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Ask HN: When did we decide that off-black backgrounds were cool?
It seems like the number of themes with a truly black background are extremely rare. I like the contrast of a true black background, but most "dark" themes seem to have a grey or slightly blue tinted background.
I'm really curious, how did we, collectively, seem to decide that a dark theme should have a off-black background? Why do people like it over a true black background?
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- not_your_vase 2y agoIt boils down to readability (not only text, but all controls also). While in theory high contrast is desirable, in practice contrast can be too high, and reading pure white text on pure black background is harder than reading dirty-white text on dark blue background - too high contrast kind of blinds the eyes.
- linsomniac 2y agoWouldn't that be an indication that your screen brightness is turned up way too high, rather than a problem to be solved by making the background brighter? I'd think that if white text on a black background was blinding, you'd really have problems bringing up a page like HN which has a solid white background...
- not_your_vase 2y agoWhen the brightness is turned too high, sure. But this phenomenon is not exclusive to screens with backlight, nor to very bright things. Think about the street signs, where readability is very important. Vast majority of the signs have green or blue background, exactly because of this reason. (Sure, there are some B/W signs, but they are usually quite rare)
- dave4420 2y agoOne other, less important reason: if you want to have a drop shadow, then your background had better not already be truly black.
- DemocracyFTW2 2y agoThis. Same is true for white, you really want a 'broken' white (very light gray) so there can still be hilites.
- linsomniac 2y agoEven weirder then that the vim theme I'm using has a "light black" text background, slightly darker black background in the statusline, and then solidblack border around all this... Though that may be because I have my terminal background set to black rather than it being part of the theme?
- BjoernKW 2y agoBecause pure black doesn't exist in nature and usually is perceived as jarring. Common design principles therefore advocate for using a colour that's almost - but not actually - black.