[floridajack]

Hello, Everyone!
We have been driving a 2021 Venza XLE since Sunday and like it very much. Driving at night is a huge disappointment, however. There are very noticeable shadows in the headlamps, particularly the left side of the car. The shadows are very evident and are seriously distracting! I have pictures and videos showing exactly what we are seeing in this $42,000 vehicle. Took it to Toyota today and spoke to a manager who dismissed our concerns as that's just the way they are and called it "adaptive headlamps." I know what those are, and the Venza is not so equipped. Our salesperson said he was going to take an LE home tonight and see if he notices the same issue (apparently the headlamps are different. Are we the only people who have noticed this troubling feature?

 

[floridajack]

 

[Esso]

Looks like the OEM projector stepping to keep your lights from being completely flat. That dip is to not blind oncoming drivers. You are in a high(er) profile car after all. To me it’s not a defect, but If your concerned you have every right to bring it up.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[gold94corolla]

yeah that looks normal enough, it's to help other people in front of you not be blinded by the bright LED lights as much.

 

[tim.s]

You're not alone, many owners have noticed. Unfortunately, t's not a defect per se, but it is a bad (dumb) design. And no, it's not "adaptive" headlights (that guy's an idiot).

The good news is that you do get used to it (the first few times you think an animal is crossing the road).

Here's another thread discussing it.

Distracting headlight phenomenon

I just drove 750+ miles non-stop on pretty dark freeways (CA->AZ on I5 and I10). There's what looks like an intentional 'dark spot' that I found very hard to ignore over on the left side of field of view. I kept thinking something was moving due to the way this dark spot interacted with the...

www.toyotanation.com

 

[tim.s]

Here are some better photos from other forums showing the LED connections in better focus.

 

[dbkelly]

Hello, Everyone!
We have been driving a 2021 Venza XLE since Sunday and like it very much. Driving at night is a huge disappointment, however. There are very noticeable shadows in the headlamps, particularly the left side of the car. The shadows are very evident and are seriously distracting! I have pictures and videos showing exactly what we are seeing in this $42,000 vehicle. Took it to Toyota today and spoke to a manager who dismissed our concerns as that's just the way they are and called it "adaptive headlamps." I know what those are, and the Venza is not so equipped. Our salesperson said he was going to take an LE home tonight and see if he notices the same issue (apparently the headlamps are different. Are we the only people who have noticed this troubling feature?

Mine looks exactly the same and I did not even notice it. These are the best headlights I have ever seem and am very happy.

 

[LilWeenie]

Hello, Everyone!
We have been driving a 2021 Venza XLE since Sunday and like it very much. Driving at night is a huge disappointment, however. There are very noticeable shadows in the headlamps, particularly the left side of the car. The shadows are very evident and are seriously distracting! I have pictures and videos showing exactly what we are seeing in this $42,000 vehicle. Took it to Toyota today and spoke to a manager who dismissed our concerns as that's just the way they are and called it "adaptive headlamps." I know what those are, and the Venza is not so equipped. Our salesperson said he was going to take an LE home tonight and see if he notices the same issue (apparently the headlamps are different. Are we the only people who have noticed this troubling feature?

I recently purchased the Venza limited and I have the same issue! At first I thought I was crazy, but then I tried to swerve when the shadow moved on the dark winding roads. Definitely a huge flaw in their design.

 

[Toyolover49]

Hello, Everyone!
We have been driving a 2021 Venza XLE since Sunday and like it very much. Driving at night is a huge disappointment, however. There are very noticeable shadows in the headlamps, particularly the left side of the car. The shadows are very evident and are seriously distracting! I have pictures and videos showing exactly what we are seeing in this $42,000 vehicle. Took it to Toyota today and spoke to a manager who dismissed our concerns as that's just the way they are and called it "adaptive headlamps." I know what those are, and the Venza is not so equipped. Our salesperson said he was going to take an LE home tonight and see if he notices the same issue (apparently the headlamps are different. Are we the only people who have noticed this troubling feature?

No you’re not. I just purchased a xle and I have the same problem.

 

[qs933]

Mine looks exactly the same and I did not even notice it. These are the best headlights I have ever seem and am very happy.

I noticed them on my Limited because of this thread; otherwise, I don’t think I would have paid much attention to it. These are much better than what I had on my 4Runner with incandescent headlights and fog lights.

 

[Steerpike]

I'm one of the authors of the 'other' threads on this. I've been driving the car now for 2 months and I am not at all 'used to this' - every time I drive at night I'm distracted by this. I posted this photo in my thread:

This is a photo taken of my garage door, with the car maybe 5-10 feet away from it. These two black spots are what ultimately grow into the big black 'blobs' you are seeing, that make you think something is crossing the road. Do you see this also, when you drive close to a wall or garage door?

I don't think this has anything to do with 'protecting oncoming drivers', and I'm not convinced it's just 'part of the LED pattern'. If you switch from low beam to high beam, the blobs completely disappear. In our headlights, there aren't separate low vs high beams; it's just one light with an overlay that drops down when you go to 'low' beam. The fact that this pattern only appears when you are on 'low' beam tells me this is a problem with whatever 'overlay' method they are using to block out the upper portion of the beam. I've been dealing with other issues but I do plan to call Toyota Customer Service and try to get a formal 'issue' raised about this.

 

[Steerpike]

I just called Toyota -
800 331-4331
Option 7
Spoke to a helpful guy pretty quickly.
The guy explained that the more people who report this, the more likely Toyota will be to address it. I may also file a safety concern, as others have advised. I was given a reference number to follow up with. He didn't have a means to receive emails from me (with the example photos) but I was able to direct him to this exact thread on ToyotaNation.com, so he was able to see the phenomenon himself.

To re-state something said above - these headlights have an extremely sharp / straight line between 'lit' and 'unlit' areas. This 'lit / unlit' boundary is quite low, and is positioned so as to not blind oncoming drivers (or drivers in front of you in the same direction). So the 'not blinding other drivers' is well taken care of by the sharp cutoff in low-beam mode; this 'dark spot' is much lower than any oncoming car is ever going to be (unless your were driving over a ridge or similar). The very first picture posted by the author of this thread (where the dark-spot is visible on the grass) does a good job of showing where the 'blob' is, and you can see that it is VERY low - much lower than any oncoming vehicle.

To 'Tim.S' - you had mentioned (in another thread perhaps) this pattern is an attribute of the LED design, but I don't understand that - if you turn 'high beam' on, the pattern disappears so this would suggest the pattern is more associated with the high/low beam overlay than the LED design - but I'd be interested in a more detailed explanation.

 

[Steerpike]

I found a 'trick' to make the 'blob' more visible while stationary. Last night I was in a parking lot that had a convenient wall around it. I pointed the car directly at the wall, about (very roughly!) 30-50 feet away, and got out and took some pics. Accidentally, I stepped in front of one of the headlights, and suddenly the blob was far more visible. The reason is, each headlight 'washes out' the other headlight's 'dark spot' so by standing in front of one of them, you get to see the other headlight's dark spot more clearly. So this is what I saw:

This picture also reinforces just how sharp the 'edge' of the lighted area is! The wall extends about 1 foot above the edge of the lighted area. In the far distance, you can see 'city lights' (this is a grocery store parking lot with a killer view ).

Also worth noting, the two 'dark spots' do converge into one dark spot at some point in the distance; haven't yet managed to spot that in a parking lot though!

 

[gold94corolla]

In all of my many years working with headlight projector equipment, I have never seen anything like that, even with LED projectors. Nothing even comes close. That looks absolutely horrible! What an atrocity

 

[Steerpike]

In all of my many years working with headlight projector equipment, I have never seen anything like that, even with LED projectors. Nothing even comes close. That looks absolutely horrible! What an atrocity

How did you get this experience? Regardless ... given my observation that this shadow completely disappears when you go to 'high beam', and that in our cars, 'low beam' is just a mechanical overlay on the light source, would you think this is some attribute of the low beam mechanism? Is all this hidden from the casual user or can it be accessed / seen by removing the bulb from the housing perhaps? I'm tempted to pull mine apart but I've never had the inclination to dig into headlamps before!

 

[gold94corolla]

How did you get this experience? Regardless ... given my observation that this shadow completely disappears when you go to 'high beam', and that in our cars, 'low beam' is just a mechanical overlay on the light source, would you think this is some attribute of the low beam mechanism? Is all this hidden from the casual user or can it be accessed / seen by removing the bulb from the housing perhaps? I'm tempted to pull mine apart but I've never had the inclination to dig into headlamps before!

Ah my apologies, I don't mean to sound like an expert. But I have been building head lights for over 10 years, taking them apart, assembling components to swap light output sources (retrofitting). I've had all sorts of projectors, from HID to LED. And there is a massive community around headlight output modifications and improvements. And never have I see anything like this! You are right, that there is a shield causing the crisp sharp cutoff line, which moves out of the way to expose the high beam. I have no clue why there would be those weird shadow things. It would certainly drive me crazy!