Sunglasses: how much is too much light from the sides?

I was shopping for some new sunglasses and tried on several pairs, even some styles I wouldn't normally consider. I always have worn wrap around sunglasses (8 base curve), I tried on some Ray-Bans (6 base curve I think) and was surprised how much light comes from the sides and bottom. At first, I thought it was just the shape of my face, but notice everyone that wears none wrap sunglasses has a lot of light shining through the sides. It got me thinking, doesn't that defeat the purpose of a pair of shades that are suppose to shield your eyes from bright light? Perhaps even bad for your eyes, allowing uv light to get into the sides while your pupils are more dilated?

I own a pair of Wayfarers, no complaints at all about direct light coming in aside from a touch of face-reflection glare vaguely apparent at the very edges when light does come in.

Depends on your application, right? Eye doctor recommended protect from wind/dust so when I'm outside, Wiley X with face gasket works for me. Driving in a car? Seems like you would want to have decent peripheral vision, so standard glasses work.

I've always thought of wrap-arounds as element protection or for when in really bright conditions like snowboarding on a sunny day or fishing on a lake on a sunny day. Famous surfer Gerry Lopez wears goggles for that reason while his surfing buddies don't wear any eye covers on the water. In an interview he stated that his eyes have been damaged from spending so much time on the water.

My old Hobie wayfarer style have a slight curve in their 58mm lenses. My Ray Ban wayfarer have a straight 52mm setup I use for driving. It's more because the frame doesn't block things peripheral like the Hobies do. Both have prescription glass lenses.

But for dusty, very bright etc conditions a variety of tints of frameless Gargoyles provide all around eye protection without a frame blocking things along the edges. Yet my driving permit shows I wear prescriptions so being a law abider I keep the Gargoyles put away until needed.

We always wore something like these when backpacking on Mt. Rainier.
Between the snow fields and high elevation, full protection was mandatory. When snowboarding, goggles were the ticket.

~ Chance

I had a pair of Smith Foley sunglasses for years until I broke them. Very good coverage on the sides. I went to replace them but they are gone. They were close to normal aviators but more square so they didn't have the 70s porn director look. Now I settled for their Serpico version which is functional, but not the style I really wanted.

Between these two, I also tried the AO Eyewear Pilot 55mm (similar to Randolph Engineering) but the light from the side was ridiculous. I couldn't drive with them at all.