Who we are

About RedLightLog

We help people who own a mask, a panel, a wand or a hair cap use it the way the trials did, and judge the result honestly. Free tools, graded guides, and a session tracker app on the way.

Why RedLightLog exists

Red light therapy sits in an odd place. There are real randomized trials behind some of it: collagen density and skin roughness, terminal hair counts in pattern hair loss, pain scores in knee osteoarthritis at particular doses. There is also an enormous amount of marketing, much of it borrowing the credibility of those trials to sell outcomes nobody has measured. Most device owners end up guessing at three of the four variables that matter (wavelength, irradiance, time and distance) and then giving up before anything could have changed.

RedLightLog is the boring middle: a dose calculator that turns a spec sheet into J/cm2, a schedule builder that turns a goal into four weeks of sessions, and guides that say how many people were in a trial, what dose it used and what it did not show. The app, when it ships, will make the four weeks easy to keep.

Who writes it

The guides are written by the RedLightLog team at Viral Labs, a small independent studio. We are not doctors, dermatologists or physicists, and we do not pretend to be. What we do is read the trials and reviews ourselves, quote them with their size and limits, record every fact we rely on with its source and the date we checked it, and correct the page when a reader or a new study shows we got something wrong. A weekly fact-check pass re-reads the volatile lines (prices, specs, maker guidance) before each post goes live.

Our editorial and sources policy

• Trials first, then reviews, then makers. Peer-reviewed studies on PubMed and PubMed Central, then systematic reviews, then a maker's own public spec page for a device's numbers. We do not cite other blogs, retailers' copy or social posts as evidence.
• Every number has a home. If a guide says 9 J/cm2 or 26 weeks, the sources list at the bottom names the paper. If we cannot verify a number, we describe it in words or leave it out.
• Evidence is graded. Each goal gets a plain-language grade: how many trials, how many people, sham-controlled or not, which wavelengths and doses, and what the studies did not measure. One small open-label study is called one small open-label study.
• Dated and device-neutral. Any price or spec says when we read it. We do not sell devices, we do not take payment for placement, and when a guide names a brand it says so on the page and quotes only the maker's published specs. If we ever add affiliate links, every page that carries one will say so at the top.
• No fake signals. No invented ratings, review counts or user numbers, anywhere, ever.

Cleared is not proven

You will see "FDA cleared" on many devices. In the US, most home light-therapy devices reach the market through a 510(k) premarket notification, in which the maker shows the device is substantially equivalent to a device already legally on the market. That clearance is about safety and equivalence to a predicate; it is not a finding that the device produces a particular result for your goal. "FDA registered" means less still: the facility or product is listed, not reviewed. Our guides use the word cleared only in that sense, and never as shorthand for proven.

What RedLightLog is not

It is not medical advice and it does not diagnose or treat anything. Red light therapy has few reported side effects in trials, but the trials excluded people the makers now list as contraindications: pregnancy, epilepsy, active cancer, photosensitive conditions and photosensitizing medication. If any of those apply to you, or a symptom is getting worse, talk to a doctor before you shine a light at it. And never shine any device into an eye to treat an eye condition at home: a 2024 study found two red light myopia devices approached or exceeded retinal safety limits within about three minutes of continuous viewing.

The app

RedLightLog, the app, is coming to Android first, then iPhone. It will hold a device profile (mask, panel, wand, cap, belt or bed), a protocol per goal (distance, minutes, frequency, wavelength), a session timer with reminders, an adherence calendar and an optional manual before-and-after photo pair. There will be no AI reading of your photos, by design: you compare them, in the same light, four weeks apart. Read more on the app page.

Say hello

Spotted a mistake, a trial we missed, or a maker's spec that changed? Email viral.b.tandel@gmail.com. We read everything and we fix what is wrong.