A suggestion to alter the automatic activation of dark mode.

Hi, I have astigmatism, which makes it hard to read dark themes. I was quite alienated tonight, accessing your site, and seeing dark mode on by default, especially with a message claiming it was a more "soothing" appearance. While I fully understand this is the case for some people, it is not the case for all people. I would suggest instead of activating it automatically based on the time of day, that you instead have the default color theme be whatever the user's preference is, based on their operating system. This is supported in most modern browsers, with the prefers-color-scheme media query. I think the time of day toggle is clever, but should only be used as a fallback, in case the user doesn't have a preference.

I do realize that I am easily able to click once and turn on the light theme. But this is about making the user experience and flow better, and less alienating to those with certain visual needs. Just looking at dark themes is often painful to my eyes, and when a light theme exists, I shouldn't really have to manually activate it, when my system preferences are set to prefer light theme already.

I understand you likely had the best intentions when writing the message about it being "soothing", but it's important to realize that when it comes to accessibility, not everyone experiences vision the same way as you might. The wording is important, as is the implementation.

atomiks / rate-my-life

A suggestion to alter the automatic activation of dark mode. #2