What is a nit? Screen brightness explained
Why nits decide whether you can read your screen in the sun, and how many you need.
By Let’s Compare · 1 min read · Updated September 24, 2026
If you've ever squinted at a phone in bright sunshine, you've hit the limit of its brightness. Phone, TV and monitor makers quote that figure in 'nits', and the numbers keep climbing.
Brightness by use
| Screen / use | Comfortable brightness |
|---|---|
| Indoor monitor | ~300–400 nits |
| Phone outdoors | ~1,000+ nits (sustained) |
| TV, bright room (HDR) | 1,000+ nits |
| Dark-room OLED TV | Lower peak is fine (perfect blacks) |
What a nit is
A nit is a unit of brightness, technically one candela per square metre (cd/m²). More nits means a brighter screen. Brightness counts most in two situations. One is beating glare, where a brighter screen stays readable in sunlight. The other is HDR, where bright highlights (a glint of sun, a lightbulb) need serious brightness to 'pop'.
Sustained vs peak brightness
Read the wording carefully. 'Peak brightness' is a best-case number a screen hits for a moment on a small patch of HDR content. 'Sustained' or 'full-screen' brightness is what you get across the whole display, and it's much lower. A phone advertised at '2,000 nits peak' might sustain 800–1,000 nits in everyday use. For readability, compare the sustained figures.
Targets by screen
Some rough guides. A phone wants around 1,000+ sustained nits to stay easily readable in direct sun, and an indoor monitor is comfortable at roughly 300–400 nits. A TV in a bright room benefits from high brightness (1,000+ nits) for HDR and glare. A dark-room OLED, on the other hand, can look stunning at lower peak brightness thanks to its perfect blacks.
More isn't always better. Beyond what your room needs, extra nits mostly serve HDR highlights.
Related explainers
- OLED burn-in: how real is it in 2026?
What causes it, who's at risk, and how modern OLEDs fight back.
- What is Dolby Vision? HDR formats explained
HDR10, HDR10+, Dolby Vision and HLG: what the formats do and which to care about.
- OLED vs QLED vs Mini-LED: which TV panel is right for you
Perfect blacks or searing brightness? The panel decides the picture more than the brand or the feature list does.
Sources & further reading
The facts and figures in this article come from the references below (some of them not in English), so you can check them yourself.
- Candela per square metre — Wikipedia
- High-dynamic-range television — Wikipedia