Galaxy S26 may bring these new camera features, even without major hardware upgrades

Samsung’s Galaxy S26 series appears to have kept Samsung busier than usual. While the lineup was slated to receive an overhaul with new product names, the changes were reportedly quashed recently, forcing Samsung to return to the older classification. And all this toiling may have contributed to a delayed launch and fewer upgrades to the Galaxy S26 series than we had hoped, especially in the camera department.

While the camera itself isn’t receiving any significant upgrades, some of the software features supporting it are expected to improve. One way we can see this improvement is by adding additional camera settings options to Samsung phones through a first-party extension.

Tipster chunvn8888 on X recently shared a list of features coming to Samsung’s Camera Assistant app with the Galaxy S26 series. For those who may not know, Camera Assistant is an app that can be installed on a recently released Galaxy flagship to expand controls, such as automatic lens switching or enhanced HDR controls, essentially bringing additional Camera settings that are hidden by default.

According to the tipster, the following new features will be added to Camera Assistant with the Galaxy S26’s launch:

• 24MP resolution for the default Camera and Portrait modes,
• Adaptive Pixel, which reduces noise by combining multiple lower-resolution pictures into one single high-resolution shot,
• Focus speed slider for picture and video mode, and
• The option to turn off HDR10+ and use regular HDR.

Among these options, the 24MP mode is expected to sit between the current 12MP and 50MP modes that the Galaxy S25 Ultra offers, combining the speed and efficiency of a 12MP shot with the details of a higher resolution. The Adaptive Pixel suggestively adds more detail and better light to images by combining multiple smaller shots. However, it’s not apparent from the description whether it implies stitching smaller pictures for a bigger canvas or superimposing images at different ISO and exposure levels. Since Samsung’s phones already do the latter to some extent, it might bring the former option.

The third option likely refers to a slider that allows users to adjust the speed at which the camera shifts focus from one subject to another, emulating manual focus on professional cameras. If that’s true, it could be a significant step towards a cinematic style of video recording, eliminating sudden focus jumps. Finally, the fourth option could limit regular video recording to standard HDR, allowing the video to be edited in post without the grainy effect.

While these additional options are a welcome addition, Samsung is likely to disappoint in terms of camera specifications. The Galaxy S26 Ultra, for instance, maintains the same 200MP camera sensor that the Ultra phones have had since the Galaxy S23 Ultra. The only upgrade we might see on the phone is a new 12MP 3x telephoto lens, upgraded from the previously used 10MP sensor. Meanwhile, Samsung has also claimed big camera upgrades for the Galaxy S26 series, in addition to teasing an in-house processor. With the Ultra being spared from this treatment, we might see these upgrades limited to the standard and the Plus variants of the Galaxy S26.