There are few topics more guaranteed to spark unsolicited opinions in the modern development world than dark mode. It has become something of a rite of passage. Developers add it to their portfolios. SaaS products brag about it on their landing pages. Product teams obsess over it in planning sessions. Users, when surveyed, will dutifully click the “dark mode” checkbox because it feels like the thing we’re all supposed to like.
At Quantum Pixel, we’ve built enough websites, apps, and platforms to confidently say this: dark mode is a nice-to-have. It is not a feature of consequence. It is not a growth driver. It is not an accessibility requirement. And for the overwhelming majority of businesses, prioritising dark mode early in a product or website lifecycle is a classic example of vanity engineering — burning time on low-impact features while leaving meaningful conversion, usability, and performance improvements untouched.
The Real Problem with the Dark Mode Obsession
The core issue is misaligned priorities. Too many teams obsess over dark mode as a perceived signal of “product completeness” without asking the fundamental question: does this materially improve business outcomes?
Most companies — especially those focused on generating leads, closing sales, or onboarding customers — have dramatically more impactful fixes sitting untouched. They have landing pages that load in four seconds because of unoptimised JavaScript bundles. They have forms with friction points that kill conversion rates. They have blog content that ranks on page three of Google because basic technical SEO was never addressed. They have inaccessible components that exclude a percentage of their user base entirely. But sure — let’s ship dark mode first.
This is not to say dark mode has no value. But it is a feature whose impact is disproportionate to the effort it often receives. For most businesses, it offers no measurable uplift in conversions, no noticeable reduction in churn, and no significant improvement in operational efficiency. It simply scratches the aesthetic itch of designers and developers — and wastes cycles that could deliver far greater returns elsewhere.
What the Data Actually Says About User Preference
Surveys may suggest users prefer dark mode. But preference does not equal impact. In controlled experiments, most business websites see zero statistically significant uplift in conversion rates when adding dark mode. Nor is dark mode a meaningful retention lever for most SaaS products outside of highly technical or developer-centric tools.
In practice, users who want dark mode are typically a vocal minority. Their feedback gets amplified because developers tend to be part of that group. The product team hears about it louder because their circles care about it more. Leadership assumes demand is higher than it really is. Meanwhile, the silent majority of users care more about clarity, ease of use, fast load times, and clean user journeys — none of which are improved by the addition of dark mode.
Dark Mode Is Cheap… Until It Isn’t
“But it’s just CSS variables, it only takes a day,” comes the common refrain. This is rarely true in production. Dark mode seems simple until you deal with edge cases, third-party components, poor design token discipline, image handling, chart libraries, and brand guidelines that were never designed for dual themes.
Dark mode also carries maintenance debt. Every new component, page, or feature needs to be designed, tested, and supported across both modes. Bugs multiply. Complexity creeps in. The regression surface area grows, all for a feature that produces little measurable return.
For high-traffic platforms with huge user bases, dark mode makes sense as a polish feature — after core flows are rock-solid. For growing businesses, especially those struggling with performance, conversion, or operational scaling, it is an indulgence. You are not losing sales because your site is bright. You are losing sales because your checkout flow is clunky and your SEO is broken.
What Should Take Priority Instead
If your business is early-stage, growing, or trying to fix underperformance, there is a more sensible order of operations:
Fix performance first. A faster site improves everything — SEO, UX, conversions. Optimise your critical path rendering before styling a second theme.
Fix accessibility. A high-contrast, accessible light mode serves more users than an optional dark theme that adds more cognitive overhead.
Fix conversion flows. Every user journey should be ruthlessly streamlined before design flourish gets attention.
Fix content structure and search performance. Invest in making your website useful and findable before making it dual-tone.
Only after these foundations are nailed does dark mode become worth its weight. By then, it’s a quality-of-life feature for an already effective system — not a crutch masking deeper product weaknesses.
“A well-performing, usable site in one mode will always outperform a sluggish, dual-themed site.”
Dark Mode Last, Business Impact First
Dark mode is aesthetic icing. It belongs at the end of the roadmap, not the start. Businesses that scale fastest fix core flows first: speed, usability, clarity, scalability. Companies that burn cycles on dark mode too early pay for it later — in technical debt, slowdowns, and missed growth milestones.
At Quantum Pixel, we believe in building systems that deliver business value before design indulgence. A good product earns the right to polish itself — it does not start by polishing irrelevant corners while the foundation leaks.
Want a better performing website? Fix the pipes before painting the walls.