Turn on Windows 10 Night light for a better sleep

Did you know that the light on your Windows PC can affect your sleep pattern and thus your health? Turn on Windows Night Light so you can sleep well at night.

A few years ago, Scientific American published an article discussing how researchers had discovered that the light from our computers, phones, and tablets can affect our sleep: Why is blue light before bed bad for sleep?

The light from our devices has been found to be rich in short wavelengths and this means light at the blue end of the spectrum. The problem is that blue light affects the production of the sleep-inducing hormone melatonin more than any other color of light.

Melatonin makes you sleepy, so there is less of it in your body during the day and more at night. The bright bluish light like that during the day is believed to suppress melatonin production, thus keeping you awake and alert.

When the sun goes down, melatonin production increases and we become sleepy. Except when using computers, phones and tablets which continue to expose us to bluish light and reduce melatonin production. This messes up our circadian rhythm – the body’s natural clock.

The solution, which has been available on phones and tablets for a while, is to change the color of the light emitted by computer and device screens. By reducing the amount of blue light and increasing wavelengths toward the red end of the spectrum (like the setting sun), it helps maintain our natural circadian rhythm and melatonin production.

The result is a better night's sleep and we're more refreshed when we wake up the next morning.

This brings us to a new setting in Windows 10 that reduces the blue light from the computer screen and boosts the red. The idea is that this activates late in the evening so if you're still using your computer you're not being kept awake by blue light.

A redder glow on your computer screen helps you sleep, which is good for your health.

How to enable Windows night light

1. Press Windows+I to open the Settings app
2. click system
3. click display in the sidebar
4. Do that... on night light switch

There are some useful configuration settings that you can click to access night light settings.

There is a button to turn it on manually, but the easiest way to use the night light is to turn it on and select the schedule sunset to sunrise. Windows knows when the sun rises and sets no matter where you are in the world, so this feature just works.

It might not be such a good idea to choose this option as it gets dark very early in the evening in winter. It depends on where you live in the world, but where I am it's dark by 5pm on a winter evening. I don't want the night light to come on at 5pm and make me sleepy!

For this reason, you should opt for the set hours Opportunity.

Set a schedule for the Windows night light

This allows you to manually set the time it activates and deactivates. It makes sense to set it for a few hours before you normally go to bed.

Just one last thought. Worrying about work, whether we got enough Facebook likes today, who said what to whom on social media is more likely to keep you awake than blue lights.

Relax! Relax before you go to bed.

By: Turn on Windows 10 Night light for a better sleep