Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

tbuzleski

macrumors member
Oct 23, 2013
34
47
So I received my iphone 11 pro space grey today and I clearly have a LG Oled panel.

Compared to my Xs max the screen is uneven and the colors doesn’t pop like my xs.
The colors also shift a lot more when viewed from the side.

Anyone else noticed this?
This describes mine perfectly. It’s back to the store for me.
 

Dayley28

macrumors member
Jan 10, 2019
38
15
This describes mine perfectly. It’s back to the store for me.

Yes mine does the exact same. It’s not drastic in normal lighting but when indoors or at night the display looks tinted and not very vibrant. Think I’m going to return the 11 Pro and get the 11 instead. LCD seems to be less varied.
 

krislinus

macrumors newbie
Dec 29, 2014
4
0
My 11 Pro has a noticeable color shift when tilting the iPhone. I think that might be something Apple should fix if it should live up to the “Pro” name. At what degrees should I view my phone at when doing image editing?
 

dmylrea

macrumors 601
Sep 27, 2005
4,809
6,871
My 11 Pro has a noticeable color shift when tilting the iPhone. I think that might be something Apple should fix if it should live up to the “Pro” name. At what degrees should I view my phone at when doing image editing?
Mine too (11 Pro Max). Looks neutral when holding it and normal viewing angle. Lay it flat, and it turns bluish.

Are they all like that?

Are there two different OLED displays being used (LG and Samsung)? If so, how does one determine which one has?
 

krislinus

macrumors newbie
Dec 29, 2014
4
0
Mine too (11 Pro Max). Looks neutral when holding it and normal viewing angle. Lay it flat, and it turns bluish.

Are they all like that?

Are there two different OLED displays being used (LG and Samsung)? If so, how does one determine which one has?

Exactly!
 

jimmy_uk

macrumors 68020
Oct 19, 2015
2,347
3,161
UK
Here’s my iPhone X side by side with the 11Pro both on max brightness showing the same thing. They 11Pro (on the right) definitely has a weird color balance - yellowish red and not white. I compared them both to the latest iPad Pro and the iPad is much closer to the X’s color balance. Not sure what the deal is - might return or check out a couple display models to see if this is product-wide.
[automerge]1569261553[/automerge]


And yes, True Tone is off.
These are the two main types of OLED you will see from Apple in my experience. Cooler blueish to yellow, warmer reddish to yellow.
 

EricaGriffin

macrumors newbie
Sep 28, 2019
12
55
Hi guys - I registered on the forum just to reply to this topic. I too received my 11 Pro and immediately noticed the very warm white balance, and overall yellowish hue on the screen. I promptly went to the local apple store to compare to other 11 Pros and realized that my screen was SLIGHTLY warmer than the floor models (my bro said I was crazy they were the same), but SIGNIFICANTLY brighter and sharper, with all settings equal.

My OCD not satisfied, I broke out an old colorimeter that I use to color calibrate my monitors and generate color profiles. Using a pure white (255,255,255) target on each device, I tested my new 11 Pro, my old iPhone 7, and my Macbook Pro. The standard in the graphics and print industry is 6500K at pure white - this is what almost all professional print, broadcast, photo, and graphics pros strive for. The results were surprising: Macbook was slightly cooler at ~6770K, old iPhone 7 was a nuclear 8900K, and the new 11 Pro was nearly SPOT ON at 6553K!

I think the take home message here is that our brains have been conditioned to perceive very cool colors as "vibrant" or "clearer" even though it's definitely not industry standard. Results attached.
6500K isn’t the industry standard. D65 white with a color temp of 6,504 and CIE 1931 coordinates ( x=0.3127, y=0.329.) is. D65 white and 6,500K ARE NOT the same thing.
Along the black body curve we have pure white and then iso-cct lines. You can have several chromacity coordinates (points) along the iso-cct lines that correspond to a given color temp.
This is to say that you can have a color temp of 6,500K but it isn’t actually white. You can be anywhere along the 6,500K iso-cct line and still get a calculated color temp of 6,500K.
With these screens, under the grayscale RGB levels there is isn’t enough blue. So when you are left with more green and red in relation to blue you get yellowish white. That’s what we’ve got. A color temp that corresponds to 6,500K but yellowish whites (greenish-yellow whites at that). Fun, ain’t it?
 
Last edited:

dmylrea

macrumors 601
Sep 27, 2005
4,809
6,871
I also stopped by an Apple Store yesterday and compared my iPhone 11 Pro Max to three demo models.

Using samples well into the store (not close to the windows), I compared my phone to the samples both when viewing direct and when sitting flat.

I did notice that all of them, including mine, become dimmer and shift to a more bluish hue when rotated off axis either direction. I also noticed that, with the same display settings and brightness, the display models were slightly brighter and when laying flat on the counter, the display models looked more neutral whereas my iPhone looked more bluish.

Wondering if that is enough to warrant a swap? I don't look forward to reloading a phone again (especially photos from iCloud which isn't working well right now and takes a week).
 
Last edited:
  • Like
Reactions: srgz

vampyr

macrumors regular
Aug 29, 2008
204
38
wow... I sure am glad I found this thread. I recently bought iPhone 11 for my wife and son, and an iPhone 11 Pro for myself.
I noticed how much more white their screens looked and how yellow mine was.
One of the tests I did was to bring up a white background (Create a BLANK Note) then bring up the control center and hold down the brightness level bar until it fills the screen.
I did this on both the iPhone 11 and iPhone 11 Pro side-by-side. I can say that the iPhone Pro HAS MORE YELLOW. This is REALLY noticeable when i switch the True Tone on. iPhone Pro shows a drastic difference, while the iPhone 11 is a very slight difference.

And you are ALL RIGHT that when you tilt the screen slightly towards you or away from you, the yellow tint goes away. This tells me that the glass used for the display is slightly different than the glass used on the iPhone 11.

I don't think it's enough to warrant a return though... because you aren't going to stare at a white screen all the time. And without a doubt HDR videos look A LOT better on the iPhone 11 PRO screen than the iPhone 11.

(on a side note... THANKS FOR TELLING ME ABOUT THE AUTO-BRIGHTNESS). I had wondered why my phone looked so much darker.... with auto-brightness turned off.. it is too bright!!!!!
 

Maetras

macrumors newbie
Aug 14, 2017
5
0
Hello, I've noticed that when I'm on my phone at night there is a slight pink tint at the bottom of the screen. It is also slightly pink towards the top of the screen but it's not as big an area. It can't be seen during the day but it is somewhat annoying when I'm reading stuff at night. When I turn on night mode the pink area becomes much more orange than the other areas and it is quite noticeable. I checked if my sister's iphone xs has the problem and it doesn't. Has anyone else noticed this? I read on the internet about a pink tint problem on previous models but for those cases it’s also present on white backgrounds whereas for me I can only notice the colour shift on dark grey backgrounds. I would try and get a return but nearly everywhere is out of stock for a long long while.
 

RangerDoug

macrumors newbie
Sep 12, 2019
25
12
I got my 3rd iPhone 11 pro and it's still yellow. I gave up. I'm just keeping it on dark mode and living my life. Apple won't let you return and buy more than 3 phones.
 
  • Like
Reactions: m0sher and Ron21

HEK

macrumors 68040
Sep 24, 2013
3,547
6,080
US Eastern time zone
1. Turn off True Tone.
2. Turn up brightness to maximum.
3. In Accessibility, Display & Text, scroll down and turn off Auto Brightness.

Now review phone screen again. Also critical for best HDR video viewing.
 

srgz

macrumors regular
Aug 22, 2010
134
81
My 11 Pro has a noticeable color shift when tilting the iPhone. I think that might be something Apple should fix if it should live up to the “Pro” name. At what degrees should I view my phone at when doing image editing?

I just received my iPhone 11 Pro and whites look paper white head on but when I tilt the screen they turn blue
It looks pretty annoying and I don’t think I want to get used to it
I like the colors in general but the white shift / blue shift is out of control and really really bad, especially compared to my iPhone 8’s LCD panel

I too am going to return this and get an 11, i didn’t pay a premium price to have to deal with problems.

yes, True Tone is off, brightness all the way up and auto brightness is off.
 

srgz

macrumors regular
Aug 22, 2010
134
81
I can't see anything wrong in that video, so I reiterate: every single year.

You don’t see the shift to blue? The whole hue changes... this doesn’t happen on IPS/LCD displays. There’s a subtle shift to grey but only at extreme angles. Whereas with this even a mere 5 degree difference causes the hue shift.
The brightness is max and True Tone is off.
Also FYI if you’re using your phone that way (With Max brightness on and auto brightness off) 24/7 that’s _really_ not good for longevity, especially for oled.

Anyway, I went to Best Buy just now and tested a few display models...they all have this problem to varying degrees.
One was pinkish instead of blue, which is totally weird, and another was not quite as bad as mine but still noticeable. I ended up swapping my 11 pro for the 11. The screen of the 11 is not as bright, that’s noticeable right away, but color accuracy and white hue shift is much better, in my opinion anyway. Also dont have to worry about burn in or PWM causing headaches, since neither are a problem with LCD/IPS panels. $300 for a not so great OLED display and a telephoto lens doesn’t seem worth it to me. Just my $0.02.
 
Last edited:

AmazingTechGeek

macrumors demi-god
Mar 6, 2015
684
304
Los Angeles
You don’t see the shift to blue? The whole hue changes... this doesn’t happen on IPS/LCD displays. There’s a subtle shift to grey but only at extreme angles. Whereas with this even a mere 5 degree difference causes the hue shift.
The brightness is max and True Tone is off.
Also FYI if you’re using your phone that way (With Max brightness on and auto brightness off) 24/7 that’s _really_ not good for longevity, especially for oled.

Anyway, I went to Best Buy just now and tested a few display models...they all have this problem to varying degrees.
One was pinkish instead of blue, which is totally weird, and another was not quite as bad as mine but still noticeable. I ended up swapping my 11 pro for the 11. The screen of the 11 is not as bright, that’s noticeable right away, but color accuracy and white hue shift is much better, in my opinion anyway. Also dont have to worry about burn in or PWM causing headaches, since neither are a problem with LCD/IPS panels. $300 for a not so great OLED display and a telephoto lens doesn’t seem worth it to me. Just my $0.02.
Honestly, the iPhone 8 series has the worst True Tone with deep yellows. It could be worse.

Anyone with this issue should try the solution I posted above. I think we should have manual control over how sensitive True Tone is, but the solution I provided is a nice workaround.
 

srgz

macrumors regular
Aug 22, 2010
134
81
Honestly, the iPhone 8 series has the worst True Tone with deep yellows. It could be worse.

Anyone with this issue should try the solution I posted above. I think we should have manual control over how sensitive True Tone is, but the solution I provided is a nice workaround.

I think we should have total control over the display period just like we would in OS X but oh well. I’m happy with the 11. Ill miss the brightness of the OLED display but not the colors and viewing angles. The 11 is superior in both those departments.
 

cahn2126

macrumors newbie
Dec 7, 2019
6
0
I just received my iphone 11 pro today, and registered here just to post about the off angle viewing. Like others here, the screen is more neutral color when looking at it straight but when you tilt then you get a blue tint/hue. I notice this big time on whites/greys. I made a genius appointment tomorrow and will check out the floor models to see if they show the same issue
 

Harthag

macrumors 68000
Jun 20, 2009
1,799
2,187
U.S.
I just received my iphone 11 pro today, and registered here just to post about the off angle viewing. Like others here, the screen is more neutral color when looking at it straight but when you tilt then you get a blue tint/hue. I notice this big time on whites/greys. I made a genius appointment tomorrow and will check out the floor models to see if they show the same issue

If slight blue tint at an angle is your only issue do not waste your time. All OLED phones have some color shift. Consider yourself a winner if you get a little blue shift. Can be FAR worse. Some screens shift to pink or have pink edges and / or notch ears. Some screens look different on the top than bottom (half pink / yellow half blue). Some screens have an awful yellow tint. Assuming you have no other issues, just keep the phone. The "geniuses" will not notice anything.
 

cahn2126

macrumors newbie
Dec 7, 2019
6
0
If slight blue tint at an angle is your only issue do not waste your time. All OLED phones have some color shift. Consider yourself a winner if you get a little blue shift. Can be FAR worse. Some screens shift to pink or have pink edges and / or notch ears. Some screens look different on the top than bottom (half pink / yellow half blue). Some screens have an awful yellow tint. Assuming you have no other issues, just keep the phone. The "geniuses" will not notice anything.

You were right. All of the iphone pros there had the color shift from yellow to blue. The girl helping said that's just how they are made. I said that's crap. OLED tvs and monitors don't do that. The iphone 11 doesn't do that and while it's not sharper is better because it has a more blue tone screen and there's no off angle viewing color change. Also, my iphone 11 pro was much brighter than most of the floor models even at identical settings.
 
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.