Daven Tamayo

Samsung launches new Galaxy S26 flagship series

Article (news)

Arthur Fuentes

ABS-CBN News

<div><img src="https://od2-image-api.abs-cbn.com/prod/editorImage/1772010694229galaxy s26 4 colors.png" style="width:960px" class="fr-fic fr-dib" width="960"/>Samsung Galaxy S26 Ultra. Arthur Fuentes, ABS-CBN News</div>MANILA — Samsung has finally launched its much-anticipated Galaxy S26 flagships for 2026, along with new Galaxy Buds promising even better specs and features.The top-of-the-line S26 Ultra gets a redesign, with a “plateau” now surrounding the three main cameras at the back. It’s also been slimmed down and now comes with four new colorways of Cobalt Violet, White, Black and Sky Blue. It also gets the Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5–the variant that was specially ‘tuned’ for Galaxy. This should be interesting as the Samsung tuning of the Qualcomm chip on the Z Fold 7 apparently has made the chip more efficient, allowing it to have longer battery life without sacrificing performance.Samsung claims that the S26 Ultra&#x27;s CPU performance increased up to 19 percent over the previous generation; NPU performance is up 39 percent; and GPU performance up by 24 percent.The Ultra retains its quad camera combo at the back, with the 200MP main camera assisted by a 50 MP ultrawide,  a 50MP 5x telephoto, and another 10MP 3x telephoto — much like the current configuration of the S25. Samsung however, says that the capabilities of the cameras have been further beefed up to bring photos with finer details even on very high zoom settings. <div> </div><div><img src="https://od2-image-api.abs-cbn.com/prod/editorImage/1772012788769s26 series.jpg" style="width:960px" class="fr-fic fr-dib" width="960"/>Samsung Galaxy S26 Ultra. Arthur Fuentes, ABS-CBN News</div>AI is also more tightly integrated into the phone, allowing users to quickly edit their photos by changing backgrounds, erasing unwanted elements, and even ‘regenerating’ parts of a subject. Samsung Philippines demonstrated this by taking a photo a half-eaten cake and prompting the S26 to generate a picture of what it woiuld look like as a whole cake. The speed and accuracy of the rendering was pretty impressive during the demo. Samsung Philippines also demoed the improved video stabilization on the S26, which allows the phone to almost completely cancel out sudden jerky movements of the camera and produce footage that was almost like it used a gimbal. There&#x27;s also Enhanced Nightography Video for shooting footage in dark conditions. Privacy has also been beefed up on the S26 series, with a new feature that dims the display when viewed from the sides. This protects users from shoulder surfers who want to take a peek at what is being displayed on the screen. Another interesting feature is AI-powered Call Screening, which identifies unknown callers and summarizes intent, making it easier to safely manage calls. &quot;Privacy Alerts use machine learning to proactively notify users in real time when apps with device admin privileges unnecessarily attempt to access sensitive data, such as precise location, call logs or contacts. These alerts help users quickly understand when apps are seeking deeper access, so they can manage permissions with greater clarity and control,&quot; Samsung said.Along with the Galaxy S26 Ultra, Samsung also unveiled the Galaxy S26+ and the base model Galaxy S26. The latter two models share the exact same specs, except for the slightly larger 6.7-inch screen of the S26+ versus the more compact 6.3-inch size of the base S26. The S26 Ultra, meanwhile, has a 6.9-inch screen. All the phones in the series will have a base RAM configuration of 12GB.Unlike S26 Ultra, which uses the top-shelf Snapdragon chip, the S26+ and S26 will run Samsung’s own Exynos 2600 chip. This is an interesting choice as the Exynos has a finer 2nm process than the Snapdragon’s 3nm. In theory, the smaller circuits of the Exynos should be at least more efficient. Both the S26+ and S26 have triple camera setups made up of a 50MP main camera, a 12MP ultrawide, and a 10MP 3x telephoto. Samsung Philippines says the S26 Ultra will start at P86,990 for the 256GB variant, while the S26+ will start at 74,990 and the S26 starts at P58,990. People who preorder from Feb. 26 to March 17, however, will get double the storage for the same price, and also 30 percent off purchases of Galaxy Buds or Galaxy Watch purchased with the phone.