u/Wrong_User_Logged

• He lost the Ring.
• He got stabbed twice.
• He lost a finger
• He never married and had no kids.
• He had to leave the Shire.
• Everyone else got kingdoms, wives, or glory — Frodo got PTSD and a boat.

My new MacBook uses PWM flickering, which gives me eye strain.

I hate this display, so I downgraded to an iBook.

What software should I install first?

Are you using a MacBook Pro with Apple silicon?

Your laptop screen may be flickering constantly. You probably can’t see it, but your eyes may still react to it, which can lead to faster eye fatigue or eye strain.

Why does this happen? Apple uses PWM — pulse-width modulation — to control screen brightness. In simple terms, the display rapidly flickers on and off to manage brightness and power use. Even if the flicker is invisible to you, your eyes may still be exposed to it continuously.

And I’m not the only one noticing this. This video discusses the issue:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OHGKhFVdjlM

Almost no reviewers talk about it. Notebookcheck is one of the few sources that actually measures PWM:
https://www.notebookcheck.net/Apple-MacBook-Pro-M5-2025-review-The-fastest-single-core-performance-in-the-world.1144391.0.html

What can you do?
Not much, unfortunately. If you feel eye strain, consider returning the device to Apple as soon as possible — Apple usually gives you a 14-day return window.

A safer option may be the MacBook Air, which uses a basic IPS LCD display and does not rely on PWM in the same way. Also be careful with Apple OLED devices, such as the iPad Pro, if you are sensitive to PWM.

I used to think “eye strain from a laptop display” was probably just brightness, bad posture, dry eyes, or too much screen time.

Then I got a MacBook Pro with the mini-LED/XDR display.

The screen looks incredible: sharp, bright, high contrast, 120 Hz, beautiful HDR. But after using it for a while, I started noticing something strange: eye pressure, fatigue, and a kind of headache/visual discomfort that I don’t get on my MacBook Air. The Air feels much easier on my eyes, even during longer sessions.

After digging into it, I learned about PWM — pulse-width modulation. In simple terms, some displays control brightness by rapidly flickering the backlight on and off. Most people never notice it. But a subset of users can be sensitive to it, especially on OLED or mini-LED displays. For those people, the screen can look perfectly normal while still causing eye strain, headaches, dizziness, or that “my eyes just hate this display” feeling.

And this is the frustrating part: Apple gives us almost no proper control over it.

There is no “flicker-sensitive mode.”
No “disable PWM” option.
No clear warning in macOS.
No accessibility setting specifically for people who react badly to PWM or temporal dithering.

I’m not saying every headache from a MacBook Pro is PWM. It could also be brightness, contrast, glare, scaling, dry eyes, local dimming, ProMotion, or temporal dithering. But if you have a MacBook Pro and you notice:

• eye strain that starts unusually fast,
• pressure behind the eyes,
• headaches after using the internal display,
• discomfort that disappears on another screen,
• the MacBook Air feeling easier on your eyes than the Pro,

then PWM or display flicker sensitivity might be worth looking into.

The annoying thing is that many affected users are not “haters.” They bought the Pro because they wanted the best MacBook. The machine is amazing. The display is technically impressive. But for some people, it is physically uncomfortable to use.

Apple already treats many visual issues as accessibility concerns. PWM sensitivity should be one of them. At minimum, Apple should acknowledge that a small group of users can be affected and give us a real flicker-sensitive display mode.