Not all blue-blocking glasses are created equal!
Whether you have clear or amber blue blockers, they might not be blocking the light you’ve been sold on…
The Best Way to Test Blue Blocking Glasses
Technically speaking, the only surefire way to test how well a pair of blue-blocking glasses work, is with a lab-grade spectrometer.
A spectrometer is a device that’s able to measure the entire visible light spectrum all the way from 380nm violet light to 780 nm deep red light, and everything in between.
Some companies provide a spectral graph of their lenses, but many don’t, leaving you to simply have to trust that their claims are true!
Here at Optimize Your Biology, we own a lab-grade spectrometer, so we sought to solve this problem by third-party testing every pair of blue blockers we could get our hands on!
Below are three pairs of amber blue blockers we tested, and as you can see they let through various amounts of blue and green light.
So don’t take anyone’s word for it!
Check to see if your blue blockers have been tested below:
If we haven’t tested yours yet and you’d like us to, send us a message!
Testing Blue Light Computer Glasses
Since computer lens glasses block very little blue light they often don’t have much if any pigment in the lenses themselves, so how can you tell how well they work?
1. Reflection Test
The quickest way to check a pair of computer glasses is to just make sure they have the blue reflective coating on them.
Some reflective coatings have a green or violet hue, which means they aren’t blocking blue light very well!
Now this isn’t a very scientific test, nor are all of these coatings created equal, but it’s something easy you can do at home.
2. Pigment Test
Some “clear” blue-blocking glasses will have a very slight pigment in the lens in addition to the reflective coating.
It can be hard to see initially, but if you hold it up you should be able to make out a slight amber hue to the lenses.
This added pigment means the lenses are capable of blocking more blue light!
As you can see, a little bit of pigment in the lenses can go a long way!
In fact, without it, the blue light coming from your screen won’t be blocked much at all.
I’ve written an article going over my favorite clear and tinted blue blocking glasses so if you’re looking for some, check it out!
3. Spectrum Report
At the end of the day, we recommend asking to see a spectrum report of the lenses you plan to buy, only then can you really know how well they work and what they block!
Be sure to check our blue light blocking database to see how well clear computer blue blockers work, and if yours have been tested.
4. LED Laser Test
Blue-blocking computer lenses will often come with a small blue LED light and a photosensitive card so that you can check your glasses do in fact block “blue light”.
However, this is a misleading test.
As you saw above, the clear lenses don’t seem to block much blue light, they do however block plenty of violet light.
And that’s just what this LED is, a short wavelength violet LED, which does not mimic the blue light coming from a typical RGB computer screen.
The penlight peaks at around 400nm. This type of light is blocked by the glasses.
However, blue light coming from computer screens is not violet, but blue, so the fact that this light doesn’t shine through the glasses doesn’t really indicate it’s ability to block blue light.
Testing Amber and Red Lens Blue Blocking Glasses at Home
Blue-blocking glasses designed for evening use are much easier to test at home!
1. Squares Test
An interesting way to test amber and red blue-blocking glasses is with the blue square test.
This uses a fully saturated blue square using the hex color code #0000FF.
This code tells the computer to use zero red and green from the RGB diode and all of the blue.
The blue square should look black or dark grey.
2. Difference Test
Another test you can perform is the difference test, using the same theory as before, however, this time it’s a bit more obvious if a change has occurred.
In this case, the word “BLUE” should just about completely disappear…
However, again, neither of these tests is completely reliable because even though we’ve instructed the computer not to use anything other than pure blue, you can’t shut off the backlight, which uses multiple colors to light up the RGB panel in a computer.
If you’re using an OLED device this should work better than your average laptop or PC.
Ultimately, the best way to be sure is to get a spectrum report…
3. Spectrum Report
Finally, once more I urge you to make sure your nighttime blue blockers actually block the light they’re advertised to by checking the third-party spectrum report for the lenses.
We have a database with over 30 different blue blockers you can check if you’d like!
Or if you want to see our favorite recommendations instead, you can check those out here.
