4 Health and Wellness Benefits of E-Ink Devices
E-ink displays are no longer limited to e-readers like the Kindle. reMarkable ushered in a genre of e-ink writing tablets. The Light Phone II is an e-ink phone. And Onyx has positioned the Boox Tab Ultra as an e-ink tablet PC.
E-ink is niche, but many people adopt the display type specifically for the health and lifestyle benefits. What are some of the ways an e-ink display can help improve your well-being?
1. E-Ink Reduces Eye Strain
Staring into an LCD or OLED display is akin to staring into a dim light bulb for minutes or hours at a time. The panels emit light that can gradually straing your eyes. How long this takes depends in part on your own physiology and your acclimation to the technology, but most people eventually experience eye strain at some point.
E-ink displays do not produce light. Turns out,how e-ink worksis very different from conventional screens. They consist of negatively-charged black microparticles and positively-charged white ones attaching to or repelling from the surface of a panel to form text and images. Color e-ink screens function similarly, only with colored particles mixing as necessary to form the correct color.
So you’re not looking at a light-producing panel of pixels. The experience is more akin to looking at ink on a page, hence the name: e-ink.
E-ink doesn’t completely eradicate eye strain. Like with reading physical books, your eyes can still get tired, especially if you read in poor lighting.
2. You May Start to Sleep Better
Reading a book is a good way to ease yourself into a comfortable sleep. But reading a phone before bed? Not so much—which is why avoiding smartphone use in bed is one ofseveral ways to improve your sleep hygiene. While this does have something to do with the difference in what you’re likely reading on your phone, the issue has more to do with the way smartphones emit light.
Your body follows a sleep cycle over the course of 24 hours. In the morning, your body produces cortisol to make you feel awake. In the evenings, your body produces melatonin to make you feel sleepy.
Backlit devices that emit blue light delay the production of melatonin in your body, which reduces the feeling of sleepiness. Sunlight shifts toward the red spectrum as the day comes to an end. Blue light tricks your brain into thinking it’s a different time of day.
E-ink displays don’t emit light, leaving you to turn to other sources. Even e-ink devices with lights aren’t backlit. The lights align the edge of the display and shine down onto the screen. Staring at a front-lit e-ink screen in a pitch-black room still isn’t ideal, but it has less of an impact compared to an LCD display emitting blue light directly into your eyes.
3. E-Ink Displays Are Less Addictive
App developers know how to make their software addictive. It’s by design, with color and fast animations serving as part of their toolkit. E-ink displays counteract much of this. A black and white display makes icons less eye-catching. As a result, Google and Apple have both added the option to grayscale their phones to appeal to people trying to reduce screen time.
But the difference between an e-ink display and a grayscaled iPhone doesn’t come down solely to the backlight. E-ink displays also have a slower refresh rate. This makes animations choppy, even on high-powered devices like theBoox Tab Ultra e-ink Android tablet.
Color e-ink devices also have this lower refresh rate. And while they may have color, their tones tend to be more muted and less crisp than their vivid LCD and OLED peers. The experience is more akin to looking at a newspaper than a glossy magazine.
That’s how E-ink screens nullify the appeal of color—either by doing away with them or muting them. Visuals on an e-ink display don’t beg for your attention in much the same way. This means you may be less hooked by software you don’t wish to use, and you may also be inclined to use certain addictive apps less often. YouTube videos are viewable on an e-ink tablet, but you’re probably not going to watch them for long.
4. E-Ink Helps Improve Concentration and Focus
People often think of the ability to concentrate as a matter of willpower. But that’s not true. How well you focus has a lot to do with your environment and your conditioning. It’s ill-advised to offer young kids more than a couple of hours of screen time a day, because the constant stimulation and immediate gratification impact developing brains, as covered inDiscover Magazine. Adult brains may be less malleable, but they’re not immune.
A computer or mobile device with a vivid screen bombards you with myriad requests and colors. The elements of design that make devices addictive also make it hard to concentrate.
This makes an Android tablet with an e-ink screen much less distracting than an Android tablet with a conventional display. E-ink makes it easier to focus, and the reduced strain on your eyes gives you the ability to concentrate on writing, drawing, and reading for longer. Your mind becomes less scattered.
The ability to concentrate for an extended period of time is often associated with increased productivity, and you might call to mind Cal Newport’s popular book “Deep Work: Rules for Focused Success in a Distracted World.” But a steady state of mind is better for your well-being overall.
Scattered thoughts come with heightened anxiety and stress, putting more strain on your body and making it difficult to relax. This is why part of meditation involves developing the ability to concentrate on one thing for an extended period of time. Doing so releases tension and helps you experience peace.
A Screen Impacts How You View the World
A screen isn’t an invisible layer between you and the rest of the world. It impacts how you see, which shapes what you do. Using a type of screen that’s easier on the eyes and less stimulating isn’t merely a matter of personal preference. It can do wonders for your state of mind and how your body feels.
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