I knew Samsung’s version of Android 16 would be good, but these One UI 8 features make my Galaxy S25 Edge feel brand-new.
Remember when Samsung made an absolute mess of its One UI 7 rollout? We sure do, but we’re no longer here to talk about that. Instead, we’re ready to focus on the fact that Samsung is already onto the next big thing and that One UI 8 is already landing on Galaxy S25 devices (with more updates coming in the next few weeks). And, although it’s not quite as large an overhaul as One UI 7 was, there’s still a lot to like.
After getting a little taste of Samsung’s vision of Android 16 on my Galaxy S25 FE, I loaded it up on my Galaxy S25 Edge while I compare it to the iPhone Air. Here are the stand-out features I’ve been impressed by so far.Split Screen just got so much better
I’ve trusted Android phones for all my multitasking needs for as long as I can remember. But just because a phone can do something doesn’t always mean it can do it correctly or comfortably. For a long time, I had to live life 50/50, giving half of my screen to one app and half to the other.
Sometimes it was fine, like if I only needed to type on one side while referring back to the other for information, but other times, it was impossible. Ads would take over half a window while the keyboard covered my text box. Then, OnePlus introduced Open Canvas. It took the idea of splitting my screen outside the physical bezels and letting me store apps where I could just see the edge until I needed them.
Now, One UI 8 supports the same interface. It’s great — truly. You can open one app, then long-press on it as if you were going to quit out of it and drag it to the top or bottom half of your display.
Once you let go, your Galaxy device will prompt you to open a second app, and this is where the magic happens. With two apps open, you can press on the three dots between them and drag up or down to shift the balance as far as 90/10 in either direction. It’s made typing out an email and planning logistics for a December trip to California so much easier, simply because I no longer have to see as much of one app at any given time.Out with the old DeX, in with the new DeX
We’ve known it was coming for a while now, but the day has finally arrived: DeX is dead, long live DeX. Well, it’s not really dead, just different. With the arrival of One UI 8, Samsung has shifted from the proprietary version of its desktop mirroring app DeX to a more standard Android Desktop Mode version of the software.
