The Samsung Galaxy S26 Ultra is undoubtedly a brilliant flagship smartphone with a powerful AI-ready processor, excellent cameras, a great design and features like Super Steady Video and Privacy Screen. It’s that last bit, though, that could be responsible for a rather surprising S26 Ultra problem: the screen is ever so slightly dimmer than the S25 Ultra, even with Privacy Display disabled.
There have been online complaints about the Galaxy S26 Ultra’s display, including some claiming it causes eye strain. As someone who spent many days staring at the 6.9-inch Dynamic AMOLED display, I can tell you that I never experienced that. As far as I could tell, the screen looked bright, clear and colorful.
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However, after reading today’s story and the concerns from Reddit, I decided to look again.
First, I dug back into Future Labs benchmarks and focused specifically on brightness in Nits and color volume. The Galaxy S26 Ultra is rated by Samsung at 2600 peak nits, the same number as the S25 Ultra’s display (except for the Privacy screen, these panels are essentially identical), but it’s rare for any flagship to meet these criteria under all of our test conditions.
As you can see below, the HDR brightness is generally lower than the rated number for both phones. However, you may also notice that there is very little difference between the S26 Ultra and the S25 Ultra, and yes, the S25 Ultra is always a bit brighter in our tests. It also bests, by a very small margin, the S26 Ultra in color volume.
| Row 0 – Cell 0 |
Samsung Galaxy S26 Ultra |
Samsung Galaxy S25 Ultra |
|
Color gamut (sRGB) |
151 |
151.5 |
|
Volume (DCI-P3 |
106.9 |
107.3 |
| Row 0 – Cell 0 |
Samsung Galaxy S26 Ultra |
Samsung Galaxy S25 Ultra |
|
Adaptive brightness to |
1303 |
1328 |
|
Adaptive brightness off |
1272 |
1282 |
The differences are so small as to be negligible, and I would challenge anyone to notice these differences at a glance. If you happen to be holding an S26 Ultra, I’m sure you see the same bright and colorful display that I did. However, I have an advantage. I still have the excellent Galaxy S25 Ultra on hand.
I decided to perform a simple side-by-side visual test. First I made sure both phones had all their platform updates. Next, I made sure all screen settings were the same, including resolution and brightness. I disabled adaptive brightness and on the S26 Ultra I made sure Privacy Display was off.
Then I placed the two phones next to each other, screen up.
Looking dead on, with my eyes perpendicular to the screen, I thought I detected a slight difference, with the S25 Ultra possibly a touch brighter. The difference is so slight that I’m not sure it’s obvious in this picture.
But when I changed the perspective to more of an off-angle view, the difference was significant. Granted, I wouldn’t normally see my screen this way, but I think it provides some evidence that the difference may be driven by how Samsung now handles wide pixels. In the Privacy display they are turned off, but perhaps their configuration, even with the Privacy display turned off, is slightly changed compared to how the S25 Ultra’s pixels are arranged.
I have sent Samsung the picture and asked for a comment. I will update this post with their response.
What I think we can have here is a reasonable trade-off: an almost imperceptible screen adjustment of brightness (and perhaps color saturation) for a powerful and currently unmatched privacy tool for mobile phones.
I put no effort into using the Galaxy S26 Ultra and stand by my original review. It’s still the best Android out there. That said, Samsung should come forward and outline exactly what the Privacy screen technology does or doesn’t do to the screen in default mode and address the slight changes in screen brightness.
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