Why Are Headlights So Bright Now? The Feds Are Finally Rewriting the Rules

If you feel like headlights have gotten brighter and harder to drive against at night, you’re not imagining it. Headlight glare has become one of the most common complaints drivers send to federal safety regulators. On October 6, 2026, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration announced it will begin rewriting the rule that governs every light on your car.

That rule is Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standard No. 108, and it’s a strange piece of law. It’s one of the original federal safety standards, dating to 1968, and it has grown into a 177-page document governing everything from headlights to brake lights, turn signals, and reflectors. It’s also, by NHTSA’s own admission, outdated.

How We Got Here

For more than 40 years, American headlights were remarkably uniform. Starting in 1940, the U.S. required “sealed beam” headlights, standardized glass units that were the same on nearly every car. If a headlight burned out, you bought an identical replacement at any auto parts store. It was simple, but the technology stood still while Europe moved ahead.

The U.S. didn’t allow modern replaceable-bulb headlights with custom shapes until the 1980s. Since then, lighting has changed faster than the rules. Halogen bulbs gave way to high-intensity discharge lamps, and now LEDs dominate new cars. The standard has been patched over the years, but its basic framework comes from a different era.

Why Headlights Feel So Much Brighter Now

Several things changed at once, and they compound each other.

The first is the light itself. Old halogen bulbs produce a warm, yellowish light. LED headlights produce a much whiter, bluer light, closer to daylight. That cooler light can light up more of the road for the driver behind it, but many people find it harsher and more dazzling when it’s coming at them. Our eyes are more sensitive to glare from bluish light, especially at night when our pupils are wide open.

The second is height. Under FMVSS 108, headlights can be mounted anywhere from 22 inches to 54 inches off the ground. That upper limit is 4.5 feet, roughly at or above the eye level of someone sitting in a sedan. As pickups and SUVs have taken over American roads, more headlights sit near the top of that range, aimed straight at the eyes of drivers in smaller cars.

The third is aim. A headlight beam has a sharp cutoff at the top, designed to keep light below oncoming drivers’ eyes. But that only works when the headlight is aimed correctly. A headlight that’s off by even a small angle can push the bright part of the beam right into oncoming traffic. Aim can drift over time, after a minor fender-bender, or when a vehicle is loaded down with cargo, towing a trailer, or lifted with an aftermarket kit.

Here’s a detail most drivers don’t know: the federal standard tests headlights largely as components, on a lab bench, not as they’re actually mounted and aimed on a vehicle. A headlight can pass the federal test and still blind people on the road once it’s installed on a tall truck and slightly misaimed. The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety recognized this gap a decade ago. When it started rating headlights on actual vehicles in 2016, it found that many performed poorly, either lighting the road too little or producing too much glare for oncoming drivers.

The Aftermarket Bulb Problem

One of the biggest sources of glare isn’t how cars come from the factory. It’s what owners put in them.

Online retailers sell huge numbers of bright LED “upgrade” bulbs designed to plug into headlight housings that were built for halogen bulbs. The problem is that a headlight housing is designed around the exact position and shape of the light source inside it. An LED bulb puts out light from a different spot, so the housing can’t focus it properly. The result is light scattered in every direction, including straight into other drivers’ eyes. NHTSA has taken the position that these conversions generally don’t comply with federal standards, but they’re cheap, popular, and hard to police.

What NHTSA Plans to Change

According to NHTSA, the rewrite will focus on five areas. The agency will study how modern headlight technology contributes to glare for other drivers. It will update rules for LEDs, dusk sensors that switch lights on automatically, automatic high beams, and replaceable light sources. It will look at how headlight height and aim affect visibility. It will streamline testing for plastic lenses and replaceable parts. And it will work to bring U.S. lighting rules in line with international standards.

The international piece matters because of a technology called adaptive driving beam. These systems use cameras and arrays of LEDs to keep the high beams on while automatically “carving out” dark spots around oncoming cars and vehicles ahead. In theory, you get the visibility of high beams without blinding anyone. Europe allowed this technology years ago. In the U.S., Congress directed NHTSA to allow it in the 2021 infrastructure law, and the agency issued a rule in 2022. But the U.S. testing requirements were complicated enough that automakers have been slow to offer the feature here, even on cars that have it overseas. NHTSA says its current standards don’t allow automakers to deploy the latest safety-improving lighting.

An Unusual Way of Writing the Rule

NHTSA is using a process called negotiated rulemaking, which it hasn’t used for lighting in more than 25 years. Normally, an agency drafts a proposed rule on its own, publishes it, and then takes public comments. In negotiated rulemaking, the agency forms a committee of outside stakeholders who work out the proposal together before it’s published.

Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy will appoint up to 18 members from lighting manufacturers, equipment associations, safety organizations, research institutions, and engineering groups. Supporters say this approach produces better technical rules faster. Critics of the process sometimes worry that industry voices can outnumber safety advocates, which is why the makeup of the committee matters.

You Can Weigh In

NHTSA is accepting public comments on what the committee should address and whether its membership is balanced, as well as nominations for committee members. The deadline is November 9, 2026, and comments can be submitted through Regulations.gov. If headlight glare bothers you, this is a rare chance to tell federal regulators directly, before the rule is written.

Why This Is About More Than Comfort

Glare is a real safety issue, because nighttime is when driving is most dangerous. Safety groups have long noted that a disproportionate share of traffic deaths happen at night, even though far fewer miles are driven after dark. Pedestrians are especially at risk, and the large majority of pedestrian deaths happen in the dark.

When a driver is dazzled by oncoming lights, it can take several seconds for their eyes to recover. At highway speed, a car covers a long distance in that time, and a pedestrian in dark clothing or a cyclist on the shoulder can disappear completely in the glare. Older drivers, and anyone with cataracts or other eye conditions, take longer to recover and are hit hardest.

What Glare Means if You’re in a Crash

From a legal standpoint, glare usually doesn’t excuse a crash. If you’re blinded by oncoming headlights, the law generally expects you to slow down and drive more carefully until you can see again. Saying “I was blinded” rarely gets a driver off the hook. Courts tend to treat it the same way as driving into sun glare: a known hazard you have to adjust for.

But glare can also point to someone else’s fault. Connecticut, Massachusetts, and most other states require drivers to dim their high beams when approaching oncoming traffic or following another car. A driver who keeps the high beams on, or who has illegal aftermarket bulbs or a badly misaimed lifted truck, may share responsibility for a crash their lights helped cause. In some cases, defective factory lighting can even raise questions about the manufacturer.

If you’re hurt in a nighttime crash and headlights played a role, write down what you remember about the other vehicle’s lights while it’s fresh: whether the high beams were on, whether the lights looked unusually blue or bright, and whether the vehicle was lifted. Take photos of the vehicle if you can. Those details are easy to lose and can matter a great deal later.

Jake Dressler is a Connecticut and Massachusetts attorney who represents people injured in car, truck, and pedestrian accidents. For a free consultation, call (860) 913-0210 or email [email protected].

This post is general information, not legal advice. Every situation is different, so talk to a lawyer about your specific facts.