One UI 5.0 started to roll out for the Galaxy S22 series in late October and expanded to several older flagship devices on November 7. Samsung did the same with One UI 5.1, on February 13, it arrived as an early Valentine’s gift for the Galaxy S22, S21, and S20 series alongside the Z Fold 4, Flip 4, Fold 3, and Flip 3.

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Similar to One UI 5.0, the new One UI 5.1 version is also based on the Android 13 operating system. Since the Galaxy Note 20 and S20 series devices are no longer eligible for Android upgrades, Samsung made them happy with the new One UI 5.1 software.

Samsung launched the Galaxy S23 series on February 1st. The lineup includes three models namely the Galaxy S23, S23 Plus, and S23 Ultra. Pre-loaded with Android 13, the Galaxy S23 smartphones will get major updates up to Android 17.

Eligible Devices [Confirmed]

• Galaxy S22 | S22+ | S22 Ultra
• Galaxy S21 | S21+ | S21 Ultra | S21 FE
• Galaxy S20 | S20+ | S20 Ultra | S20 FE
• Galaxy Note 20 | Note 20 Ultra
• Galaxy Z Fold 4 | Z Flip 4
• Galaxy Z Fold 3 | Z Flip 3
• Galaxy Z Fold 2
• Galaxy Z Flip 5G | Z Flip

 

Samsung One UI 5.1 Features

Camera

• Changing the hue for a selfie just got easier
  Easily change the hue of your selfies with the Effects button on the side of the screen.
• Quick access to Expert RAW
  The Expert RAW app allows you to capture high-quality images without any processing or compression, perfect for those who want to edit their photos later. Accessing Expert RAW is now easier from the Advanced menu.

Gallery

• Common family album
  With Shared Family Album, sharing photos with your family is easier than ever. Gallery recommends photos to add to your shared family album by recognizing your family members’ faces. You also get 5GB of storage per family member (up to 6 people).
• Improved handling
  Processing automatically removes shadows and reflections to make your photos look great. You can also recreate GIFs for better resolution and clarity.
• Convenient information display
  If you swipe up when viewing a picture or video in your gallery, you can see at a glance when and where the picture was taken, on which device, where it’s stored, and more.
• Search has become more powerful
  You can now search for more than one person or item at a time. You can even search for people without tagging their names, just by clicking on their faces.
  Choose a location to save screenshots
  Now you can save screenshots and screen recordings in a folder of your choice by setting it up in the advanced features.

AR-Zone und AR-Emoji:

• Use 3 Emojis in AR Emoji Camera
  Take fun photos and videos with friends (up to 3 people) in mask mode. You can replace your friends’ faces with other characters by clicking the emoji.
• Layout and editing improvements in AR Doodles
  The brushes are now available on the main AR Doodle screen for quicker access. You can also resize and move drawings after you create them, and the new eraser tool lets you erase just a portion of your drawings without completely erasing them.

Widgets:

• New battery widget
  With the new battery widget you can check the battery level of your Galaxy devices. Right from the home screen, you can see how much battery your smartphone, Galaxy Buds, Galaxy Watch and other supported devices have left.
• Intuitive weather widget
  The new illustration style and a summary of the current weather conditions make it easy to know the weather information, whether it’s sunny, cloudy, raining or snowing.

Modes and Scenarios:

• Different wallpapers depending on the mode
  Set different wallpapers on the lock screen and the home screen depending on your current activities. Choose a background for work, one for sport and more by setting different modes.
• More conditions and actions for scenarios
  Run scripts automatically when you turn on airplane mode or mobile hotspot. Scripts can now open some apps, adjust left/right audio balance, and more. New actions now let you control Quick Share and touch sensitivity, as well as change the ringtone and font style.

Connectivity:

• Collaboration in Samsung Notes
  Create a shared note that multiple people can edit at the same time. Write a report with colleagues, take notes for a study group, or draw a picture with a friend. The possibilities are endless.
• Inviting to shared apps made easy
  Now you can easily invite people to shared albums, notes, and calendars using a link that can be shared across apps like messenger, email, and social networks.
• Advanced multiple controls between Galaxy Book and smartphone
  Now you can use your Galaxy Book’s mouse, keyboard, or trackpad not only with your Galaxy tablet, but also with your Galaxy smartphone. You can easily copy and paste text and drag and drop images from one device to another as if it were the same device.
• Media output for WiFi speakers
  If you want to continue listening to music on Wi-Fi speakers via Spotify Connect and the built-in Chromecast, simply open the media output from the quick access toolbar, not the music apps.
• Continue surfing on the PC
  If you surf the Internet on your smartphone with Samsung Internet and then continue browsing on your PC, you can find the websites you opened on your smartphone and continue browsing them with the PC browser.

Samsung DeX:

• Improved multitasking in DeX
  In split screen mode, you can now drag the splitter in the middle of the screen to resize both windows. You can also snap a window to one of its corners so that it takes up a quarter of the screen.

Settings:

• Settings suggestions
  Suggestions are now displayed at the top of the settings screen, letting you know about useful features to try or settings that need your attention so you can enable or try them right away.

Samsung-Internet:

• Improved search
  You can now search by folder name in bookmarks or by group name in tabs. Improved search logic allows you to find what you’re looking for, even if something is misspelled.

Setup-Assistant

• Faster and easier initial setup of your new Galaxy
  If you’re switching to a new Galaxy from a Galaxy or other Android device, simply scan the QR code on your old device to automatically migrate your Wi-Fi networks, Samsung account, and Google account to the new one Device to transfer without typing anything.

Weather:

• Detailed weather information at a glance
  Useful weather information is now displayed on the Weather app’s main screen. You can check severe weather alerts, daily weather reports, hourly precipitation and color temperature charts.

Calls:

• Bixby text calls
  Use Bixby text calls to automatically answer calls and find out the purpose of the call. You see what the caller is saying in a text chat, and you can tap or type replies that are read aloud to the caller. Bixby text calls are only available in English and Korean.

It is worth noting that the official announcement of the changelog has not been made by the company but well-known tipster Winfuture has shared it.

 

Latest News [Updated Feb. 23]

[February 21] Samsung expands One UI 5.1 to Galaxy Z Fold 2 5G and Galaxy A73 5G smartphones.

 

[February 18] Samsung released the One UI 5.1 for Galaxy Note 20 and Note 20 Ultra.

 

[February 13] Samsung is rolling out One UI 5.1 update for Galaxy S22, Galaxy S21 and Galaxy Z Fold 4 

 

[February 13] The Galaxy S22 series, Galaxy Z Fold 4 and Galaxy Z Flip 4 will start getting One UI 5.1 update on February 22 in Canada.

 

[February 01] Samsung officially introduced the Galaxy S23 smartphones, which bring One UI 5.1 pre-installed. The new software comes with various new features and major improvements over the One UI 5.0 for better user experiences.

 

[January 22] It’s been a long since Samsung started One UI 5.1 internal testing for Galaxy S22, Galaxy S21, and Galaxy S20 smartphones before the official release. Now it seems like the update is almost ready for these flagship devices.

 

[January 21] The Galaxy S21 FE 5G and Galaxy A52s 5G are the latest Samsung smartphone that has begun testing the One UI 5.1 software so that users won’t face unstable features after installing it.

 

[January 18] Samsung released a lot of One UI 5.1-compatible apps for Galaxy devices. The latest apps that got One UI 5.1 support are Good Guardians, App Booster, Thermal Guardian, Memory Guardian, Battery Tracker, Media File Guardian, and Battery Guardian.

 

[January 17] Samsung’s statement on the official Galaxy Watch 5 update changelog says – “Watch’s Camera Controller zoom feature is only supported on flagship models released after Samsung Galaxy S20 or Z Flip running at least One UI 5.1.”

As per this information, the compatible flagship Galaxy phones are:

• Galaxy S22 | S22+ | S22 Ultra
• Galaxy S21 | S21+ | S21 Ultra | S21 FE
• Galaxy S20 | S20+ | S20 Ultra | S20 FE
• Galaxy Note 20 | Note 20 Ultra
• Galaxy Z Fold 4 | Z Flip 4
• Galaxy Z Fold 3 | Z Flip 3
• Galaxy Z Fold 2 | Z Fold
• Galaxy Z Flip 5G | Z Flip

 

[January 16] Samsung Galaxy Watch 5 and Galaxy Watch 5 Pro are collecting the One UI 5.1 Camera Controller zoom feature along with January 2023 security patch.

 

[January 15] Samsung Game Launcher app reportedly received One UI 5.1-inspired user interface tweaks along with a handful of nifty features.

 

[January 13] Samsung allegedly begins One UI 5.1 firmware testing on the Galaxy A73 5G and Galaxy A53 5G smartphones.

 

[January 09] Samsung has started internally testing the One UI 5.1 update for the Galaxy S20 smartphone in India, the test build carries version number – G980FXXUFHWA1.

Aside from this, the company is testing the upcoming One UI version on the Galaxy S23 Ultra, Z Flip 4, Z Fold 4, S22 series and S20 FE.

 

[January 04] Samsung begins testing a new One UI 5.1 build on the Galaxy S22 Ultra smartphone in the Indian market. Read more here…

 

[January 02] Samsung reportedly starts One UI 5.1 update testing on the Galaxy Z Fold 4 foldable smartphone in South Korea. Read more here…

 

[December 26] Samsung accidentally released three new app updates namely Messages, Health and AR Zone extracted from the Galaxy S23 Ultra. Since the Galaxy S23 smartphones run new One UI 5.1 software, the apps already gain compatibility so can continue to run seamlessly.

 

[December 26] Leakster Ahmed Qwaider claims to have official confirmation that the Galaxy S23 Ultra runs Android 13-based One UI 5.1 software. However, the tipster didn’t mention S23 and S23 Plus, but both of these siblings will have the same software.

 

[December 19] Tipster revealed that the Galaxy S23 series announcement could be delayed to mid to late February as Samsung is confused about finalizing prices.

Features Wishlist [Updated Jan. 15]

1. Battery Widgets

During the showcase event of One UI 5.0, Samsung teased new battery widgets, which didn’t come with the Stable Android 13 update so far. The new widgets are quite similar to the ones we can see in iOS and Stock Android, containing battery status of all connected devices including watch, and buds.

• We guess those new widgets will be available for consumers with the One UI 5.1 update.

2. Multi-user profiles

Samsung enabled multi-user profiles features during the One UI 5 Beta testing for Galaxy S22 series. Due to unknown reasons, the company later announced that the multi-user feature won’t be accessible in next Beta, followed by the Stable build.

• With further optimizations, multi-user feature should come back with One UI 5.1.

3. User interface

One UI 5.0 update is all about new customization options and tools for Galaxy devices. Since the update is widely available for Galaxy consumers, it doesn’t come with noticeable changes in the user interface. The company impressively tweaked the stock app icons, but, other key elements remain the same as One UI 4.1.

Before the One UI 6, Samsung should bring some changes to its traditional quick settings, notification panel, and volume adjustment UI sections with the next One UI 5.1 build. The chances of major UI changes are quite low, still we hope, Samsung may bring some cosmetic changes.

One UI 5.0 Quick Settings

4. Camera features

The Galaxy S23 Ultra reportedly uses a 200MP primary camera sensor, and Samsung developed 12.5MP, 50MP and 200MP camera modes for photography. In some cases, the Samsung Camera app lags behind Google Camera, which should be fixed with the One UI 5.1.

Astrophotography on Galaxy is possible on Galaxy S22 series, thanks to the Expert RAW camera app. However, the availability of this app is limited, which disappoints consumers of Galaxy S21, Note 20 and S20 series smartphones. The company should bring some notable advancements to the Stock Camera app.

5. System improvements

The South Korean tech giant impressively deployed the Android 13 update for Galaxy devices, and the rollout is likely to finish before the year ends. Still, the One UI 5.0 software needs some optimization with Galaxy hardware and the Android operating system.

Material You Dynamic Theming still works better on Pixel devices, while the system animations and visual effects can be further improved with the One UI 5.1. Pixel Feature Drop updates brought a lot of new features such as Clear Calling, therefore, Samsung users want better treatment from the vendor.

Leaked Features

• AstroHyperlapse
• Zoom capability in Camera Controller