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

I have both Ultra and Ultra 2 watches and did not experience any issues with the original as with Ultra 2.

Side by side and in daylight, the screen is noticeably brighter on the Ultra 2 but at low light levels, the screen is very poor and barely visible in comparison.

Also, I much preferred the manual night screen setting via rotating the Crown. Apple please fix !!!

I found out that this latest Apple Watch update adds a night mode sensor that is a bit of a pain on the Apple model that you and I have. They changed the sensor to auto.

I found out how to turn it off

If you hold your finger on your screen until it pops into edit mode you will have a button that says edit tap on it then you will see at the top of the screen it should say style. If you swipe your finger to the right it will get to night mode.

You spin the crown to select the mode to be off.

Apple is already working on a fix

DEFINITELY A DEFECTIVE WATCH OR SOFTWARE INSTALLATION

So I went to Apple today and and asked to take one of their Ultra2s to the bathroom

After I convinced them to not call the police I compared their model to mine in the dark.

SHOCKING difference.

We either have phones with bad sensors or something went amok with the software

Exchanged mine for a new watch

To be honest I’d still like it a bit brighter but mine is drastically better

I’d suggest taking your watch to the store and ask to do a side by side

I notice there is a new OS out (10.0.2) - maybe they have fixed it already..... I am downloading now to see if it fixes my Ultra 2.

Not impressed so far, came from a Series 7 and now night / dark rooms is really difficult on a premium product!

If you haven't sorted it Apple - you need to......

Agree. If this is not fixed within the return period, I WILL return this. Even worse… Watch OS 10 RUINED made my Ultra 1 DIMMER TOO!!! Also… A brightness workaround on the ultra 1 was rendered useless with the WatchOS 10 update… So BOTH Ultras are literally ruined for me!

RIDICULOUS. iPhones have an auto-brightness OFF switch in options, so we can choose our brightness…but on the watch?? No such control. I am seriously ticked because I can return the Ultra 2…bit now Apple has ruined my Ultra 1 as well??? Wow.

How about visually impaired (me!)?? We don’t even have an override in Accessibility options for the visually impaired?? Apple REALLY did damage to existing owners here.

From what I can tell so far the option to turn it off the red night mode is limited to the wayfinder face. I played with a few other faces. And I would agree its pretty dark... It seems the easiest answer would be to turn off the auto dim feature completely or give us the option to do so with the understanding that it will impact the battery. It was a manual thing before and the update to version 10 re-purposed the crown spin to an app function of sorts.

I suspect we are dealing with several issues

For those of us with a brand new Ultra2 we are dealing with defective watches

I compared my watch to two other Ultra2 watches. The other two DID NOT HAVE THE PROBLEM

I then went to the store and compared mine to the store samples. Completely different

I have a new watch. I would still like a brighter display but this one is usable whereas my first watch was a disaster

If you are in the two week window of purchase I suggest you get yourselves new watches

I have same issue if I shine light on watch the screen goes bright.

I have brightness on full and when i tap screen the brightness won’t increase. In night mode red screen I can barely see or read anything.

So last night after barely being able to see anything on my watch, I moved from one low light room to another. The second low light room seemed to be light enough, because my watch suddenly brightened and it was readable. I then found the wayfinder watch face and turned off night mode as suggested by someone in this thread. I’ve since tested it in a fully dark space as well as very low light, and it now seems ok, but I have to have to adjust the display to full brightness for it to be ok.

I’m not sure if this is fixed now or if I should still go back to the store for a swap. It seems a bit flaky, but I don’t know. There’s issues transferring my mobile data, too, so maybe there’s more going on. But for now at least I can see the screen ok.

For the price I’d have liked a better first day experience with this watch, though. This hasn’t been fun.

Well got my watch today and also have to state, not impressed with the dimness. Compared to my Apple Watch 3 which is very bright. I understand some dimness but if I can over ride this feature that would be great. Not having that control is frustrating. Do the other watches do this? For this price there should be some flexibility.

may have to stick with the 3 then….sigh. Please fix the Apple and soon!!!

BAD HARDWARE

One of the things that distinguishes my old watch from the new is how it responded while on "always on" mode.

When I would go to a dark room with the old watch, the display would actually DIM when I raised the watch.

In other words, the display went DARKER than background levels.

I still would like a brighter night time display, but my original watch was clearly defective.

If Apple doesn’t issue an IMMEDIATE fix, I’ll return my Ultra 2. Even worse… WatchOS 10 also rendered my original Ultra much darker than it was before.

The ONLY I reason I bought the 2 after already having the first Ultra was all the talk about a brighter screen. In daylight, yes. But in dark environments, it is UTTERLY USELESS. Totally unreadable.

Same issue here. Returning tomorrow to protect myself against it NEVER being fixed. Because right it’s useless in dark locations. If/when this is fixed, I’ll buy it again.

In a dark room, if I shine the iPhone spotlight on the watch face (Ultra 3), it gets nice and bright for a short time. If it would stay this bright all of the time in darkness, it would be perfect.

I have been testing shining the iPhone light on watch in dark and the screen stays bright for a few seconds and then reverts back to dim mode.

when night mode active the watch is totally useless. Not sure if it’s worth waiting for a software fix or returning phone.

I have set the Wayfinder face as my default and turned Night Mode off - Watch is still unreadably DIM in low / no light conditions and no Option to make it brighter!

A simple Dim Control AUTO / OFF in Display and Brightness would do and let us choose if we want the Watch Face to DIM in low / no light conditions; why is APPLE deciding that for us?