We have all seen our smartphone and tablet screens fade out as soon as we step outdoors. In some cases it’s almost unreadable outdoors even though these devices are designed to be used on the go. To find out which smartphones and tablets worked better (were more readable) in high ambient lighting DisplayMate tested 4 tablets and 5 smartphones. The test were done inside an Integrating Hemisphere using a powerful light source that uniformly illuminates the displays from all directions from 0 lux (Absolute Darkness) up through 40,000 lux (Indirect Sunlight), which is very bright.

On the tablet side, DisplayMate tested Galaxy Tab 10.1, iPad 2, Kindle Fire and Motorola Xoom. While on the smartphone side they tested Nokia Lumia 900 Samsung Galaxy S, iPhone 4, Motorola Droid X and HTC Desire. All devices showed decreased viewability in high ambient lighting, but tablets performed worst than most smartphones. DisplayMate concluded the results by saying:

The DisplayMate Contrast Rating for High Ambient Light for the displays ranges from a low of 15 (HTC Desire) to a high of 90 (Nokia Lumia 900). From both the Lab Measurements and the Screen Shot Viewing Tests (below) the top performing device for display viewability under Bright Ambient Lighting is the Nokia Lumia 900. This results from a combination of its high screen Brightness and low screen Reflectance, which Nokia calls ClearBlack technology. The Samsung Galaxy S and Apple iPhone 4 are tied for second place. The best Tablets all performed a notch below the Smartphones – the Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 was the leader, with the iPad 2 in second place. The new iPad (not included below) performs better than the iPad 2 and just behind the Galaxy Tab 10.1. The other Smartphones and Tablets performed well below these top models.

You can read the complete shootout results with detailed explanation on how each smartphone and tablet screen performed, and also see the master photo grid showing each device screen in various lighting conditions on DisplayMate’s website.