I used to design dark mode with pure black backgrounds and now I avoid it completely
For years I set my dark mode backgrounds to #000000 because I thought it looked modern and crisp. After a client in Chicago showed me their eye strain reports from using my app at night, I switched to a dark gray like #1E1E1E instead. The pure black created too much contrast against white text and caused halation effects. Has anyone else noticed better user retention after moving away from true black?
Honestly, that thing you said about the support tickets dropping is wild. I used to be all about pure black too, thought it was the coolest thing ever, but seeing how much that small change helped totally changed my mind.
My buddy runs a small dev shop in Austin and he switched from pure black to dark gray last year. He told me users were complaining about ghosting and eye fatigue with #000000, especially during late night sessions. After he changed it to more of a charcoal tone, his support tickets about visual discomfort dropped like crazy. Said it made a bigger difference than he expected for such a small color tweak.