My S21 does not boost brightness automatically under sunlight?

[Owen Kim]

US user here. Samsung phones have this feature that boosts brightness to over 1000 nits when outdoors on a bright day.

My old S10 did that really well and it makes the screen look amazing even under bright sunlight.

I just recently noticed that my S21 does not, at all!

Even outside under the sunlight on a bright day, the screen just maintained its regular maximum brightness, which of course was not enough!

Restarting the phone did not fix it.
I had not installed any third party apps that would interfere with phone brightness settings and always had adaptive brightness mode on.
I am not covering any sensors I am aware of and merely using a film screen protector. (normal brightness adjustment works fine so that is out of the question)

Not sure what could be the issue here, please share your thoughts, anything would help, thanks!

 

[Laura Knotek]

Do you have your display set to natural or vivid?

 

[mustang7757]

You leave the brightness in auto ?

 

[VidJunky]

No thoughts to share. I did experience this on a recent sunny vacation. Most days it was near impossible to read anything on the phone and some times it was so washed out that it was difficult to know the screen was even on. I never checked the brightness slider, I just assumed that it was what it was and that was all I got. That's the only time I've had issues and I kind of wish had messed around with it looking back. At the time I was more concerned with getting through the day without charging. That and not letting the phone overheat in the sun.

 

[rjack22]

Be sure under display settings that the Adaptive Brightness button is turned on. Thats the only way it will work.

 

[Nyvideo]

Isn't adaptive brightness the setting to make it change brightness based on light? That's the only setting I have besides the slider. I've tried that and also never gotten brightness good enough for outside.

 

[Owen Kim]

Do you have your display set to natural or vivid?

Vivid, so was my s10

 

[Owen Kim]

You leave the brightness in auto ?

Yes

 

[mustang7757]

Yes

Try safe mode if still happening

 

[Owen Kim]

Try safe mode if still happening

Thanks, will try that

 

[mustang7757]

Thanks, will try that

Ok

 

[jsh689]

Same issue here with a Galaxy S20 FE. I cannot read anything under sunny conditions, and in Spanish Mediterranean that happens on a daily basis. No improvement even if I manually slide the brightness to the max.