How to change the brightness dim intensity in Linux Mint when on battery running MATE

By default, when you switch your Linux Mint laptop from AC power to battery, MATE dims the brightness level to 50% from the current brightness level. Personally, I felt that 50% was too low of a value for me, where the display felt too dark. There is no option in the GUI to change this value, but it can be tweaked anyway. Let's see how.

To change the on-battery brightness dim intensity in Linux Mint MATE edition, we need to use a tool which is called dconf-editor. Do it as follows:

1. Press Alt + F2 shortcut keys on the keyboard to open the "Run Application" dialog. Type the following in the text box:

   dconf-editor

   

2. When the application starts, go to the following path in the left pane:

   /org/mate/power-manager

   The application may remind you of the Registry Editor in Windows. If you are familiar with Windows Registry, this should be an easy task for you.

3. Look on the right side. Find the value named brightness-dim-battery. It is set to 50.
4. To increase the dim level, set it to a value greater than 50. To decrease the dim level and make the screen brighter, set it to a value less than 50. Personally, I set it to 100, which means dim the brightness by 0:

This change takes effect instantly and does not require a reboot or restart of any app. Since you can see the changes on-the-fly, it is easy to tweak it and find a suitable value. That's it.

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