Now that new Galaxy S20 line has been out for a while, it seems Samsung is turning its attention to some of its older phones by adding some of the S20's new features to the Galaxy S10, S10 Lite, and Galaxy Note 10.
The most important upgrades coming to the Galaxy S10 are probably all the camera features Samsung is porting over from the S20, which include an improved night mode and even a Night Hyperlapse mode for better low-light photography.
Samsung has also added the S20's Custom Filter feature, which lets you create your own reusable filters that can give your photos a distinct style you won’t find simply by selecting Clarendon or Gingham in Instagram. On top of that, one of the S20's most social media-friendly features is also heading to the S10 and Note 10 with Single Take mode, which uses all of the phones cameras to take multiple pictures and videos with a single press of the shutter button, so later you’ll have a bunch of different angles and clips to choose from.
As for video, Samsung is also adding an improved Pro Video mode to the S10 and Note 10, giving users more control over various settings like shutter speed, exposure, ISO, and more, including the ability to switch between front and rear cameras in the middle of a recording.
Samsung is even updating the Galaxy S10 and Note 10 with a better Gallery app that will seek to declutter your camera roll by grouping similar shots together and making it easy to adjust the size and composition of your pics with the new Quick Crop option.
Aside from camera improvements, the other big additions to the S10 and Note 10 are Samsung’s Quick Share and Music Share features. Quick Share is essentially Samsung’s version of Apple’s AirDrop which lets you more easily share photos and files wirelessly with others. However, the big problem with Quick Share up until now is that it was only available on the S20 line, which meant it was sort of difficult to find someone else with a compatible device that you could actually share files with.
It’s a similar situation for Music Share, which was also only available on the Galaxy S20 at launch. Music Share allows two phones to share a Bluetooth connection with things like a Bluetooth speaker or car stereo, so people could take turns playing DJ without needing repeatedly pair and unpair their devices.
Because Samsung didn’t create a more affordable version of the S20 like Samsung did with the S10e last year, these updates are even more important than normal because for people who don’t care about 5G or simply don’t want to spend $1,000 on a phone (or more for the S20+ and S20 Ultra), the Galaxy S10 and Note 10 are Samsung’s next best phones. And with the S10 line having gotten a price drop down to $440, $590, and $690 for the S10e, S10, and S10+ following the S20's launch, they might be even better deals now than they were before.