Here's our first look at Samsung's One UI 8 based on Android 16

Samsung's rollout of One UI 7 based on Android 15 has been a mess, to put it mildly, but hopefully the company will fare better with the upcoming One UI 8 based on Android 16, a version which Google has been testing for quite a while now as it gets ready to officially release it before the end of June, much sooner than usual.

Samsung seems to have begun internal testing of One UI 8 as well, seeing as how today we're treated to leaked shots of the upcoming Android skin. Spoiler alert: the big design changes all came with One UI 7, its successor seems to basically keep everything intact while upgrading the base OS to Android 16.

One UI 8 leaked images

The early build we're seeing here was installed on a Galaxy Z Fold6, and as we already mentioned, design-wise, there's nothing very new to talk about, there are only minor visual tweaks. The only actual changes are in apps like Gallery and the file manager. Of course, more tweaks could be made in the next One UI 8 pre-release builds.

One UI 8 My Files and Gallery

Interestingly, the Now Brief will make it to older phones with One UI 8, or at least that seems to be the plan at this stage in the development process.

One UI 8 AI features

Given the overall minor changes, at least in this build, perhaps it won't take Samsung as long to release One UI 8 as it did One UI 7 - we can only hope.

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Reader comments

  • Hmm

For end-user like me it doesn't matter who worked on SD8 Elite, what strange argument even is that? All it matters for me is performance. Chinese phone makers who are using SD8 Elite also didn't develop that chip. So your argument goes out ...

"As for updates it was explained again and again why OneUI 7 update took so long.." Took? No need to use past tense as it's still going, more than half a year later they still found bugs in it. "My compact S25 with SD8 E...

  • Hmm

My compact S25 with SD8 Elite doesn't feel "behind" with hardware in any way. In fact it's one of the fastest phones on the planet. As for updates it was explained again and again why OneUI 7 update took so long, but some like you...