You’re not alone if you’ve noticed that even on the lowest setting, the display on your iPhone might be a bit too bright. If you slide the brightness all the way down from Control Center, it can still provide an intrusive light in a dim setting, whether you’re reading in bed or checking it before the movie starts at the theater.

Unless you have an iPhone 16, which can turn down the brightness of its display to just one nit. But don’t worry, you can make the lowest brightness level on earlier iPhones even darker by making a few easy adjustments to the settings. I’ll demonstrate.

For additional information, see how to clean your iPhone’s cache and how to fix your iPhone’s auto-brightness if it’s making you crazy.

How to further reduce the brightness of your iPhone

CNET Tech Tips
Like the majority of displays in your home, the iPhone’s display has a white point, which is the color temperature of the white that it produces. All of the colors on your screen are influenced by the white point setting; a higher white point results in a cooler, bluer white, while a lower white point creates a warmer, yellower white.

What impact does that have on the brightness of your iPhone? Your display will automatically become more dull if you lower the white point because doing so also lessens the intensity of brilliant colors.

Toggle on Reduce White Point under Settings > Accessibility > Display & Text Size to lessen the white point on your iPhone. You can use the marker that will show up under the option to change the brightness of the vivid colors to your preferred level.

On top of that, you should note that your display can become significantly dimmer than it was before you reduced the brightness.

Lower the iOS White Point setting
Your display will become darker and the white point will be reduced more as the percentage increases.
Aguilar Nelson/CNET
Particularly if you’re using your phone in a bright area, you might not want your white point to be constantly lowered. To enable the Reduce White Point setting only when necessary, you might make a shortcut. There are two methods for doing this.

If you have an iPhone 15 Pro or 15 Pro Max, you can use the Action button as your first option. Select White Point under Settings > Action Button > Accessibility. To lessen the white point, hold down the Action button.

The second method, which is available on the iPhone 8 and later, is to use the Back Tap feature, which takes a bit more effort. First, choose Reduce White Point under Settings > Accessibility > Accessibility Shortcut. Next, select Accessibility Shortcut after selecting Double or Triple Tap under Accessibility > Touch > Back Tap. Lastly, select Reduce White Point when prompted by tapping the rear of your iPhone to open the Accessibility Shortcut menu.

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Using iOS shortcuts to activate the Reduce White Point setting
You can use the Action button or the Back Tap feature to rapidly activate Reduce White Point.
Aguilar Nelson/CNET

There’s a method for further dimming your brightness…

It may surprise you to learn that there is another method to make your brightness even lower than white point. Although you generally won’t need to, you can even combine the two to go lower. Zoom, another accessibility function that lets you swiftly zoom in and out of any location on your iPhone, is necessary for this choice. A hidden filter in the Zoom feature has the potential to drastically reduce the brightness of your screen.

Go to Accessibility > Zoom and adjust the settings before turning on the feature. Zoom Region (choose Full Screen Zoom) and Zoom Filter (select Low Light) are the only parameters you wish to change. Your display should become significantly dimmer than usual if you activate Zoom at the top. You may then adjust your display as usual to make it dimmer.

iOS zoom setting
Double-tap with three fingers to zoom out of the screen if using the Zoom feature zooms it in. This will only need to be done once.
Aguilar Nelson/CNET
Similar to the white point, you can again utilize the Action button or the Back Tap feature to activate Zoom just when necessary because you presumably don’t want it to be on all the time. Though the shortcut will use Zoom rather than Reduce White Point, the methods are similar to those in the preceding section.

Alternatively, as I indicated, you can use both functions simultaneously, although it might not be sufficient for your needs. Either should work perfectly.

Take a look at these awesome iPad settings and features while you’re here.