My first smartphone was a BlackBerry-branded unit that I can't for the life of me remember the model number of. It had the track wheel on the side of the phone, though, and a huge physical keyboard. I definitely didn't need a smartphone at the time, as I barely did anything on it, but I did love playing Brick Breaker at least.
It also had a notification light on it, which I found out one night after I got off work. I pulled the phone out of my pocket and tossed it into the passenger seat. It was dark out, so when that notification light lit up, the whole cabin lit up, too. It was distracting, but it certainly got the job done. I replied to the text message the light was prompting me on, put the phone back in my pocket, and went on my way.
Since then, notification lights have come and go. Some manufacturers have used them on a semi-regular basis, others dropped them altogether.
It has been a long time since I've seen a notification light. But I do remember being a fan of them, generally. When I was having fun with adding custom ROMs on my Android phones, I remember adding notification lights to the phones I could, especially the ones that might not have supported it out of the box. But since then, my interest in the feature has waned pretty heavily.
It had been long enough that when I saw one in action recently, it actually threw me off a little bit. They can be pretty distracting! I had extended family near me recently, to celebrate a birthday, and one of them had a Galaxy Note 5 on the tablet, face up. The phone didn't vibrate or make a sound -- it just started suddenly blinking a really bright, blue light. My attention was immediately brought to it, and, unfortunately, the owner of the phone wasn't too keen on making the notification go away at any reasonable rate, so I got to watch it flash on and off for several minutes.
I think if I had to choose between a notification light and, say, an always-on display, which just lights up enough of the display to show that you have a missed text, or other notification, I would go with the always-on display. In fact, this type of feature has quickly become one of my favorites, and seeing companies find new uses for it is pretty cool. Like Google with the Pixel 2. It does the standard things, showing notifications and what not, but it can also show you the name and artist of a song that's playing. I have to use Shazam a lot, so this is a pretty cool addition.
What about you, though? Are you a fan of notification lights? Or would you prefer to use an always-on display if that was an option? Let me know!
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