7 issues I miss about Samsung since switching to a Pixel

I’ve used a number of Nexus and Pixels up to now, however from 2019 till current, I’ve been a Samsung man, proudly owning the S10 Plus and each Extremely mannequin from the S20 to the S24 collection. A couple of months in the past, I began occupied with switching to a Pixel for the primary time because the Pixel 3 XL. After the Pixel 10 launched, I pulled the set off and acquired a 10 Professional. After six years within the realm of Samsung, switching from One UI to Google’s imaginative and prescient of Android has been a giant adjustment. A few of these changes have been more durable than others, and after a couple of weeks with my Pixel, these are the issues I miss most from One UI.

I didn’t anticipate Samsung’s Clock app to be one of many issues I missed most, however One UI 7 added options I haven’t seen in some other clock app. Alarm teams are like folders on your private home display, letting you place a number of alarms in a single place. Toggling all the alarms in a bunch with the press of a single button saves time and is a lot simpler than having to scroll by means of a listing of alarms to search out the suitable ones.

Alarm teams forestall muddle, and that’s one thing I miss, particularly with Google’s Materials 3 Expressive redesign of its clock app. Google is outwardly planning to deal with complaints, however for now, it seems like a multitude.

Good Lock is a set of modules that allow you to customise and modify completely different components of how your telephone seems to be and behaves. Theme Park allows you to customise app icons, both by creating your individual designs or importing an icon pack downloaded from the Play Retailer. These customized icons are system-wide, so that you’ll see them on the house display, within the overview display, and in all places else you’d anticipate. Subsequent, there’s Sound Assistant. Because the title suggests, this module helps you to modify what your telephone does with sound. My favourite a part of Sound Assistant is “management media with quantity keys.” When enabled, long-pressing the quantity keys with the display off adjustments the observe you’re listening to. I flip the contact controls for my earbuds off at evening so I can lie on my facet, and this made altering tracks extra handy as a result of I didn’t must open my eyes or wake my telephone.

However what I miss above all else is One Hand Operation +. Abysmal title apart, this app modified how I navigated my telephone for the six years I used to be utilizing One UI. The module customises what swipes from the facet of the display do. As an alternative of simply going again like each different Android telephone, this app provides triggers for swiping straight out, diagonally up, and diagonally down. In my setup, which you’ll see within the recording above, swiping diagonally up opens the overview display, swiping out goes again, and swiping diagonally down goes house. Having full navigation with out stretching my thumb to the underside of the display was extra comfy, particularly on bigger telephones.

Samsung Modes and Routines is an app that has numerous choices for automating your telephone, with dozens of triggers and actions which you can hyperlink up. Consider it as Samsung’s reply to Apple’s Siri Shortcuts. Modes and Routines can management all the pieces in your Samsung ecosystem, together with earbuds and watches. You may, for instance, have your Galaxy Buds activate noise cancellation and change equalizer presets every time a recreation and Bluetooth controller are related.

Nonetheless, the 2 routines I used most are for migraines and telephone appointments. The previous is activated manually by a widget on my house display and dims my show, activates the blue mild filter, and mutes all sound. Having the ability to modify all of these settings with a single faucet saves a number of squinting at my telephone when a migraine aura is making all the pieces blurry.

The latter routine makes certain I by no means miss any of the over-the-phone physician’s appointments I’ve frequently. With all the notifications I obtain every day, I maintain my telephone on silent on a regular basis. When I’ve an appointment, I set an alarm to go off about ten minutes earlier than that decision is scheduled. A selected alarm can set off routines, so when my “appointment” alarm goes off, the routine units my ringer and notification quantity to 100%.

I really like having widgets on my house display, and Samsung makes it simpler than ever to make use of them in a means that’s each helpful and pleasing to take a look at. Widget stacks allow you to “stack” widgets of the identical dimension on high of one another and scroll by means of them. This manner, you possibly can have as many widgets as you may ever want on one display with out your setup trying like a multitude. On my Galaxy S25, I’ve three stacks: Calendar and Tick Tick, battery and Now Temporary, and Clock and Climate.

The Now Bar is Samsung’s implementation of Dwell Updates, an Android 16 characteristic that reveals real-time data, comparable to navigation, sports activities scores, and extra, in a notification What frustrates me with Dwell Updates on the Pixel is that few apps help it — I can’t get Google Maps to show instructions this manner, although Samsung telephones on Android 15 have been in a position to do that with Maps and extra since One UI 7 was launched earlier this 12 months.

Samsung received Google’s personal apps working with its implementation months earlier than Google might do the identical for Pixels. To make issues worse, media controls received’t be supported on Pixels although they work with Samsung’s Now Bar. Media controls are what I take advantage of the Now Bar for greater than the rest, and it’s disappointing that I received’t be capable of try this on my Pixel.

The Edge Panel is a love-it-or-hate-it characteristic, and I adore it. A small deal with along with the display helps you to pull out numerous panels, like a favourite apps web page, fast instruments like a compass or tally counter, climate, and extra. The apps and instruments panels are those I take advantage of most, and it’s one of many issues that makes multitasking in One UI that significantly better.

From anyplace in your telephone, a easy swipe provides you entry to your whole apps and a lot extra, and it’s one thing I’ve missed greater than I anticipated. Some apps attempt to replicate this on non-Samsung telephones, and whereas they work fairly properly, it’s nowhere close to as easy an expertise as what Samsung has constructed into One UI.

I take advantage of multi-window on my Android gadgets on a regular basis. The Pixel matches Samsung’s gadgets for split-screen multitasking, however it doesn’t come near pop-up home windows. These freeform apps behave as they might in a desktop atmosphere, so you possibly can minimise, resize, and drag them round your display. I primarily use pop-up home windows to leap out and in of chat apps whereas doing different issues on my telephone, like watching YouTube. Having the ability to learn a message and reply with out leaving the app I’m in is extra handy than some other technique. Pop-up home windows tie again into Edge Panels, too, as you possibly can drag an app from the apps panel to the middle of the display to launch it in a window.

The Pixel does have choices. Chat Bubbles allow you to put conversations in a floating bubble, however this needs to be turned on and off per dialog, and when it’s switched on, it’ll routinely open a bubble every time you get a message as a substitute of displaying up as a traditional notification. It additionally solely helps you to work together with the chosen dialog, so you possibly can’t navigate to some other chats, and it solely works with messaging apps. Samsung’s pop-up home windows work with any app, and you need to use these purposes usually as a substitute of being restricted to a selected message thread.

Chat Bubbles really feel like a crude, half-baked resolution relatively than a dependable characteristic I’d need to use on a regular basis. In actual fact, Chat Bubbles are switched off by default and buried within the settings menu, so it seems like Google has given up on it.

I miss a number of the quirks and options from One UI, however that doesn’t imply I remorse making the change again to a Pixel as my main telephone. Each telephone comes with its personal set of professionals and cons, and proper now I’m prepared to forego issues like pop-up home windows and the Now Bar for the opposite stuff the Pixel has to supply. Even so, I’d love for Google so as to add a few of these issues to its Android pores and skin sooner or later.

Are there options in One UI that you just’d miss should you modified smartphone manufacturers? Would you miss them sufficient that you just wouldn’t think about shopping for something apart from a Galaxy? Tell us.