Samsung’s One UI 8 public beta testing may kick off in May

Samsung only recently pushed One UI 7 to all its compatible flagship devices. However, the rumor mill has already moved on to One UI 8, with early leaked firmware indicating Samsung’s next Android skin may not pack major changes. Rumors also suggest the company will make up for the delay in One UI 7’s release by pushing One UI 8 as soon as July. To achieve this, the company will apparently launch the One UI 8 beta program as soon as this month.

SamMobile reports that Samsung will seemingly launch the Android 16-based One UI 8 beta program for its select flagship devices in the third week of May. This is even a few weeks earlier than a rumor from last week, which claimed One UI 8 beta might arrive as early as June 2025. Even if the beta program starts later this month, it will likely only be available for the company 2025 flagship: the Galaxy S25 series.

Samsung typically starts beta testing a new version of its Android skin a few months before its public release. With One UI 6, the company started its public beta testing in August 2023 and eventually pushed the stable build in late October. Android 15-based One UI 7 was the only outlier, with the beta program only starting in early December 2024.

Android 16 will drop a few months earlier this year, in June, so it makes sense for Samsung to bring forward the One UI 8 beta program as well. This further explains why the One UI 8 leak cycle has started earlier than usual this year.

One UI 8 could be One UI 7.1 in disguise

Early One UI 8 hands-on indicates it will not pack any major changes. Instead, Samsung will focus on refining the UI of its system apps further to bring them in line with the design changes it introduced in One UI 7. This includes giving the Weather app an animated glow-up with slick new 3D animations and even more refined system animations.

There will supposedly be some multitasking-related improvements as well, like a bigger limit for RAM Plus and a revamped DeX experience.