These 5 Samsung Galaxy S26 Features Will Make It Hard To Beat In 2026

Samsung may have released the slim, futuristic Galaxy Z TriFold and the Apple Vision Pro-rivaling Galaxy XR in 2025, but it’s not resting on its laurels. The Samsung Galaxy series is a standard-bearer for Android phones, the devices against which all new phones are inevitably compared, whether or not that’s fair, and newly-released beta software indicates that the S26 series of phones, from the base S26 to the premium Galaxy S26 Ultra, will be hard to beat.

Now, Samsung’s Galaxy S26 lineup likely won’t get anyone’s blood pumping when it comes to hardware upgrades, although it may yet have an advantage over the competition by not making any of the spec downgrades we expect from its rivals due to the RAM crisis. But the excitement comes from the software: the December 2025 beta versions of One UI 8.5, the final version of which will debut on the new phones, are packed with features that may make them strong contenders for the best user experience on any smartphone, period.

Although most of those improvements will trickle down to the S25 lineup and even the S22, Samsung is known to make owners of older devices wait months for those upgrades. Even when the update does make its way to them, older phones won’t receive all the latest features. Thus, the Galaxy S26 will be the phone to beat. From powerful Bluetooth enhancements that will let you share music to unlimited headphones to exciting new customization options that will make it easier than ever navigate device settings, these are five of the most impressive features that will debut on the Galaxy S26 series.

One of the most exciting upgrades to hit the Galaxy S26 series is a fully customizable Quick Settings panel. With One UI 7, which launched on the Galaxy S25 Ultra, Samsung unveiled a new Quick Settings that takes over the entire screen with multiple control widgets, more closely mirroring the equivalent Control Center on iOS. It refined that experience slightly on One UI 8, which debuted on the Galaxy Z Fold 7. Now, Samsung is bringing even more iPhone-like functionality to its own phones by allowing users to rearrange and resize widgets and quick toggles to their heart’s content.

The current implementation is already excellent. You can access your media controls, Wi-Fi and Bluetooth, brightness, volume, nearby devices, smart home controls, screen mirroring, and device modes all from a swipe down on your screen. Holding down on some toggles surfaces more in-depth controls for things like selecting a Wi-Fi network or quickly adjusting earbud settings. You can even move each element around. Still, most users will find that an important setting or two will still be buried in the expanded quick toggles menu (which requires a second swipe), no matter how much tweaking they do.

One UI 8.5 will let users resize and reorient every element, as well as place individual quick toggles on the main Quick Settings screen. If you find you’re always hunting for the Do Not Disturb toggle, for example, the update will allow you to dedicate a permanent spot to it, instead of having it hide among rows of tiny icons.

The iPhone has long proved that aesthetics are vital to users’ perception of their devices. Samsung has put a lot of work into beautifying its version of Android over the years, and One UI 8.5 includes a feature that has proven popular on competing devices, including the iPhone. Samsung’s adaptive smartphone clock solves a problem we didn’t know we had, by now responding dynamically to a user’s wallpaper.

On One UI 8.0, the lock screen clock adjusts its color based on a user’s choice of wallpaper for better contrast and legibility. Although the font, style, size, and placement of the clock are adjustable, those elements do not adapt and scale automatically with the wallpaper. The new lock screen clock in version 8.5 will do so. For instance, if you have a picture of your child on the lock screen, the clock may contort itself to avoid covering their face. If it’s a landscape, the clock might hover in the sky.

Ultimately, this change might make the readability of your clock slightly better, but it won’t provide any other practical benefits. What it will do is make the S26 feel more personal, which is something competitors like Apple have always excelled at.

Android has expanded its anti-theft features over the past several years, and Samsung is building on those by bringing improvements to its own devices in the form of enhanced lock screen protections and an increased scope for existing security measures. These features will almost certainly be deployed to all devices receiving the One UI 8.5 update, since they do not require any specialized hardware.

The most useful security improvement in One UI 8.5 is called Failed Authentication Lock. When your phone is unlocked, you may still need to enter your password or scan your fingerprint to access payments, banking apps, Secure Folder, and other sensitive areas. While your main lock screen likely has security measures equipped to wipe your phone if the password is incorrectly entered too many times in a row, these second-layer password screens didn’t. Until now, a thief who, say, snatched an unlocked phone from your hand would have unlimited chances to try getting into your sensitive apps. Failed Authentication Lock will add a failsafe to those second security layers by locking your phone after multiple unsuccessful attempts.

There are also new improvements to the existing Identify Check feature, which requires users to confirm their phone’s password or provide biometric authentication before changing important settings. The S26 will add more settings to Identity Check’s selection of protected ones, although Samsung has not yet revealed which settings are being added.

Bluetooth is getting an Auracast upgrade in One UI 8.5, giving it the ability to broadcast audio to any compatible headphones within range. This is a feature that could be exclusive to newer phones with hardware that supports Bluetooth Low Energy, though it would be shocking to see it remain an S26 exclusive for very long. Samsung has been all-in on Auracast since it brought the feature to One UI last year, and Google added Auracast to Android just this year.

Users could already connect to an Auracast broadcast from a Samsung phone using compatible Bluetooth headphones, but One UI 8.5 will let you use your phone as a broadcast hub. That means you can share audio from any app on your phone, as well as use the phone’s internal microphones (or a connected mic) to broadcast your voice. It’s unclear how many headphones or earbuds will be able to connect at one time, but Auracast theoretically supports an unlimited number of connections on Android.

The applications for this feature are only limited by the imagination. You could host a silent disco where people bring their own headphones, watch movies with friends even when kids are asleep in the next room, or make classrooms more accessible for children who are deaf or hard of hearing. You could even put compatible Bluetooth speakers in multiple rooms to create a DIY full-home audio system.

Samsung has spent a lot of time improving its ecosystem for users with multiple Galaxy devices, and one of the most exciting such features is the new Storage Share. If you’ve ever used a tablet or laptop and realized you need a file that’s stuck on your phone, you know how frustrating it can be to have to pull out the other device, find that file, and send it to the device that needs it. With Storage Share, you don’t need to go through that hassle. You can now browse the file systems on those devices remotely.

Files viewed remotely can be played and shared. However, it doesn’t look like users will be able to manage or reorganize files via this remote viewing feature. Meanwhile, testing shows that the device being remotely accessed does not need to have One UI 8.5 installed, although it’s unclear how far back support extends. That’s great news for anyone who uses older Samsung devices alongside newer ones.

How well Storage Share works will likely depend on how close your devices are, as well as the strength and congestion level of your network. Moreover, there are some security concerns to be aware of. If you’ve ever used something like uPNP or network-attached storage to access files on your local network, it’s pretty easy to guess that Samsung is probably using a similar technology here. That means you should probably keep Storage Share disabled when out in public to avoid security risks, but it will be very useful for those with multiple Samsung devices at home.