Should Websites Be Required To Have A Dark Mode Option?

[TheCoder2019]

Vote For Your Preferred Theme: Dark vs Light Theme

 

I personally vote Yes so my eyes don't burn out every time I visit GitHub or any other site that has this in their CSS:

html {
	background-color: #FFFFFF
    color: #000
}

It kills me, and this is also why Inspect Element exists...

[AndreiArgeanu]

No, websites shouldn't have any requirements, sometimes dark modes can't be implemented due to design choices. No one should be obligated to include features in their websites if they don't want to.

[Teddy07]

No, because it takes development time to do it well. Many websites are already bad in terms of usability. They need to fix it first.

[WereCatf]

7 hours ago, TheCoder2019 said:

every time I visit GitHub

Github does have a dark theme!

[wall03]

<rant>

It's not that easy. When I implemented it into my website, it took tons of tweaking and media elements modifying different things. It's not as simple as taking the text and turning it white and the background black.

For example, the menu bar:

The page you're on (In this case, the home page) has a white background, not the other way around.

 

When you hover over a menu item, it looks more like this

which has different colors then the background or the page you're on and isn't quite as easy as it sounds.

 

Another example: the background color. Seriously.

This is #0d0d0d. It took me 7 minutes to find this exact color. Really. I also tweaked it on my offline copy until I decided it was right.

 

There are TONS more examples, like the footnotes (which I like to be a slightly different color then the body background color.

</rant>

[minibois]

Quote

Should Websites Be Required To Have A Dark Mode Option?

Absolutely not.

I'd rather have them focus on meaningful things, like options for people with limited vision or just general user experience.

[Drama Lama]

It’s nice to have but nothing more

content and functionality should be more important than darkmode

[Yummychickenblue]

i can't see a hugely compelling reason for a dark mode especially since many website already don't conform to established w3 standards and best practices (like screen reader accessibility for example)

[Crunchy Dragon]

No.

 

If you want sitewide dark mode, there are extensions that allow that(DarkReader, for example).

[colonel_mortis]

Making a dark mode that is actually usable is much harder than you likely think - if you look closely at the day and night themes here on the forum, you'll notice that there's a lot more to it than just inverting the colours. It would be nice if more websites did have a dark theme, but especially for a website as large as GitHub it is a lot of work to create and maintain.

[Sauron]

Uhh... like, by law? Seems a bit excessive... and there's a loooong list of things I'd require of a website before I get to the dark theme.

 

Also Dark Reader exists.

[TheCoder2019]

2 hours ago, WereCatf said:

Github does have a dark theme!

Now it does!

[PCGuy_5960]

5 minutes ago, Sauron said:

Uhh... like, by law? Seems a bit excessive... and there's a loooong list of things I'd require of a website before I get to the dark theme.

[JZStudios]

Dark mode sucks and I don't why people rave about it. Any time I try to read Steam reviews it gives me a headache and strains my eyes for at least an hour. I can stare at white pages and read paragraphs of text all day long and be perfectly fine. It's proven to be far easier on the eyes to not have dark mode.

And then when I switch pages to something that doesn't have dark mode the brightness shift doesn't burn my eyes.

[TheCoder2019]

2 minutes ago, JZStudios said:

Dark mode sucks and I don't why people rave about it.

I don't get caught by my parents as easy with it enabled, and I think that's why some people use it. iOS has night shift so when I wake up in the middle of the night to check the time, I'm not "OH MY GOD ITS TOO BRIGHT"

[pythonmegapixel]

There are actual accessibility issues that need to be solved first:

• Low contrast e.g. grey on white
• Inconsiderate colour coding
• Poor font choice
• Pages which fuck up if you zoom in
• Needless animation
• CAPTCHAs with no audio option
• Important text embedded in images

and so on.

 

Once those are eridicated, developers can turn their consideration to things like dark theme

[PlayStation 2]

No, it's not my fault that your eyes suck.

[TetraSky]

Required? No.

Should they have one?

Absolutely, if the website is brighter than the sun.

[Sauron]

3 hours ago, JZStudios said:

I can stare at white pages and read paragraphs of text all day long and be perfectly fine. It's proven to be far easier on the eyes to not have dark mode.

Paper is not the same as a screen. A screen is backlit. Lowering the brightness helps but then you get flushed out colors. Dark themes on the other hand don't shine as much light in your eyes while keeping colors vivid.

[Arika]

3 hours ago, handymanshandle said:

No, it's not my fault that your eyes suck.

 

[TheCoder2019]

2 minutes ago, Grand Admiral Thrawn said:

I can see why the pages you visit do not have dark mode. You must insert a semicolon after properties. Fixed. You are welcome.

oop. We dont speak of that...

[AlwaysWong]

dark mode increase battery life on smartphone.

[JZStudios]

11 hours ago, TheCoder2019 said:

I don't get caught by my parents as easy with it enabled, and I think that's why some people use it. iOS has night shift so when I wake up in the middle of the night to check the time, I'm not "OH MY GOD ITS TOO BRIGHT"

I'm not 12. And if you are 12, stop doing stuff that you're afraid to get caught about.

Late night reading is a flawed argument. 1. White on black sucks to read and is bad for your eyes, 2. You shouldn't be reading or be holding a screen that close to your face if you're trying to sleep. If you're not trying to sleep, dark mode isn't really necessary.

7 hours ago, Sauron said:

Paper is not the same as a screen. A screen is backlit. Lowering the brightness helps but then you get flushed out colors. Dark themes on the other hand don't shine as much light in your eyes while keeping colors vivid.

I have other lights on. I don't sit in complete darkness, and neither do most other people. Dark mode is only useful for low-light applications, which realistically are pretty rare.

Otherwise yes, reading black font on white is far easier on the eyes whether it's paper or a screen.

[Sauron]

2 hours ago, JZStudios said:

I have other lights on. I don't sit in complete darkness, and neither do most other people. Dark mode is only useful for low-light applications, which realistically are pretty rare.

Says you. I find it better regardless of lighting conditions. The lower the light difference with the surroundings, the better.

[Moonzy]

4 hours ago, JZStudios said:

I don't sit in complete darkness, and neither do most other people

I almost never see the light

 

Dark mode is nice but not necessary