Samsung Galaxy AI Features: Complete Guide to Galaxy S26 AI (2026)

Updated June 2026 · 11-minute read

Samsung Galaxy AI is the name Samsung uses for the collection of AI features built into its Galaxy phones, tablets, and watches. It debuted on the Galaxy S24 series in early 2024 and has expanded significantly with each subsequent device generation. The Galaxy S26, released in early 2026, brings the most complete version of Galaxy AI yet, with deeper Gemini integration, expanded language support, and several new features not available on older models.

This article covers every significant Galaxy AI feature available on the Galaxy S26 series, explains how each one works, identifies which features are genuinely useful in daily use, and clarifies which ones require a Samsung account or a specific subscription to access.

Circle to Search: The Feature Everyone Actually Uses

Circle to Search is the Galaxy AI feature that gets used most consistently in daily life, and it is one of the best examples of AI genuinely removing friction from a common task.

The concept is simple. While looking at anything on your phone screen, press and hold the home button or navigation bar. A ripple effect appears and the whole screen becomes searchable. Draw a circle, scribble, or tap on anything you want to know more about and Google searches for it instantly, without leaving the app you are in.

You can circle a shoe in a video someone sent you and find where to buy it. You can circle a restaurant name in an Instagram post and get its address and hours. You can circle a foreign language word and get a translation. You can circle a plant in a photo and identify the species. The search covers text, objects, images, and in supported videos, individual frames.

Circle to Search runs on a combination of on-device processing and Google Search. The visual recognition happens locally using the Snapdragon 8 Gen 4's AI capabilities, while the search results come from Google's servers. This is available on Galaxy S24 and later, including all Galaxy S26 models.

Live Translate: Real-Time Voice Translation in Calls

Live Translate works during phone calls to translate speech in real time between two people speaking different languages. Both speakers hear the conversation in their own language with a short delay, and the translated text also appears on screen during the call.

In 2026, Live Translate supports 20 languages with real-time voice output, including English, Spanish, French, German, Korean, Japanese, Chinese (Mandarin), Portuguese, Italian, Arabic, and several others. Text-only translation supports additional languages beyond the voice-capable ones.

The practical application is most obvious for international business calls or for keeping in contact with family members who speak a different language. The translation is not perfect, particularly with accents, rapid speech, or technical vocabulary, but it is good enough to carry a meaningful conversation without a human interpreter.

Live Translate processes audio on-device using Gemini Nano, which means the contents of your conversations are not sent to Samsung's or Google's servers. This is an important privacy consideration given that phone call content is sensitive.

Chat Assist: AI Writing in Every App

Chat Assist is Samsung's equivalent of Apple Intelligence's Writing Tools. It appears in the Samsung keyboard when you are typing in any app, offering AI assistance for the text you are writing.

The available options include tone adjustment, translation, grammar correction, and a chat booster that helps you respond to messages more quickly by suggesting ways to continue or complete what you are writing. You can also ask it to rewrite a selected passage in a different style.

The tone adjustment options in Chat Assist are more granular than Apple's. Beyond formal and casual, Samsung offers options like professional, social, educational, and concise, which makes the tool more useful for people who write across several different contexts throughout the day.

Chat Assist uses Gemini for cloud-based processing on the Galaxy S26, which means it requires an internet connection and the text you are working on is sent to Google's servers. Users who prefer on-device processing should be aware of this distinction compared to Apple Intelligence's Writing Tools, which process locally.

Generative Edit in Gallery

Generative Edit gives the Galaxy S26's Gallery app AI-powered photo editing tools that work without requiring Photoshop or a separate editing application.

The main tools:

Object Eraser removes unwanted elements from photos. Select an object, tap erase, and the AI fills in the background. It works best on objects against relatively uniform backgrounds and produces rougher results on complex textures.

Generative Fill extends the edges of a photo when you need a wider frame than the original captured. If you want to share a portrait but the subject fills too much of the frame, you can expand the canvas and have the AI generate plausible background around the original image. The results are impressive for natural scenes and occasionally obvious at the fill edges for detailed environments.

Remaster applies AI enhancement to older or lower quality photos, sharpening details and improving colour balance. Useful for improving scans of old printed photos or screenshots from lower resolution sources.

Watermark removal can remove certain types of watermarks from images. This works reliably on simple text watermarks and less reliably on logo-based watermarks that cover large portions of the image.

Most Generative Edit features process in the cloud using Samsung's AI servers, which means the photos you edit are sent externally. Samsung states that uploaded images are not retained after processing but users with sensitive photos should be aware that cloud processing is involved.

Live Transcribe and Note Assist

Samsung's Note Assist in Samsung Notes uses AI to help with note-taking in several ways that are genuinely useful for students and professionals.

Auto Format takes messy, unstructured notes and organises them into headers, bullet points, and logical sections. If you type notes quickly during a meeting without worrying about formatting, Note Assist can restructure them into a readable document afterward.

Summarize condenses long notes into a shorter summary, useful for reviewing what was covered in a long meeting or lecture without reading the full transcript.

Cover Letter and Template generation can draft structured documents from rough notes. Provide bullet points about your experience and the job you are applying for, and Note Assist drafts a cover letter structure you can then edit.

Transcript Assist works with Samsung Voice Recorder to transcribe recorded audio and organise the transcript in Notes. The accuracy is reasonable in good recording conditions and drops with background noise or multiple overlapping speakers.

Interpreter: Real-Time Translation in Person

Interpreter is designed for face-to-face conversations between people speaking different languages. You place the phone between two people, select the two languages, and the app provides real-time translation displayed on both halves of the screen simultaneously, so each person can read the translation of what the other is saying.

The split-screen display makes Interpreter more practical for in-person conversations than holding the phone up and reading a single translation feed. It supports 13 languages with real-time voice-to-text translation.

The processing for Interpreter runs partly on-device via Gemini Nano for voice recognition and partly via cloud for translation. Performance is noticeably better with a strong data connection.

Browsing Assist and Web Content AI

Samsung Internet browser includes AI tools for working with web content directly on the phone.

Page Summarize generates a summary of the webpage you are reading, accessible through the browser toolbar. For long articles and reports, this is useful for quickly assessing whether the content is relevant before reading the full piece.

Ask a question about this page lets you query the content of the current webpage in natural language. You can ask specific questions about what the page covers, request comparisons between options listed on the page, or ask for clarification of technical content.

These features use cloud processing through Samsung's AI servers and require an internet connection beyond the standard connection needed to load the webpage.

Galaxy AI and the Galaxy Ring

On the Galaxy S26, Samsung has deepened the integration between Galaxy AI on the phone and data from the Galaxy Ring. The Energy Score displayed in Samsung Health combines phone activity data, sleep data from the ring, and heart rate patterns to give a daily readiness score similar to Oura's Readiness Score.

The AI coaching in Samsung Health on Galaxy S26 can now reference your Galaxy Ring sleep data to personalise daily activity recommendations. If the ring detected poor sleep quality, the AI adjusts the day's activity recommendations accordingly rather than applying a fixed formula.

This integration only works with a Samsung Galaxy Ring and requires both devices to be connected to the same Samsung account.

Which Galaxy AI Features Are Free vs Paid

The majority of Galaxy AI features are free with a Samsung account. Samsung has committed to not charging for the core Galaxy AI features on Galaxy S24 and later devices, though this commitment applies through at least 2025 and beyond, and advanced generative features may have usage limits on older devices over time.

Galaxy AI vs Apple Intelligence: Honest Comparison

Frequently Asked Questions

Which Samsung phones have Galaxy AI?

Galaxy AI is available on Galaxy S24 series and later, Galaxy Z Fold 6 and Flip 6 and later, Galaxy Tab S10 series and later, and selected Galaxy A series phones from 2025 onward. Older devices do not receive the full Galaxy AI feature set due to hardware limitations, though some features have been made available on Galaxy S23 series through software updates.

Does Galaxy AI work without a Samsung account?

Circle to Search and Browsing Assist work without a Samsung account. Most other Galaxy AI features, including Live Translate, Chat Assist, Note Assist, and Generative Edit, require signing into a Samsung account on the device.

Is Galaxy AI free to use?

Yes, the core Galaxy AI features are free. Samsung has committed to offering Galaxy AI at no additional charge on qualifying devices. Some advanced generative features may have usage limits and Samsung has not confirmed indefinite free access as the service scales, but as of mid-2026 there is no subscription required for any standard Galaxy AI feature.

Does Live Translate record and store my phone calls?

Live Translate processes voice recognition on-device using Gemini Nano and does not send call audio to external servers. The translated text output may be processed through cloud services for the translation step. Samsung states that conversation content is not retained after the translation session ends. The on-device voice recognition means the raw audio of your calls does not leave the device.

Can I use Galaxy AI on a Samsung tablet?

Yes. Galaxy AI features are available on Galaxy Tab S10 series and later tablets. The experience is largely identical to the phone version, with some features like Live Translate in calls being more relevant on phones and features like Note Assist being particularly useful on tablets used for note-taking.

Samsung Galaxy AI features are updated through software updates to One UI. Feature availability varies by device model and region. This article reflects Galaxy AI capabilities as of June 2026 on Galaxy S26 series devices.