.

I believe most of the people on here aren’t actually upset with the topic of this discussion per say, but rather they are concerned if something is physically wrong with their hardware... and rightfully so. I’m simply stating what I’ve found after testing (as I recall) 5, 12-series iPhones and all have the warmer tone of white appearance versus all the other prior iPhones (LCD and OLED screens) and all iPads with which I have compared. I just thought that maybe my findings would give some people peace of mind that it’s most likely nothing wrong with their phones, but the way it was designed. If a change is desired, then one can adjust it. If a person is not happy with how the screen appears by default and doesn’t want to change the settings, then I think only a return may be the option because I believe exchanging it will yield the same results and not make the problem go away because it may not actually be a problem to Apple. I also think if Apple receives enough negative feedback about it... maybe they will release an update to tweak the default settings.

You can actually see the comparative difference within this text thread with a client for this is on an iPad screen and you can see the picture of an iPhone 12 Max and the difference is plain as day.

So I can only hope this puts some minds at ease.

Thank you.

Sincerely,

Not an Apple employee.

3x champ.

I think what you say is partly true.

Yes, apple designed it that way. 

But there was also a genuine hardware issue early on, IMO. I’ve had 5 iPhone 12’s trying to rid myself of the issue. From my experience two were definitely faulty - mushy yellow and dull, even with True Tone off. Ans way less bright than my 10.

But alert to the issue, I’m very sensitive to it and I’m sure, as seems to be the consensus now, “new True Tone”, has a yellowish tint that some don’t notice, some like and some don’t like. 

So if your 12 on max brightness is more dull and lifeless than your old phone, send it back. If it’s as bright and only looks yellow with True Tone on, tough luck, it’s what apple wanted for 2021.

ive learned a painful lesson. I’d it’s not broke don’t fix it. Next years Apple idea may not be your idea of a good idea. Check it out first, wait three months for the bug count, then decide.

I had logical reasons to change other than vanity, but in the end, I just assumed the 12 would be easily as good as my 10. For me it isn’t.

Holly - that sounds more like my conclusion.

”expected behaviour” is like the euphemism “feature”. They’ve cocked up and don’t have the desire to fix it so let’s pretend it’s supposed to be that way.

But my repeat to anyone with one that is dim and yellow with True Tone OFF is to get a replacement. Some early panels were clearly (very) faulty.

With True Tone off, mine is ice white. True Tone on, can be really yucky, depending on where I am.