I have several different bbt thermometers. This is my favorite, because of the backlight. It is true that the backlight goes off after you initially turn it on, but when your temperature reading is complete you just press the button again and the backlight turns back on and shows the reading. I also like that you hear the beeps to tell you this thermometer is working. On my other ones if too much time would go by I would have to check to make sure it was really working and that meant turning on a light and then doing it all over again, which would make the reading inaccurate, since you had to get up and turn on a light to see the thermometer. The light is great and the thermometer works great.Get more detail about Basal Digital Thermometer.