Think back ten years, and Samsung had a different reputation to what it enjoys today as the manufacturer ofsome of our favorite phones. TouchWiz was the thick software skin it slathered atop Android, and it was awful. It looked terrible, performed worse, and software updates were far from guaranteed, with those you did receive always being outdated. KitKat was only a few weeks from release when my Galaxy S2 received Jellybean. That changed, with Samsung establishing itself as the Android update king untilGoogle recently dethronedthe South Korean giant.
Turn the clock back a month, and Samsung was the best option for long-term software support in the Android space. All Galaxy S, Z, and select A series devices released after the Galaxy S21 were promisedfour Android updates with a fifth year of security patchesto follow. Google only offered three Android updates with five years of patches. That means a cheap Galaxy A54 will outlast the Pixel 7 Pro, a Google device that’s all about the software.
As of the October Pixel event,Google has finally made the commitment we hopedit would since it started using its own custom processors in Pixel phones — seven years of Android updates and security patches for thePixel 8 series, keeping it relevant until 2030. This is an incredible feat, but it raises a question: How will Samsung respond?
I would love nothing more than for Samsung to match Google’s new update promise, but there’s a significant obstacle in its way: Qualcomm. Some devices, most infamously the OnePlus X, won’t get the updates they are promised because Qualcomm will stop providing updated drivers. Updating a device with old drivers is possible, but it’s a lot of work, can’t be guaranteed, and can cause performance issues.
Samsung does have its own chips it could use, but do we want a world where all Samsung phones use Exynos chips? Sure, it would give Qualcomm a wake-up call, but if the past is anything to go by, it would lead to significantly worse Samsung products. I’ve used the Exynos S10+, S20 Ultra, S21 Ultra, and S22 Ultra. The S10+ was fine, but the rest performed significantly worse than the Snapdragon-powered models. My S22 Ultra was particularly bad, doubling as a portable space heater when asked to do so much as send a tweet.
Would that unpredictability be worth it for longer updates? No. The promise of extended software support only matters if the phone is worth using that long, and any device with the performance issues of previous Exynos chips should be avoided at all costs. If Samsung can shake things up and actually deliver with a future Exynos SoC, then I’d be willing to consider using it, but only if the said chip was comparable to the equivalent Snapdragon.
The future of Android updates is uncertain. With Google’s promise to Pixel 8 customers, Samsung will need to respond somehow. What that response will be or how it will impact customers remains to be seen. If the company has to return to Exynos, I pray that the company invests in making them truly competitive.
