The world’s leading smartphone manufacturer, Samsung, has been delivering updates at a pretty rapid pace in recent months — major and frequent security releases. The Galaxy S10 and Note 10 devices received Android 10 earlier than their predecessors, and we expect that trend to continue with the S20, S20 Plus, and the all-powerful S20 Ultra.

While it's great to see Samsung upping the ante for recent flagships, the situation hasn't improved much for older devices. Yes, the Galaxy S9 and Note 9 both received Android 10 earlier than expected, but the S8 and Note 8 were still left out of the Android 10 program, with Samsung clarifying that the devices had exhausted their two-update quota.

Considering it’s only been five months since Android 10 came out, we shouldn’t even be thinking about Android 11 yet. But thanks to the release of the Android 11 developer preview, the tech world is already up to its ears in news and features of Android 11. Excited as we are, we couldn’t resist jumping on the bandwagon and doing a little speculation. In this section, we’ll take a look at Samsung’s upcoming Android 11-based One UI 3, and attempt to decipher what it plans for the Galaxy S9, S9+, and Note 9.

As mentioned, the Galaxy S8, S8 Plus, and Note 8 didn’t get the long-awaited upgrade to Android 10. Samsung has always been strict with its Android upgrades, reserving only two updates for each of its flagships. The S8 Duo and Note 8 came with Android Nougat out of the box and were duly upgraded to Android Oreo and Pie. With the devices getting their promised two upgrades, Samsung inevitably held the devices back from receiving the latest version of Android: Android 10.