The energy consumption of the Internet of underwater things (IoUT) nodes is a capital aspect that dramatically affects the applicability of wireless optical technologies in several scenarios, such as ocean monitoring or underwater sensor networks. Simultaneous lightwave information and power transfer (SLIPT) is a cost-effective and energy-efficient solution for energy-constrained wireless systems. Nonetheless, the reported battery-charging times for underwater operations are high, which should be improved to make this technology attractive enough to be considered for actual implementations. This paper provides a new SLIPT strategy, introducing a specific optical signal transmission scheme by controlling the transmitted direct current (DC) level component. The scheme is based on a DC-On Off Keying (OOK) modulation with an adjustable signal range (SR) to improve the energy-harvesting process and battery-charging time for underwater operations. The results reveal that the system provides a signal-to-noise ratio higher than 28 dB and the bit-error rate of less than 10 −10 which is below the forward error correction limit with improved charging time around 30 minutes and 15 seconds for 5 F and 9.4 mF, respectively over 20 cm, and 63 seconds for 9.4 mF in 50 cm link distance.INDEX TERMS Underwater wireless optical communications, energy harvesting, information decoding, simultaneous lightwave information and power transfer (SLIPT), Internet of underwater things (IoUT).