More people are using screens for work and for leisure than ever. Americans spend an average of more than seven hours a day in front of one, and remote workers can spend up to 13 hours a day looking at a computer.
So it is no wonder eye fatigue is on the rise. Symptoms include headaches, neck pain, and dry or watery eyes. Some things genuinely help. A few are widely sold as helping and don’t. Here is how to tell whether what you have is eye strain, and what to do about it.
What is eye fatigue?
Eye fatigue, also called eye strain, is a common problem that happens when your eyes are overused. There are several ways to overuse them — long stretches in front of a screen, or driving a long distance without a break. Any activity that asks your eyes to work hard for a long period can tire them out:
- Reading
- Bright light or glare
- Moving air
- Dry air
- Dim light
- Driving
- Looking at a screen
None of these harms your eyes on its own. It is the length of the exposure that causes the trouble.
Causes and symptoms
The most common cause is tech overuse. LED screens carry a lot of glare and a harsh contrast between text and background. People hold devices too close, and blink less often while staring at them. All of it adds up.
Eye fatigue usually shows up as watery or dry eyes and headaches, but there are a few other things worth watching for:
- Double vision
- Blurry vision
- Sore back, shoulders, or neck
- Itchy eyes
- Trouble concentrating
- Sensitivity to light
- Difficulty keeping your eyes open
If you are getting one or more of these regularly, talk to your optometrist rather than guessing at it.
What actually helps
Start with the lighting — not too harsh, not too dim. Close the blinds or put a lamp nearby so your eyes are not working so hard while you read. Cut the glare on your screens, with an anti-glare display or an anti-reflective cover on the one you already own.
The single most effective thing is taking breaks. Every twenty minutes, look at something about twenty feet away for twenty seconds. Move the screen further back than feels natural. Blink on purpose — you blink far less than you think while reading a screen.
What about blue light glasses?
They are sold as the fix for exactly this, and the evidence does not support it. In 2023 Cochrane pooled seventeen randomised trials and found that blue-light filtering lenses probably make no difference to eye strain from computer use, with no reliable evidence that they improve sleep either. We make a pair, and we would rather you heard that from us than found it out later. We wrote about it here.
A clear-lens frame is still a good thing to own for the hours you spend indoors, at a desk, on camera, in the evening. Just buy it for the frame. See ours.
