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<\/a><\/p>\n$1300<\/p>\n
The GoodPrivacy Display works and it\u2019s cool as hellMeaningful camera hardware improvementsSleeker and more comfortable to use than the S25 UltraThe BadStill a big phoneStill expensiveStill no Qi2 magnets<\/p>\n
I tend to think of the S26 Ultra as existing in a class by itself. Can you think of another phone with four rear cameras? A built-in stylus? Performance specs up the wazoo? It attracts a particular kind of fan. So I think your interest in the S26 Ultra as a whole package should be your guiding star if you\u2019re interested in the Privacy Display but unsure about the rest. It is a phone person\u2019s phone \u2014 big, expensive, wonderful \u2014 with one especially cool new feature we haven\u2019t seen anywhere else. I can even see a world where this display tech is slowly adopted by other phone makers until it\u2019s something we take for granted. That\u2019s a feature worthy of the Ultra\u2019s lofty title.<\/p>\n
Elsewhere, the S26 Ultra is more familiar. It offers a versatile camera, an all-day battery, and Samsung\u2019s mixed bag of Galaxy AI features. This time, Samsung implemented a couple of smart AI tools that seem to borrow from Google\u2019s Pixel phones, which aren\u2019t tremendously useful now but are generally heading in the right direction. Now Nudge, modeled on Magic Cue, offers contextual suggestions based on what\u2019s being said in a text conversation. I\u2019m miserable at adding things to my calendar, and I find this extra bit of help genuinely useful. Now Nudge seems to work only in some narrowly defined use cases within the messaging app, and I only saw it pop up a couple of times. Still, on one occasion it helped me check my calendar and schedule an event.<\/p>\n
Just as I was preparing to publish this review, another AI feature appeared on the S26 Ultra by way of a software update: Gemini task automation. It\u2019s limited to ordering food and rideshare apps right now, but the idea is that you give Gemini a simple prompt, like \u201cGet me an Uber to the airport,\u201d it opens the app in a virtual window, and it goes about using the app to fulfill your request. In some quick preliminary tests<\/a> this has worked as advertised so far; crucially, Gemini stops before the final step so you can review and submit your order yourself. This, I think, is a good idea and certainly makes me feel better about using it. There are all kinds of ways to feel about this concept of computers using computers, and I have much more testing to do, but if it works consistently then this seems like a pretty significant step toward AI assistants that can actually do useful things for us.<\/p>\n You can change your outfit, add makeup to your face, and generally mess with your photos until they no longer even resemble anything that actually happened<\/p>\n Over in the gallery app, things are a little weirder. Samsung has built in some generative AI capabilities designed to help you reimagine your photos in fun ways, but for me they were unsettling. The company seems intent on zipping right past \u201cPhotos are memories\u201d<\/a> and into \u201cPhotos are whatever the hell you want them to be.\u201d With the S26 series, you can tell the phone how you want to edit the photo with natural language prompts, like you can in Google Photos. You can change your outfit, add makeup to your face, and generally mess with your photos until they no longer even resemble anything that actually happened. It\u2019s bananas.<\/p>\n Thankfully there are some basic guardrails in place. I couldn\u2019t get Samsung\u2019s AI to completely remove my clothes or dress me in a bikini. It did oblige when I asked it to remove my husband\u2019s shirt in a photo \u2014 it even extended the tattoos visible on his arm further up toward his shoulder. It will happily let you download a photo of a celebrity from the internet, paste them into your own selfie, and make it look like you happened upon Adam Driver while you were at the park and he posed for a picture with you. And then it can come up with some real weird stuff: I asked it to add my husband to a picture of me and it put him in my lap like a little ventriloquist dummy. This stuff is weird, I don\u2019t like it very much, and I can\u2019t shake the feeling that it gets harder to trust what we see in a photo every time companies like Samsung and Google add generative AI tools like this.<\/p>\n As for the camera itself, there\u2019s more good news for fans of hardware updates: Two of the S26 Ultra\u2019s cameras come with brighter apertures. The main 200-megapixel camera now uses an f\/1.4 lens compared to f\/1.7, and the 5x telephoto is now f\/2.9 versus f\/3.4. Wider apertures mean these cameras can, in theory, create more detailed images in low light since they\u2019re able to use lower ISOs or faster shutter speeds as needed. And that bears out in my side-by-side testing. The main camera consistently uses a lower ISO than the S25 Ultra, while they both stick to a shutter speed of 1\/120 second.<\/p>\n I see the same behavior on the 5x compared to the S25 Ultra in moderate lighting. In very dim light, both phones raise ISO to 1250, but the S26 Ultra is able to use a faster 1\/60th shutter speed compared to 1\/30th on the S25. Longer exposures will result in more noise that the camera has to smooth out in post-processing, and you\u2019ve got a better chance of getting a sharp image with a faster shutter speed while shooting with the telephoto camera. These are real, unequivocal improvements to the camera system, and I will take them every day over a thousand bland generative AI photo editing features.<\/p>\n Underneath all that, the S26 Ultra is still an object you can hold, and it\u2019s a nice one \u2014 if a little big for my taste. It loses what was left of its Note heritage by trading the boxy corners and sharp edges for the softer curves used by the S26 and S26 Plus. The seam along the sides of the screen where glass meets frame (aluminum this year, we\u2019re all done doing titanium I guess) is smoother than on the S25 Ultra. The S Pen silo is also right on the corner, so the end of the stylus is curved slightly on one side \u2014 now there\u2019s definitely a right way and a wrong way to fit it into the frame.<\/p>\n The dimensions are similar to last year\u2019s, but the S26 Ultra looks and feels much sleeker; the silver S25 Ultra looks like the Cybertruck of phones next to it. One similarity I\u2019m disappointed to see carrying over to this year is the lack of Qi2 magnets, which are handy for thwacking the phone onto a magnetic charger or using MagSafe PopSockets and the like. Samsung is still outsourcing those to its cases, which is bad news for those of us who don\u2019t put cases on our phones. Otherwise, the display remains huge at 6.9 inches, and although the phone feels a bit more comfortable to hold than last year\u2019s model, this is still a very big phone.<\/p>\n But the Privacy Display is the big story here. The screen uses a technology Samsung calls Flex Magic Pixel to limit the viewing angle when Privacy Display is engaged. So the question is: Does it look any different with Privacy Display turned off? Next to the S25 Ultra, they look basically the same head-on, but I can see more of a color shift from the S26 Ultra when I view it from a very low angle. This never really bothered me while using the phone, but some people are more sensitive to that kind of thing.<\/p>\n 1\/2The screens on the Galaxy S26 Ultra (left) and S25 Ultra (right) look more or less the same when viewed straight on. Privacy Display is not enabled on the S26 Ultra. Photo: Allison Johnson \/ The Verge<\/p>\n When you turn Privacy Display on, the screen dims slightly and the picture looks a bit flatter. Again, this might be a problem for some people, but it didn\u2019t really bug me; after a few moments I didn\u2019t really notice. You can enable Privacy Display just for notification banners, which is awesome, and it\u2019s kind of wild to see the effect working on just that part of the screen. Notifications look a little dim and gray, like the ghost of a notification.<\/p>\n I left Privacy Display on for days, only remembering once I tried showing someone next to me something on my phone screen (which they had to squint at to make out). At its default setting, Privacy Display makes it harder to see what\u2019s on your screen from an angle \u2014 but not impossible. Especially if there\u2019s white text on a black background, someone standing next to you is still going to be able to read it.<\/p>\n 1\/3Privacy Display off. Photo: Allison Johnson \/ The Verge<\/p>\n Enabling the option for \u201cmaximum\u201d privacy protection makes it much harder to make out text on the screen from an angle, though it also lowers contrast more dramatically when you\u2019re looking at it straight on. It would be handy if you could keep Privacy Display engaged at its default setting for general use and then kick it into maximum privacy for certain apps; given all the ways Samsung lets you customize these kinds of features, it wouldn\u2019t surprise me if Samsung is working on that for version two.<\/p>\n For the past couple of years, the Ultra seemed to be losing parts of its identity without picking up any meaningful improvements along the way. Sure, the switch from a 10x to a 5x zoom was probably the right one in the long run. And I can\u2019t say I\u2019ve missed any of the Bluetooth features that used to come with the S Pen. But altogether, it just seemed Samsung wasn\u2019t quite sure what to do with this big phone \u2014 and a name like \u201cUltra\u201d sets the standard pretty high.<\/p>\n A big phone with some new ideas.<\/p>\n Things are different this year. This phone genuinely does things I haven\u2019t seen another phone do, and that\u2019s not a phrase I\u2019ve been able to apply in a long time. Privacy Display works, it doesn\u2019t come with any serious downsides, and it\u2019s eminently useful. Even my usually tech-disinterested husband was impressed. The camera upgrades are real, too: Faster lenses let in more light and offer you a better chance of taking sharp photos. It\u2019s not some AI nonsense, it\u2019s just physics.<\/p>\n The S26 Ultra is a return to form in some ways, but it remains a pricey device and generally A Lot of Phone. But that\u2019s kind of the Ultra promise: unapologetically big, crammed with every feature you can imagine. This is still a phone for a self-selecting group of people, but I\u2019m happy to report that fans of the series are finally getting an update that\u2019s worthy of the name.<\/p>\n Photography by Allison Johnson \/ The Verge<\/p>\n Agree to Continue: Samsung Galaxy S26, S26 Plus, and S26 Ultra<\/p>\n Every smart device now requires you to agree to a series of terms and conditions before you can use it \u2014 contracts that no one actually reads. It\u2019s impossible for us to read and analyze every single one of these agreements. But we started counting exactly how many times you have to hit \u201cagree\u201d to use devices when we review them since these are agreements most people don\u2019t read and definitely can\u2019t negotiate.<\/p>\n To use the Galaxy S26, S26 Plus, or S26 Ultra, you must agree to:<\/p>\n Google Terms of Service<\/a>Google Play Terms of Service<\/a>Google Privacy Policy (included in ToS<\/a>)Install apps and updates: \u201cYou agree this device may also automatically download and install updates and apps from Google, your carrier, and your device\u2019s manufacturer, possibly using cellular data.\u201dSamsung End User License AgreementSamsung Privacy PolicySamsung Terms and Conditions<\/p>\n There\u2019s also a variety of optional agreements, including:<\/p>\n Provide anonymous location data for Google\u2019s services\u201cAllow apps and services to scan for Wi-Fi networks and nearby devices at any time, even when Wi-Fi or Bluetooth is off.\u201dSend usage and diagnostic data to GoogleGoogle Gemini Apps Privacy Notice if you opt in to using Gemini AssistantSend diagnostic data to SamsungSamsung personalized advertisingBixby personal data intelligence<\/p>\n Other features, like Google Wallet, may require additional agreements.<\/p>\n Final tally: seven mandatory agreements and more than seven optional agreements.<\/p>\n Follow topics and authors from this story to see more like this in your personalized homepage feed and to receive email updates.Allison JohnsonClose Allison Johnson<\/p>\n Posts from this author will be added to your daily email digest and your homepage feed.<\/p>\n FollowFollow<\/p>\n See All by Allison Johnson<\/a><\/p>\n MobileClose<\/p>\n Mobile<\/p>\n Posts from this topic will be added to your daily email digest and your homepage feed.<\/p>\n FollowFollow<\/p>\n See All Mobile<\/a><\/p>\n Phone ReviewsClose<\/p>\n Phone Reviews<\/p>\n Posts from this topic will be added to your daily email digest and your homepage feed.<\/p>\n FollowFollow<\/p>\n See All Phone Reviews<\/a><\/p>\n ReviewsClose<\/p>\n Reviews<\/p>\n Posts from this topic will be added to your daily email digest and your homepage feed.<\/p>\n FollowFollow<\/p>\n See All Reviews<\/a><\/p>\n SamsungClose<\/p>\n Samsung<\/p>\n Posts from this topic will be added to your daily email digest and your homepage feed.<\/p>\n FollowFollow<\/p>\n![\"Samsung](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/268399_Samsung_Galaxy_S26_Ultra_review_AJohnson_0011.jpg\"\/)
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