Why Are Headlights So Blinding?

If you have ever been in front of someone that has blinding headlights you know how frustrating it can be to have a bright light shining in your eyes at night.  If you have ever wondered why are headlights so blinding this article is created to help you understand why headlights have become so blinding over the past few years and what you can do to defend your eyes against bright headlights.

HID Headlights

HID headlights or high-intensity discharge headlights are somewhat common on new vehicles being made today.  They are called high-intensity discharge headlights because of the amount of light that they output comparable to normal halogen headlights that you will find on most older vehicles.

HID headlights are going to be put in a projector housing on new vehicles that will focus the light coming from the HID bulb into a specific area of the projector housing.  If you have ever had HID headlights on your vehicle you will know that there is a horizontal line where your headlights are projected below the horizontal line, this is done to help protect oncoming drivers from being blinded by your headlights.  

Forcing the light from your HID headlights downwards usually works fine in practice but can be an issue if you are heading towards another driver on an uneven road.  As the front end of your car dips up and down on hills the headlights will also shift up and down potentially shining in the eyes of oncoming drivers.

One thing to note with HID headlights and projector housings is that over time your headlight projector housing can become loose and you may need to readjust the projector housing so that your headlights are level to where they originally came out of the factory.  

If you wanted to know how to adjust your headlights on your car I’ve included the video below that gives a general description as to how to adjust your projector headlights.  If your vehicle came with HID projector headlights you may want to look up a Youtube video for your specific car so that you can have step by step instructions on how to adjust your HID projector headlights for your specific make and model vehicle.

Laser Headlights

BMW being the innovative automotive manufacturer that they are have started making laser headlights for their vehicles which is one of the brightest headlight technology available currently.  BMW has already implemented its laser headlight technology in the BMW i8 but it only recently became available as it was previously banned by US regulations.

Below is a video showing how the BMW i8 laser headlights work behind the scenes and how BMW is able to convert laser light to a usable light that can be used in car headlights.

Below is a video showing BMW’s i8 laser headlights in action at night on a road. As you can see they are very bright headlights and light up the road much brighter than even HID headlights.

Audi has also jumped into the laser headlight game by releasing its own laser headlight technology that they recently featured in the Audi A8.  With Audi’s laser headlight technology they are able to use their laser headlights to do more than just project their light in a certain area, Audi’s headlights are able to sense oncoming traffic and divert their headlights from the oncoming traffic effectively never blinding the oncoming vehicles.  

Audi laser headlights have the ability to project the tire width of your car to show you how much room you have in the lane if the lane is uneven.  Audi’s laser headlights can also project a solid line on the road between road markers to better define where the middle and edge of the road is. Currently, the Audi Matrix laser headlight technology is not available in the US because of headlight regulations.  Audi is working with US lawmakers to see what they can do to allow the US to allow them to start offering this sort of technology on their new vehicles that they sell in the US.

The video below shows this new technology in a tech demo to show how they would work and what they could do.

LED Headlights

LED headlights are another common new headlight technology that has enabled car headlights to be brighter which enables their drivers to see better at night. With brighter LED headlights on new cars, this is going to naturally cause more blinding light for oncoming drivers. This is typically a cause for LED headlights because of their bright white light, whereas normal halogen bulbs are going to have a more yellow tint to them in comparison.

A new trend that has caught on in the auto industry is using LED strips or lights to accentuate the headlight assembly.  This can also cause more blinding light for oncoming cars as this light is typically not focused in a certain direction or angle.  Most new cars coming out in 2019 are going to have some sort of LED light in the headlight that does not directly aid with being able to see further down the road.  While these LED strips may look cool they also increase glare at night.

I don’t really see the LED headlight trend changing anytime soon either.  With the cost and electricity savings of LED lights over halogen headlights LED headlights are here to stay.

Aftermarket Headlights

Some people will put HID or Xenon headlights in their headlight assembly that was designed to be used for normal halogen headlights.  This is not that big of a deal for halogen headlights as they are not super blinding to look. With HID headlights if they are not put in a lense designed to project the light in a specific direction it will just output the light in all directions which can be blinding to anyone on the road.  

If you are ever planning on using HID headlights on your car and your car did not come with them from the factory one option would be to replace your headlights with an aftermarket assembly that has a HID projector built into it.  

The other option would be to use your existing headlights and mount your own HID projectors inside of them.  This can be a very time consuming and is probably left to professionals if you have never attempted something like that before.  If you wanted to see what that process would look like I’ve included the below video that shows how you could retrofit your stock halogen headlights with LED projector headlights if you wanted to check out how difficult the process would be.  

Lifted Trucks

If someone behind you has decided to lift their truck and hasn’t taken the time to adjust their headlights this can also cause issues with you being able to see. Most headlights are made to be adjustable to direct the light coming out from them either up or down.

When people lift their truck higher up in the air they should also adjust their headlights to point the light more down to the ground, however most people that lift their truck don’t adjust their headlights and they remain in their normal position that they were in before they decided to lift their truck.  This means that when their lifted truck pulls behind you at a stoplight their headlights are shining directly into the back of your vehicle and side-view mirrors.

How To Protect Yourself Against Blinding Headlights

1. Auto-Dimming Mirrors

Some new cars will come with auto-dimming rearview mirrors and auto-dimming side mirrors if your vehicle does come with these features you would want to make sure that you have them enabled.  With auto-dimming rearview mirrors they can greatly reduce the amount of light that is reflected back at you in your rearview mirror from the headlights behind you.

If your vehicle did not come with auto-dimming mirrors you can buy aftermarket auto-dimming rearview mirrors for your car if you wanted.  It may not be that easy to install an aftermarket auto dimming mirror if your car did not come with one from the factory so keep that in mind.

2. Clean Your Windshield

If the windshield of your vehicle is dirty this can also increase the amount of glare that you are seeing through your windshield.  Your windshield is going to get dirty and dusty over time as you use your car. If you have not cleaned your windshield in a long time then that may make a huge difference in how much glare you see through your windshield.  

If you or someone else smokes in your vehicle this can also cause your windshield to start building up layers of grime from the cigarette smoke on your windshield.  My buddy smokes in his truck and I went to borrow it one night, I could hardly see out of the windshield at night because of the layer of smoke on it.

3. Anti Glare Glasses

If the blinding glare from oncoming drivers is coming to the point where you don’t want to drive at night you may want to look at picking up some anti-glare glasses for night driving.  These sorts of glasses will typically have yellow colored lenses to help you see better at night by reducing glare. I’ve never used anti-glare glasses while driving so I can’t comment on the effectiveness of these types of glasses.

4. Intelligent Headlights

Like I mentioned before more cars are coming out with intelligent headlights that can sense oncoming cars and pedestrians and divert their light around the oncoming vehicle.  This technology could benefit everyone if all vehicle manufacturers started using this technology on their headlights.

Unfortunately, it’s going to be a while until all of the headlights being made on new cars have intelligent headlight technology.  This sort of technology is starting to come out on higher-end luxury brand vehicles like Mercedes Benz and Audi but it’s going to be a while before technology like this will be coming out on Hondas or Toyotas if only for the price to implement the technology on new cars.

5. Intelligent Drivers

Unfortunately, people that may have their headlights improperly aligned may not do anything about it to help matters out.  That’s why it’s important to get the word out about what you learned here today and let others know that their vehicle’s headlights can be adjusted so that the light is not pointing in the eyes of oncoming drivers.  If you do anything to adjust the height of your vehicle’s suspension you would also want to adjust your headlights to compensate for the raise or lowering in height of your vehicle.

How to retrofit projector headlights

I personally don’t think that I would attempt doing something like this at least not with expensive headlights.  If I were going to attempt doing something like this I would only attempt it on headlights that were old and that I did not really care about as your chances of screwing up the headlight can be high, especially if you have never torn apart a headlight assembly before.

I have a buddy with an older mustang that decided that he was going to replace his factory halogen headlights with aftermarket HID headlights that he did not put in a projector housing.  He said that it just scattered the light from the normal headlight housing all over the road which was blinding other drivers. He said that drivers would frequently flash their brights at him because it looked as if he had his brights on all the time.  If you don’t want to be an idiot and blind all of the oncoming drivers coming at you then you should always use a projector housing with HID bulbs and HID kits.

In Conclusion

With new car technology headlights are becoming brighter every year.  That’s why some people have started to ask the question of why are headlights so blinding?  Now you know why headlights nowadays are so bright and can be so blinding at night.