As the sun sets, social networks become more active, Internet traffic spikes up, a lot of people get hooked to their smartphones and end up staring at the screen till late in the night.
Sure, Evening is the perfect time to see catch that funny video on YouTube, have a group chat with your friends or calmly read an e-book on Your phone or tablet. But that color rich screen is causing more damage than just dry eyes.
Research has shown repeatedly that exposure to blue light at night has adverse side effects on our health. Let me elaborate.
Visible light contains a wide range of wavelengths(Colors). Exposure to blue light considerably reduces secretion of melatonin, the sleep hormone. As the sun sets, blue light diminishes, cutting off out visual contact with shorter wavelength. Then starts melatonin production which helps us catch a night of sound sleep.
But what happens when Your eyes get an unhealthy dose of blue light from your phone even after the sunset?
- Inhibited production of melatonin resulting in a shorter and a shallow sleep.
- Unwanted changes in your natural circadian rhythms. (sleep-wake rhythm that impacts many other body functions.)
- Disturbed circadian rhythms and poor quality of sleep has been shown to adversely affect immunity, which can lead to enhanced vulnerability to diseases.
Introducing Red Moon : Open Source Android App for Nightshift feature
What if I told You that You can reduce these risks and sleep better with the help of an android app? Enter Red Moon. Redshift for Android.
Red Moon is an app which filters out the blue light exuded from your android phone or tab. It works with location service and efficiently manages the screen according to the Sun’s position.
As the sun sets, your phone screen starts to gently turn redder (which is blue light emission diminishing) and you can immediately feel your eyes falling in love with Red Moon.
Why Red Moon?
First and obvious choice for this kind of app on Android is Twilight. But unlike Twilight, Red Moon is an open source project. Red Moon is minimalistic, simple and needs no setup or maintenance.
Install the app, Open the app, click on Location and touch the start button. That’s it.
Getting Red Moon
Red Moon can be downloaded from Play Store. It is a paid app on Play Store though (see this video to know what free in Free and Open Source means).
Since it is an open source application, you can download it for free from the open source app store F-Droid.
Download Red Moon for free from F-Droid
You can also get its source code from GitHub, if you want. The APK file is also available on GitHub.
Loving Red Moon? Do share this with your friends and help them make their eyes happy.
The Linux Desktop equivalent is called redshift btw
Thanks for sharing Ed. Checked it out. I must say, Redshift is pretty soothing on the eye. Especially for us night-crawlers.
Red Moon: A Free and Open Source Alternative To Twilight ???
Red Moon – Screen Filter 1.99€ …..
Open source :D
Free in Free and Open Source doesn’t mean $0. This is why I recommended to check the video in the article.
Thanks for recommending, I’ve been using it all day today and it’s great.
It works better at night :P
And for those if us who love to tinker (and sometimes break things) there is CF.Lumen (search for it in the Play Store or F-Droid). It’s open-source and has lots of extra tweaks. It also has root mode which completely disables the blue lights on your phone/tablet when needed.
Thanks for the info Elvis. Does completely turning off blue lights really useful?
Actually, CF.Lumen is not open source, but propietary.
Cf.Lumen IS NOT FLOSS nor can it be found on F-Droid. Just free as in free beer.
Redmoon’s features request are going to catch the fomer. For reference on Red Moon’s github: https://github.com/raatmarien/red-moon