Damien Wilde / Android Authority
TL;DR
- Android 15 will finally soon be making its way to Galaxy devices.
- Users in the US and South Korea will likely get the beta first.
- Samsung has already indicated plans to start the beta before the end of the year.
Looking back at the history of One UI, it’s clear Samsung is making a push to get Android updates to its devices as fast as possible. This is in contrast to the dark days of TouchWiz, where users didn’t get Jellybean on their Galaxy S2 until just before the release of KitKat. This year has been an anomaly. Usually we’d be well into the beta by now, but we’re getting closer to the end of the year without any public release yet. That looks like it may soon be changing, and the beta could now be imminent.
One UI 7, based on Android 15, started to leak months ago. However, the timeframe for its arrival remained uncertain until Samsung’s Developer Conference. There the company announced the beta would come in late 2024 with a stable release in 2025, alongside the debut of the Galaxy S25 series.
One UI 7 beta could be here sooner than we thought
The creation of a forum page on Samsung’s community website typically signals the beta program’s imminent launch. As found by Tarun Vats over on Twitter, the US forum for the Galaxy S24’s One UI beta is now live. If you follow that link right now you won’t find anything useful, but if previous betas are anything to go by, we should see the beta going live in the next few weeks.
One UI 7 is Samsung’s make or break
Despite the anticipation for One UI there are concerns about Samsung’s direction. Samsung users, myself included, have been frustrated with Samsung over the last year. The S24 series, Z Fold 6, and Z Flip 6 are disappointingly minor upgrades over the 2023 lineup. One UI 7 hasn’t been free of controversy either, due to many of the leaks pointing to change for the sake of change.
The most troubling leak so far is the proposed redesign of the notification shade and quick settings panel. Samsung is separating them into two different pull-downs, and the bubbly redesign of the notification shade is jarring. Thankfully, the separation of the two panels appears to be a user option rather than a forced change.
Replicating functionality from the iPhone appears to be a theme this year. The app icons have taken on an iOS aesthetic, although Samsung has toned down the iOS aesthetic of the app icons since the initial leaks, the battery indicator looks just like the one on the iPhone, and One UI 7 will include Samsung’s version of live activities too.
It’s not all bad, though. Samsung phones have been smooth enough for a long time, but compare them to a Pixel and the small stutters become more noticeable. Samsung has overhauled the animations in One UI 7, making them smoother and more responsive to user input.
The One UI 7 beta is Samsung’s opportunity to listen to us, its customers, and show us that it is willing to listen to what we want from it. If it can’t deliver the exciting hardware it used to, then perhaps it can make up for it by taking on board our feedback about the software.
The beta for One UI 7 should start within the next several weeks, with a stable release in 2025, likely around the launch of the Galaxy S25 series. Based on previous years, the beta will start in South Korea and the US before spreading to other regions.
