Some people use it because they have migraines and bright lights trigger their headaches.

Some people use it for "stealth" reasons when they want to be online without giving off a lot of light for some reason.

Some people are photophobic -- aka light sensitive -- and just favor darker websites generally.

There's myriad reasons to want to use dark mode. It's not any one thing.

None of this applied to the people I've worked with who preferred it in IntelliJ.

I'm willing to mark it up to personal preferences that I'll just never understand, alongside why great directors keep casting Leonardo DiCaprio.

People tend to downplay or actively hide their handicaps at work. People having migraines or suffering from light sensitivity may actively hide things like that.

And that list wasn't intended to be comprehensive.

I just like dark colors, it's less eyestrain over the day. And yes, I do like to pretend I'm on a submarine.

You'll note that work usually happens during the day, people often browse HN after work, especially when it's dark.

Leo's awesome. Wolf of Wall Street? The Aviator?

Yep, bright screens give me headaches and sometimes migraines, which means I end up needing to lie in a dark room for an hour.

I try to dark mode everything I can as well as have monitors in reader mode and contrast turned down.

"Nothing" on an additive medium, the screen, is black. With absorptive color (paper) it is white. I just find everything to look better if you stick to this. I find light mode apps and sites uncomfortable and ugly, much like a white-on-black print book.

That said, I've heard from many people that they struggle to read light-on-dark. So it's best to have both options, especially for a site like HN where it doesn't require a huge design effort.

This. Also, when in a dark room like if you are laying in bed, don't you want less light coming out of your phone and it not to be like shining a flashlight in your eyes. Dark mode helps there especially if you have an OLED screen so that the text is the only light coming out.

It's nice at night.