Galaxy S26 Ultra's Privacy Display arrived a year later than it was meant to

Privacy Display is one of the coolest and most widely discussed features on the Galaxy S26 Ultra. Not only does it make the Galaxy S26 Ultra’s display feel like an upgrade, but it also redeems Samsung from any accusations of not innovating. While the feature is uniquely developed by Samsung for the Galaxy S26 Ultra, it has been under development for longer than you might think. In fact, it was almost added to the Galaxy S25 Ultra.

The chief operating officer at Samsung’s MX (Mobile Experience) arm, Won-Joon Choi, recently told Bloomberg that Samsung was prepared to deploy the Privacy Display on the Galaxy S25 Ultra last year. However, the plan was later halted due to last-minute snags.

Choi told Bloomberg that Samsung couldn’t proceed with the plan because it had to “solve a couple of the last challenges.” It therefore took another year resolve the issues. And from what we can tell based on limited time with the Galaxy S26 Ultra ahead of the launch, Samsung appears to have fared well.

The executive adds that the idea was proposed about three to four years ago by a Samsung engineer, and the company has since been working on making it a reality. It’s spectacular that despite the project’s long duration, Samsung was able to contain details about Privacy Display from leaking until close to the launch.

While the feature is currently limited to the Galaxy S26 Ultra, Samsung could bring it to other phones in the future and perhaps expand it to models beyond the Ultra. “If we believe it’s time to propagate it to other models, we’ll consider doing so,” Choi said in the interview.

Alongside Samsung, other Chinese phone companies are also reportedly exploring ways replicate the functionality on their flagship phones. It remains to be seen if they do so by contracting a display vendor who can crack Samsung’s technology or by sourcing those displays from Samsung itself.

In addition to the Privacy Display, Choi also spoke about Samsung’s reluctance to dabble with experimental form factors, such as the TriFold or Galaxy S25 Edge, and plans to retain the S Pen for future Galaxy devices.