2025 is coming to an end and now we're looking at 2026 phones, and Samsung The Galaxy S26 series could be one of the first of these, according to a recent leak. could be presented as early as January.
Thanks to other leaks and rumors, we also have some idea of what to expect from them, but that's not what this article is about. Rather, it's what we want them to do, and it's a mixture of things that are likely and very unlikely, but none of which are unrealistic for a flagship phone.
So, from better batteries to more megapixels and more, here's what we want from the Samsung Galaxy S26 series.
1. Silicon-carbon battery.
It seems like every year new Chinese phones will have larger batteries, and this has become even more relevant lately as many have switched to silicon-carbon batteries, which allow for higher capacity without increasing the battery itself.
But Samsung hasn't made this change and it's really starting to fall behind in battery capacity. In fact, even other rivals such as Google And Apple – who haven't yet made the switch – are starting to offer phones with larger batteries than Samsung's.
For some reason, Samsung doesn't seem to want to go above 5,000mAh in its phones, but with the Galaxy S26 series and the Galaxy S26 Ultra in particular, we'd like to see the battery reach new heights. Ideally, a silicon-carbon design would be used for this, as this would allow for greater gains with minimal impact on the thickness of the phone.
Will this happen? Probably not. There's no indication that Samsung has introduced silicon-carbon batteries here, or that it plans to pack any of these phones with a battery larger than 5,000mAh. But the Samsung Galaxy S26 could at least get a small boost. one report points to a 4,300mAh batterywhat will be above 4000 mAh Samsung Galaxy S25.
2. Telephoto lens with 10x zoom.
Samsung Ultra phones were once the kings of telephoto lenses, beating almost all competitors with 10x optical zoom. But then Samsung made a curious decision – switching these phones to 5x optical zoom instead.
Now they still have what Samsung describes as a 10x “optical quality” zoom, but this is achieved by cropping the sensor, meaning the effective sensor size is smaller and the megapixel count is lower, so it may be optical quality, but it's optical quality you'll get from a much worse camera.
Not only that, but many competing phones also offer 5x optical zoom and often their own “optical quality” options, so Samsung has really lost its edge here.
That's why we'd love to see a return to 10x optical zoom on the Samsung Galaxy S26 Ultra – there's already a separate camera with 3x zoom if you don't want to zoom in quite as much. This way, we get the best of both worlds and Samsung can reclaim the camera zoom crown.
However, this probably won't happen as most leaks suggest it will. Few, if any, changes to the Samsung Galaxy S26 Ultra's camerasand nothing with its 5x zoom.
3. Fast charging
Capacity isn't the only aspect of batteries where Samsung is lagging behind, as the company also continues to limit charging power to fairly low levels. For example, Samsung Galaxy S25 has a maximum power of 25 W, and even Samsung Galaxy S25 Ultra can only provide 45W charging, with both phones also supporting wireless charging at just 15W.
To give you an idea of how much better things can be, the recently released OnePlus 15 It supports 120W wired charging and 50W wireless charging, so Samsung really has something to strive for.
Luckily, it looks like the company may at least be taking a small step in the right direction, with some reports saying the Galaxy S26 Ultra could have 60W wired charging and 25W wireless charging. So while it's still not what we'd like, it would be a start.
4. Same chipset everywhere
One interesting feature of the Samsung Galaxy S lineup is that different regions often use different chipsets, with Samsung splitting them between its own Exynos series and the more common Qualcomm Snapdragon processors.
This usually means that some countries get slightly worse versions of the phones, as one chipset is almost inevitably better than the other, with Snapdragon models tending to have the edge.
Therefore, we would like to put an end to this practice so that customers in some regions do not receive worse conditions than others.
Unfortunately, this probably won't happen as reports say there will be a combination this time Snapdragon 8 Elite 5th generation and Exynos 2600 chipsets, although leaks suggest this Exynos model can at least match Snapdragon better than most years.
5. More megapixels
While some cameras in the Samsung Galaxy S25 lineup have many megapixels, others do not: for example, the 3x telephoto camera is only 10MP on all models, and the ultra-wide camera is just 12MP on the Samsung Galaxy S25 and Samsung Galaxy S25 Plus.
Considering how expensive these phones are, that's not all that great, and while megapixels aren't the only factor in photography, we can't say these sensors are special in other ways either.
So, for the Samsung Galaxy S26 series, we'd love to see them upgraded – ideally with more megapixels, as it's an easy feature to shout about, but if Samsung can provide larger sensors, then so much the better.
Will this happen? Well, there is some disagreement among tipsters about what Samsung has planned for the cameras, but we have heard talk about it. The 12MP ultra-wide-angle lens can be expanded to 50MP.And the 10MP telephoto lens may get a slight upgrade to 12MP.so there's a chance that at least some of the sensors will be better this time.
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