Samsung Galaxy S26 Ultra’s Valuable Camera Upgrade

Will Samsung bring back a beloved camera feature to give the Galaxy S26 Ultra’s camera an advantage over the competition?

Asif Iqbal Shaik reports that the South Korean company may be ready to offer a variable aperture for the main lens of Galaxy S26 Ultra.

Galaxy S26 Ultra’s New Lens

Samsung previously offered a variable aperture lens with the Galaxy S9 and S10 smartphones. In those cases, it would be more accurate to say dual-aperture rather than variable with two settings available. The first was f1.5, which allowed more light into the sensor but a narrower field of view, while the f2.4 offered a wider field of view but required more ambient light—such as daylight conditions—to gather enough information or an accurate picture.

The Galaxy S26 Ultra would not have many competitors in this space. Variable aperture lenses can be found on some Huawei and Xiaomi smartphones, but Samsung could make far more marketing noise if the S26 Ultra were to carry this key feature.

Galaxy S26 Ultra’s Innovative Choice

Photography remains one of the key areas of innovation in smartphones. The last two years have seen the widespread adoption of periscope lenses for telephoto lenses, while the main lenses have seen increased sensitivity and resolution. The reintroduction of variable aperture would offer a renewed focus on the hardware.

The last few years have leaned heavily into machine learning and generative AI to process and edit photos. While Google has generally been the first to debut the previous two generations of AI on Android, Samsung’s Galaxy AI has captured the lion’s share of the AI smartphone market. No doubt that will continue into the Galaxy S26 Ultra, but three years of leaning into imaging software may start to feel repetitive. A newly engineered aperture could fit the bill nicely.

Galaxy S26 Ultra And 2026’s Portfolio

It’s also worth noting that the variable aperture is only being discussed in conjunction with the Galaxy S26 Ultra, not the vanilla Galaxy S26 or the larger Galaxy S26+. With smartphones generally in the “good enough” category for most consumer needs, every smartphone manufacturer is looking to find both an edge in marketing and a way to create distance between devices and price points in their portfolio.

A unique lens in the main camera could be Samsung’s next step along those lines.

Now read more about Samsung’s fashionable alternative to the Galaxy S26 Ultra, the slimline Galaxy S25 Edge…