Anyone else blinded by these new headlights when driving?

[Totallybannanas]

Am I the only one struggling with how bright car headlights have become? I’ve been avoiding driving at night for a while now because of it, but I don’t remember them being this intense in the past. Every car I pass feels like it’s on full beams, and I end up feeling completely blinded. I know my astigmatism makes it worse, but I recently had an eye test and wear corrective glasses. Tonight, I had to make a journey I couldn’t avoid, and I found myself driving at 40mph in a 60mph zone because the car behind me was tailgating and their lights were so dazzling. I eventually pulled over to let them pass. Does anyone else deal with this?

I struggle with this issue too. Night driving has become really problematic. Thanks to the previous poster who linked to the petition. Hopefully lots of us will sign it.

It's your astigmatism OP. I had quite a bad astigmatism myself and used to find them absolutely blinding. Since I had eye surgery last year to correct it I now no longer have a problem and driving at night is fine. I'm just wondering if you can get some driving glasses that correct your astigmatism and whether they would help?

Might be more likely electric cars, I found I can get much closer to animals before they notice me in an electric car, I nearly hit a muntjac deer the other day where previously all I'd see was their back end disappearing into the hedge.

I wonder how many of the people posting on this thread have those awful lights?

A majority of us will have the dazzling lights that are also disrupting driving.
It's not the person driving the car's fault - we didn't know the lights were blinding when we purchased.

It's the manufacturers fault.

It should be brought into the MOT that lights are adjusted by the mechanic for anti-dazzle. Perhaps some of those strips put over the light like when you drive on the right abroad.

Any solution would help - this isn't about blaming drivers.

The problem is compounded with the cats eyes not working where I drive. Don't know if that is unique to where I live.

Another astigmatism gal here. I always wear corrective glasses/toric lenses (because I’m also disgustingly short sighted) and those weird yellow glasses.

They help a bit and clear nights aren’t too bad but if it rains I’m fucked.

We live rurally and I have a job which means I often finish around midnight so absolutely can’t avoid night driving ☹️

All modern cars are the same I think it is just the new type of lights they use. I was driving to work this morning (7am so still dark) and the car behind me was very old circa 1990s. I thought he just had his low beams on and forgotten to put his full lights on until I realised they were on, just shows the difference. Tbf I thought his lights were not bright enough it would be nice to find a happy medium. I generally drive in the city so not as noticeable with street lights but very noticeable on rural roads. I also think people need to adjust their lights so they are shining down and not up.

I agree - thought it was just me!

The rain makes it much worse. It can't be good that people are avoiding driving at night.

It’s not just astigmatism, they are glaring right in you face when they are oncoming

I heard on the radio that it is some type of LED light being used recently and that there is a huge issue.

I only drive in urban areas and at night, especially in the rain it slows me right down.

But that's an expensive high-tech solution (which is prone to failure) to solve a simple problem. Just legislate to enforce less-dazzling lights FFS!

And as said by another poster, it takes no account of pedestrians or cyclists, who are also negatively affected by this.

I'm on the Essex/Suffolk border and it's a rare (and lovely) road that has cats eyes these days. They are so helpful especially when it's foggy.

They are a real problem, but it suddenly occurred to me the other day when I was complaining about them to my DH...

Am I part of the problem?

I have no idea how bright MY lights are - are they blinding other people? Am I moaning, along with all the others, about myself?

Yes I've recently signed the petition mentioned by PP. Has anyone posted the link?
Sorry not rtft.

@RainbowDr0p I have driven on motorways and dual carriage ways with my hand up to block the oncoming lights, like you would block the sun! It's bonkers!

I've done this very recently myself, about six cars oncoming with blinding lights in quick succession and had to raise my arm to try and block the light. So dangerous but no choice as no option to pull over.

I agree, most people won’t be aware because you are obviously inside your car, never looking at your own headlights

I completely agree with you OP!

I also have an astigmatism, and it makes night driving fairly close to impossible for me. These days, I only really night drive if it's short distances and roads I know really well.
Long story, but back in late October I volunteered to go and cover for a week at another site for work. No problem, they put me up in a hotel, I get expenses, whatever. I've done it before in the summer months, and it's been quite a fun adventure.
But the hotel was right in the middle of the countryside, down long twisty turny unlit roads. I absolutely hated it. Couldn't see a bloody thing.
Then, in the same week, they asked me to go and spend the day in one of their London sites. So cue me driving through London and out to the countryside hotel in the dark on completely unknown roads. I absolutely hated it.

I hated it SO much, I'm not going to volunteer again.

It should be brought into the MOT that lights are adjusted by the mechanic for anti-dazzle.

They are adjusted to spec during MOT…

I totally agree. I have stopped driving in the dark now because of it - I'm just too dazzled to be safe.

How are people getting about if they've stopped driving at night.
It's dark by 4pm at the moment. Doesn't it limit what you do in the evening?

I was fiddling with my headlight settings while parked up the other day, and realised that the daylight running lights are much brighter than “sidelights”. And that my auto headlights seem to go straight from DRL to headlights bypassing sidelights, which I assume is the same for most cars - I find it tiring driving on winter afternoons and everyone else’s main beam lights are on and blinding me. So I am manually selecting “sidelights” for dull and dingy winter daytime, and hopefully this means I am lit up enough that people can see me, but I’m not dazzling. (It also means my rear lights are on, which they aren’t in DRL mode). During the day anyway, like everyone else I’m probably part of the problem when it gets dark with main beam on.

Well if you have no street lights at all then of course that will make it worse. That's what I mean, the old street lights used to provide more lighting on the road and therefore headlights didn't seem as bright.

Yes so many are too bright! But then I also find it hard to see in stretches of road without streetlights.
During the recent windy storm I had a prick following close behind flashing me on the motorway. Super dangerous I couldn't see because he kept dazzling me. I was overtaking at a sensible speed (72mph), it was busy enough that I had to be in the outside lane to overtake.