You can make a difference in the Apple Support Community!

When you sign up with your Apple Account, you can provide valuable feedback to other community members by upvoting helpful replies and User Tips.

Looks like no one’s replied in a while. To start the conversation again, simply ask a new question.

Apple Watch Ultra 2 VERY dim inside and dark enviroments..

Hello.

I just bought a very expensive Ultra 2 Watch. I am happy with the watch overall, but what totally ruins the experience is it is SO dim inside and in dark enviroments! I can hardly read it. There is no override available and the brightness is set to full. My son has a Series 6 and that is brighter in the same conditions. This cant be real? This so called "ULTRA" is more weak in brightness performance than an older regular Apple Watch. If there is something I HATE it is factory controlled auto stuff like this! We know the watch can be brighter so WHY on earth is it locked to a weak sensor that is WAY to low calibrated? I know its unfortunately not a hardware issue as ALL other Ultra Watch suffer from this ridicolous factory setting. Why can I not disable this auto dim or at least raise the lower minimum brightness. This is a disaster, as I can hardly read the watch in my office and living room where we have low light usually. This is almost a RETURN ISSUE for me! The fact that the user cannot set this setting when I bought and paid for the watch is a disgrace! And for those that reply its working as intended I can see by a search that hundreds of other users complain about this "error". This HAS to be corrected in a software update ASAP!

Apple Watch Ultra 2, watchOS 10

Posted on Sep 22, 2023 12:31 PM

Reply
Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Posted on Sep 26, 2023 9:32 PM

Just received my Apple Watch Ultra 2 today and loved it until nighttime. I cannot read my text messages at all because it’s so dim and the brightness feature does not do much. Please re-calibrate!!! This is unacceptable for a Watch at this price.


Similar questions

611 replies

Nov 10, 2023 12:24 PM in response to A A P L

I too was very excited to get the Ultra 2. And like many who have commented here, I couldn’t live with the dim screen in poor lighting conditions. It was a deal breaker for me. Took it back to Verizon after only 2 days.

Problem being, …. My series 3 Apple Watch is 6 years old now, and probably running out of life.

Can anyone tell me how many series back I need to go to get a watch that doesn’t have the auto dimming burden?

Im 70, retired with bad eyes and always charge my watch at bedtime. 😉

Nov 10, 2023 12:48 PM in response to 2008Bullitt

Can anyone tell me how many series back I need to go to get a watch that doesn’t have the auto dimming burden?
Im 70, retired with bad eyes and always charge my watch at bedtime. 😉

My 7 which I traded in for the U2, was good. Of course, I have not run iOS17 on it so maybe it's been hobbled as well.

Apple really disappoints me on this one. At 62, my peepers aren't as good either...

Nov 10, 2023 1:02 PM in response to LasseK1981

Does anyone have any media contacts? I really think the media would find this quite interesting. It would make for some great headlines! It's clearly a software issue, since some have reported their older watches becoming dimmer after the latest iOS update. So, it would be a simple fix on Apple's part to retain, and not lose, thousands of customers over this.

Nov 11, 2023 5:31 AM in response to shifflav

I had to call internationally just to report this problem via phone as every time I tried talking with them over iMessage they would just say “advisor” or “level 2” and what not. So I called with international rates for over 30 minutes on the phone and she said it’s “expected behavior” to only suggest I turn off… Always on Display? I don’t think we were on the same page until the last 5 minutes of our conversation over the phone. Then I clarified for the 5th time that yes, it is an expected behavior for the screen to dim when outside at night or somewhat dim room but not to that degree where I came even tell the time! I don’t know at this point …

Nov 11, 2023 5:35 AM in response to LasseK1981

We need a reliable comment from Apple on this. Is this under review? I don't think the battery life is the ultimate problem with why Apple won't fix this. I think it is more that it is not really on their radar and just a general stubbornness to respond. Tech support will be clueless on this as many have found out. How many pages of threads and articles are needed to get a peep out of Apple these days? Very discouraging.

Nov 12, 2023 11:41 AM in response to LasseK1981

I also have the problem with my Watch Series 9. I just spoke to Apple Support about the problem and may have found a solution. It's stupid but somehow it really seems to work: Turn off your iPhone's automatic brightness. Somehow the Apple Watch seems to react to this. Since I deactivated the automatic brightness on my iPhone, my watch no longer gets so incredibly dark. Please try this and let us know if it helped you too.

Nov 12, 2023 12:17 PM in response to LasseK1981

NMaybe we need to be saying this in another category in the forums where app software developers collaborate with Apple software engineers. I do t think this is going to move as nowhere further then stir our frustrations with this stubbornness from apples software engineers. We need to get the attention of 3rd party app creators and bring it up with them and in turn they can implement this auto screen brightness software control.

Nov 12, 2023 4:13 PM in response to LasseK1981

I was wondering if a couple of you guys could try this and let me know what happens as it works for me..

I have to use a face that has no option for switching off night mode and because Siri face is the only one apart from wayfinder that the calendar sync works correctly with as it used to, all the rest the sync doesn't update the calendar correctly. I need to be able to show my blood glucose in the calendar, using another app Shuggah, but there is no option in the Siri face to turn off night mode, and I need to turn it off, so I can see my blood sugars in the calendar complication as I am a diabetic, hence when it gets dark I can hardly see any display apart from the time, so I added Modular ultra on iPhone watch app and set it as my face after turning night mode off in the edit mode on the iPhone sliding the green frame across to where it says off at the bottom, not the red just green frame with off at bottom of frame then set as my watch face. Then I went back to the watch pressed down on the face and went back to the Siri face. It's working OK for me in the dark now as night mode is turned off, now it's not brilliant but well usable enough for me to be able to see everything so you can now pick the face you want that doesn't have the night mode option to turn it off, and I'm a pensioner with poor eyesight. Let me know if it

works for you, please.

Nov 13, 2023 2:55 AM in response to LasseK1981

I have to use a face that has no option for switching off night mode and because Siri face is the only one apart from wayfinder that the calendar sync works correctly with like it used to, all the rest the calendar sync doesn't update the calendar correctly. I need to be able to show my blood glucose in the calendar, using another app Shuggah, but there is no option in the Siri face to turn off night mode, and I need to turn it off, so I can see my blood sugars in the calendar complication as I am a diabetic, hence when it gets dark I can hardly see any display apart from the time, so I added Modular ultra on iPhone watch app and set it as my face after turning night mode off in the edit mode on the iPhone sliding the green frame across to where it says off at the bottom, not the red just green frame with off at bottom of frame then set as my watch face. Then I went back to the watch pressed down on the face and went back to the Siri face and night mode stayed off. It's working OK for me in the dark now as night mode is turned off, now it's not brilliant but well usable enough for me to be able to see everything, so you can now pick the face you want that doesn't have the night mode option to turn it off, and I'm a pensioner with poor eyesight. Let me know if it works for you, please. Tried early hours this morning pitch black, still can read it don't think It's as it should be but definitely usable I can even read the small blood value, just hate the face with a vengeance it's so ugly and limited to two complications when I need to use a lot more to use my home automations to make things easier for me as I am disabled.

Nov 13, 2023 5:35 AM in response to LasseK1981

To remind people, it's a problem with the Ultra 2, not the Series 9. So a much smaller group. If it was also the same in series 9, it would have been fixed by now with so many more people affected. For Ultra 2 users, there is no workaround currently. No auto on/off, night on/off, different faces, or swapping out replacements helps ... it's just unreadable when it is in a dark environment period!

Nov 13, 2023 8:55 AM in response to Bmbsales

Bmbsales wrote:

The way I “fixed” this, is to turn raise to wake, on. Now it will show full bright even in dark conditions.

As a note…I use theater mode at night while sleeping, so not much battery loss throughout the night.

I did that last night, and while it does get brighter for a few seconds, that's ONLY good for if I need to know time and nothing else.

For regular use having a face with 8 complications, it's a no-go.

And while I have not SCUBA dived yet with this watch, I will never do it if I need to rely upon it.

Sad, since I got this Ultra2 for a replacement to the other watches I use.

I'm going to still keep trying, but I'm losing hope at this point...

Apple Watch Ultra 2 VERY dim inside and dark enviroments..

Welcome to Apple Support Community
A forum where Apple customers help each other with their products. Get started with your Apple Account.