Sight Development in Babies

A baby's sight begins developing from birth. Understanding the progression of a baby's eyesight helps parents be aware of any problems or complications with an infant's sight.

Birth

• From birth, babies can see, although vision is fuzzy and mostly in black and white. Most infants can see between 8 to 15 inches from their face--about the distance an infant is from a person's face while they are being held.

Eye Focus

• In the first couple months of life, an infant's eyes begin working in tandem. It's normal for a baby's eyes to wander individually or cross from time to time during this period. Babies will also begin mastering the art of focusing their eyes, allowing them to maintain eye contact for short amounts of time.

Color Recognition

• From 3 to 4 months, an infant's color recognition will be fully mature causing the baby to be drawn to bright primary colored objects. Babies also begin developing depth perception and will begin to show signs of hand-eye coordination by reaching and grasping.

Tracking Moving Objects

• At around 5 months, infants will develop sight skills to track moving objects. They will also understand the idea of object permanence--hearing something although they cannot see it, such as a door opening or a person in another room. This is illustrated in a baby's enjoyment of playing peek-a-boo.

Sight Development

• By 8 months, an infant's sight is almost fully developed with 20/20 vision similar to a healthy adult. If at any time it seems your infant's sight is not developing as it should, contact a pediatrician.