How Often Should You Have an Eye Test?

For a healthy adult with no symptoms, every two years is the usual answer, moving to yearly from around 60 to 70. If you have diabetes, glaucoma, a close relative with glaucoma, or you are of African or Caribbean descent, the interval shortens to yearly or whatever your clinician sets.

The reason it is not simply about glasses is that the most important things an eye test finds cause no symptoms at all until late.

What a proper eye test is actually looking for#

A sight test measures your refraction: whether you need glasses and what strength. Alongside that, the examiner checks eye pressure, looks at the optic nerve and retina, and assesses visual fields where shown.

That second part is the screening. Glaucoma erodes peripheral vision so slowly that the brain fills in the gap, and people often lose a great deal before noticing anything. Diabetic retinopathy and early macular degeneration are equally quiet. All three are far more treatable early, and none of them announce themselves.

Occasionally an examiner sees something systemic. The retinal changes of very high blood pressure, or swelling of the optic disc suggesting raised pressure inside the skull. Those findings send people to a doctor the same day.

Where practice differs by country#

The UK funds free NHS sight tests for children, over-60s, people with diabetes or glaucoma, close relatives of glaucoma patients over 40. Those on certain benefits, generally on a two-yearly cycle. Most of the EU works through ophthalmologists or optometrists with varying reimbursement. The US has no single schedule. A baseline examination around 40 is widely advised, and access is largely insurance-dependent. Across the Gulf and South Asia, testing is mostly private or delivered through employer and school programs.

Diabetic retinal screening, by contrast, is close to universal in principle, WHO and every major diabetes body recommend at least annual retinal examination, even where the delivery differs.

When to go sooner#

Any change in vision that you notice. Frequent headaches, especially with reading or screen work. Eye strain that does not settle with breaks. Double vision. Difficulty with night driving or with glare. A child squinting, sitting close to the screen, or struggling at school.

At work#

Display screen equipment regulations in the UK and much of the EU entitle regular screen users to a funded eye test and, if glasses are needed specifically for screen distance, a contribution towards them. A great many employees never claim this. Separately, anyone doing safety-critical work, driving, machinery, working at height, has vision standards to meet. Those checks are not a substitute for a full eye examination.

Eye strain from screens is real but does not damage the eyes. It responds to breaks, blink awareness, screen distance and lighting rather than to a stronger prescription.

Where this fits#

Eye testing belongs to the same quiet category as blood pressure checks and screening tests: routine, unexciting, and occasionally the thing that prevents permanent damage. The fuller guide to health checkups by age sets out which checks earn their place in each decade.