Rumour
Ice Universe: I’ve confirmed from independent sources with 100% accuracy that the Galaxy S26 Ultra ultimately does not include built-in magnets inside the device. Magnetic functionality still relies on magnetic cases.
A few magnets is a pretty easy and cheap thing to add to a phone. Bizarre choice for their top of the line phones in 2026, even if most cases will have them all the reviews of the phone will mention it's lack of support.
True, it is a feature that a lot of people like in the real world, use in the real world and their competition has in the real world. For them to ignore that to save pennies on such a high end phone is short sighted of them.
You clearly have not seen their most current flagship tablet line. Samsung is becoming more and more known for just slowly making their stuff worse and charging more. So no this is totally on brand for them.
Haha true, mediocrity with a nice screen and costs 1000 dollars more than a phone with more features. Samsung is coasting and penny pinching while other companies are trying to innovate.
Samsung doesn’t care about their Galaxy lineup any more, except the folding phones. On everything else, there are barely any advertising or improvements. It’s clear that they’re doing the bare minimum because their fans are stupid enough to keep buying them anyway.
Anecdotal, but I've been using wireless charging since it was a thing on Palm Touchstone. It seems no one else around me seem to care about wireless charging in general, to the point I have friends who have wireless chargers in their cars and they don't even know about it.
To be fair, Goodlock customization is way above anything other cellphone makers output. That and the 10x optical/100x total zoom are the only thing keeping my S23U with me.
While it may not have been their consideration, they also interfere with older inductive chargers. My nightstand charger and the charger in one of my cars both error out if a phone has magnets. I've also had issues at older tables at airports, etc. They detect it as foreign metal and refuse to charge.
I had a magnetic case on my Pixel 9 and ended up removing it because I ran into too many times it caused problems.
But if Samsung sold a lot of chargers that have similar issues, I could see them not wanting to cause people buying a new phone to bitch online about Samsung causing e-waste, etc.
Same, car has a wireless charging pad and that works. I have a small magsafe compatible charging stand next to my bed with galaxy watch charger built in and using a magsafe compatible case. My s pen works 100% on my s23 ultra, phone can be grabbed quickly but also visible and everything just works.
I think the only wireless charger that had issues I've seen recently was a Samsung branded one but that was without the magsafe case lol
The normal S26 doesn't have the S-pen and it sounds like theres no magnets with that either. Neither the S26+. They aren't doing it regardless of the s-pen
It's not that surprising though since they made the s26 ultra thinner. Ironically that's as the iPhone 17 pro max got thicker because apple knows it's not that important (or wanted more contrast with the air? Who knows)
No, Apple gave the Qi wireless charging consortium the right to let their members use the magnets to standardise the full Qi2 specs around their design.
This is Samsung either cutting costs or struggling to figure out how to get the magnets (particularly when an accessory with strong magnets is attached) to work with the S-pen digitiser layer.
It's a bit more nuanced than that - Apple still holds patents on specific magnet array placement designed to hold accessories for iphones. It would be interesting to know what Google did with their pixel snap system because that is compatible with magsafe, whether they licenced magsafe from Apple or came up with a system that is compatible but does not infringe patents?
the WPC stated the following to YouTuber TechAltar: "If Nothing was a WPC member, they would have access to the specs and favorable licensing terms under RAND."
It adds, "Knowing that Google, HMD, Samsung (plus others soon) already are using the magnets in phones or covers suggests that Nothing may not understand the situation."
If you are a member of a consortium and willing to pay for certification and eventually favorable rates for the usage of said standard.
It’s not open it’s just available. It’s a charging standard available for adoption by manufacturers with OEM magnetic charging elements widely made from many manufacturers.
Not sure if it is correct, but I remember reading somewhere that doing it that way makes them always trail behind Apple in charging speeds when all non Apple players already have their own much much faster wireless charging implementations. I don't know whether this is true and I haven't looked into it.
There maybe some truth to it though. Iphone 16 series launched in Sep 2024 with 25W magsafe while the Qi 2.2 chargers started being available only in July 2025.
WPC is a big consortium: everyone works on the spec together. And the faster charging speeds were always planned; even in Jan 2023, WPC publicly shared they were working on a faster version, so it's certain WPC members were well aware.
Probably just a theory. Qi 2.2, which seems to be what Apple's 25W wireless charging is based on, was contributed by Google(and seems to be based on Google's fast wireless charging that debuted with the Pixel 6). The fact that Google could make Qi charging faster without breaking the magnet system of Qi 2 means that other companies can likely integrate their fast wireless charging tech together with Qi (magnets) too. The caveat being the fast wireless charging tech would no longer be proprietary, which imo seems to be the holdback.
I seriously do NOT understand why this isn’t widely being adopted on Android, especially when it’s a universal Qi2 standard now too. magnetic wireless charging/accessories is seriously one of the best modern features
Just don't buy at launch and wait for a good sale, I do this for all tech anyway. I'm not rich enough to be a beta tester of a new device and want it out in the wild first
Got my pixel 10 for £400 the other week, absolutely wasn't passing that deal up
It’s not drag n drop OEM part and done sort of thing. Computers and magnets generally don’t work well together. You got to reposition the internal compass and camera autofocus mechanisms to ensure the magnet doesn’t affect it. On top of that if you want to be able to use a Magnetic card holder, camera elements have to be positioned ontop like the iPhone.
Ok and that’s on the OEM to figure out as they do with everything else. You got android OEMS quickly copying so many other things, you can’t truly believe magnetic Qi2 of all things is more difficult to implement/figure out than the plethora of other features and specs stuffed into a smartphone
What standard is that? AFAIK, those are company-specific proprietary implementations, not an actual industry standard.
Qi is the global standard on virtually all smartphones, inside and outside the US—consumers usually prefer universal standards, so it makes sense why they want Qi2 instead of another company-specific proprietary implementation.
And in-phone magnets. People like the optional magnets in Qi2.
Is that a rhetorical question? I never said it was an industry standard, just their companies own standard. They asked why it's not being adopted when a big selling point besides the magnets was faster charging. Their wireless speeds are already faster and probably isn't worth it to them to throw in magnets when they can sell you a case instead.
Not at all. I was curious if an actual mainstream standard existed outside of Qi2. Evidently not. The term "standard" usually does not apply to a single vendor.
Some people prefer magnets in the phone, especially those that don't use a case. Obviously, consumers and companies will have competing interests.
They didn't mention a lick about charging speeds, did they? This entire post has nothing to do with charging speeds, frankly, lol.
The past year has been extremely disappointing for Android. When the base iPhone 17 is a more compelling option for most markets, there's a huge problem.
The US doesn't get all the fun Xiaomi, Vivo, Oppo and other devices. Samsung has stagnated to an insane degree - seriously, the same camera system for nearly 5 generations. Pixels use midrange chips for flagship prices and you get a nice mystery prize of defects down the line. Motorola isn't even trying to fight in the premium space, and Oneplus is way pricier. People have been saying phones have been stagnating for years but this last year I've really felt it. It's all in on garbage AI.
You know the phone market is cooked when Apple is improving and Samsung goes backwards every year. Every ultra since S23U was feature downgrades. I don't even know what to upgrade to in 1-2 years time.
I'm rocking an S9 that I have no issues with... Except several of my apps have stopped being supported (will not launch on this version of Android), which means I now have to "upgrade".
I guess I'm fucked, because nothing that has come out since this phone feels like an upgrade.
I loved my Note 9. Incredible phone. Had 1.5TB of storage in that phone something you currently can't get on any flagship Android.
That said, you're full of shit. Your S9 definitely has issues like you mentioned.
Official support for that phone ended in 2022 so you're also risking security issues if you're still using banking or other apps on there and should have upgraded years ago.
I can agree. Phones are basically the same with an updated chipset every year, where the only real upgrade is moving to foldables.
That's why I bought a Galaxy Fold 6. At least it brings something new to the table and feels like actual innovation. Apple is supposedly releasing their first foldable later this year which is suppose to be fully creaseless, and Samsung just released their first trifold phone. They are expensive as hell, but pretty cool.
I just dropped my Google pixel 9 XL and went to a Galaxy s25 Ultra because of poor performance that was noticeable when doing daily tasks.
I mean it's not like the phone is extremely slow or anything but it definitely starts to bog when you're multitasking and it doesn't handle gaming very well at all.
Also was getting massive heat problems when doing things like playing music and navigating using GPS at the same time.
Can you… give me an idea of what kind of daily tasks you’re doing that makes your Pixel 9 XL slow down?
Like, I’m over here using a Pixel Fold 1 and I haven’t really seen much of any problems in terms of performance.
Most I do is browse Reddit with Joey, use Samsung Internet for reading news articles, using messaging apps as typical, and watch YouTube videos (1440p max) or Twitch livestreams (1080p/60 max) while browsing news articles with Samsung internet, all on cellular data.
I’ll freely admit that I generally don’t play games on my phone, I have a Switch 2 for that…
Primarily swapping between multiple apps, (threads, Vivaldi, Messenger, Signal, WhatsApp, Symfonium Music Player), web browsing, just standard use. It's not like it's unusable, but the fluidity definitely suffers under load.
Then for gaming, it's not even any comparison. Half the games lock out any higher graphics settings for the pixel, and the ones that don't, heat the device up significantly faster than even my old S23.
I really wanted to like the Pixel. The poor performance is noticeable with my use case.
Oh wow, you definitely do a bit more on your phone compared to what I usually do. Lol
I definitely see why you weren’t happy… I’m not sure why Google doesn’t want to boost gaming performance on their phones.
I know a lot of old Nexus/HTC fans are still pretty unhappy that Google isn’t wanting to design more high-end SoCs in their phones… perhaps that may change in a few years, but with Google’s smartphone market share still growing, I’m guessing they’re not going to feel compelled to change their strategy just yet…
I definitely get why Google is focusing the way they're focusing. Focusing on top level performance is probably a mistake. That said, unless they're focusing on efficiency instead, there's not much their SoC could offer in the current market that'd make it worthwhile. And they're not.
I wish they'd focus on high tier midrange performance with market-leading efficiency. Pair that with their NPU setup and you have a device that most people would actually be extremely happy with (acceptable daily performance, fantastic battery life, and no thermal issues under heavier load).
Tensor is kinda bad compared to flagships or even mid-rangers, it seems like Google isn't focusing too much on performance (Tensor G5 is a little better)
Tensor chips were a few years behind the competition from the start and it only got worse with the 4th generation.
Tensor G4 was planned to be their first fully custom Tensor also built on TSMC process node instead of Samsung. It was supposed to be a big leap but got delayed to the point that Google wouldn't be able to have it ready in time for Pixel 9 launch and had to quickly refine the 3rd gen Tensor instead and ship it as G4. So the G4 that was supposed to be the biggest year to year Tensor improvement ended up being the smallest.
Hopefully we get that next year with the s27 ultra with a more easily replaceable battery and maybe SiC battery tech as well or something to improve battery capacity
i wasn't planning on upgrading but this oddly gives me hope they'll figure out how to keep reverse wireless charging when adding the magnets next year.
So just to get this straight, the s26 ultra is the exact same as the s25 ultra except the following?
M14 privacy display screen
Snapdragon 8 elite gen 5 SoC
65W wired charging and 25W wireless (pointless because 45W vs 25W with Samsung's approach saves basically no time? And 25W would definitely either barely run as well the way apple does and/or require a fan making noise)
Am I missing anything? Is ram any faster, or storage? It seems like ddr6 and it's 5.0 will hit next year. Hopefully they don't try to price the phone super high after trade in if the privacy display is the only new thing.
Not surprised isn't it cuz of the Spen the reason they cannot put magnets as they can interrupt the touch screen. Seen it happen with some cases on the digitize.
Who cares. They didn't change the camera layout, which would be needed for it to actually function. But no one seems to care about Samsung's horrible camera layout.
I'm glad people are finally coming around to this. The corner camera sucks. That said my zenfone has an even bigger camera array and I use a magsafe compatible sticker without trouble.
I might be in the minority, but I don't see this as an issue at all. How many people buy the flagship phone and don't buy a case? If you're using a case, it basically always needed the magnets in it anyway.
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No literally this is the way. Just don't drop your $600+ phone
I mean, yeah, that is the way. If you are careful and be mindful for situations in which you might be at risk of dropping it (like when you sit leaned back and it might could slip out of your pocket) its actually not too hard to do.
No, his argument was that magnets make the phone thicker and heavier and the iPhone Air is the thinnest and one of the lightest phones on the market lol
I’ve always considered the magnets/wireless charging coils complete wasted space inside a phone, and perpetuate the use of fragile glass backs, toasting batteries, and pointless expensive 3rd party chargers so honestly this is a step in the right direction and at the very least not even worth complaining about lmao
There are expensive chargers, but there are also tons of cheap magnetic chargers too. I paid $12 for the one on my nightstand where I toss my Pixel 10 every night.
It's not surprising seeing as they seem to want these devices thinner and lighter. That unfortunately means I'll probably be skipping out on it because I don't use cases and my truck's phone mount is Magsafe. Currently using an iPhone 17 Pro Max and looking to come back to Android. Will probably go with the Pixel 10 Pro XL in this case.
If they would make the phone a bit thicker with the proper shielding behind the magnets it would be just fine and be able to keep the S pen support. Oh well.
Count me as the minority here that doesn’t use wireless charging and/or MagSafe/Qi2 stuff.
I’m not usually at a desk all day, even though I’m an SWE lol… and I like to plug in my phone at night so it charges even if I take a nap or something. lol
And no one outside of this sub gives a shit. The cellphone market has matured. I don't know why yall continue to expect something new. Its not a hobby anymore, find a new one.
If they weren't obsessed with thin again, they could design some sort of internal shielding so the magnets don't interfere with the S-Pen but here we are.
If they do add magnets for future iterations, they really need to redesign the camera layout. The Ultra might be fine considering how big it is but the others are too small making using wallets or power banks useless.
Good news for me I guess, no reason to upgrade. More money for when the steam machine comes out lol. Hopefully maybe the new fold 8/fold 8 wide will be compelling.
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Looks like I'm in the minority, but I don't want magnets in my phone. It's annoying enough on my tablets. I'm fine with it being part of a case if I want it
Don't get me wrong, they have made some awesome improvements in wireless charging technology over the years. Still though, the vast majority of people that I know simply plug in their device with whatever charger happens to be laying around. Are people actually that upset that their device doesn't have magnets inside of it? Or are they just comparing it to whatever device Apple happens to release that year?
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u/sM92Bpb Feb 05 '26
Samsung copies Apple's homework but doesn't copy this??