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Samsung Galaxy S21 One UI 4.1 Update Changelog and New Features
Launched in January 2021 at Galaxy unpacked virtual event, the Samsung Galaxy S21 series comes pre-installed with Android 11 based One UI 3.1. This series devices are eligible for four generations of Android OS upgrades. At the end of last year, Galaxy S21, Galaxy S21+, and Galaxy S21 Ultra received One UI 4.0 update based on Android 12.
Recently, Samsung Galaxy S21 series smartphone began grabbing the latest One UI 4.1 based on Android 12 along with March 2022 security patch. The latest update comes with several new features and improvements to enhance user experience and device performance.
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Based on Android 12, One UI 4.1 is the latest version of Samsung’s custom skin that brings a slew of new features and improvements that aimed to make your Galaxy experience more intuitive, more fun, more secure, and easier than ever.
Some highlighted features of One UI 4.1 includes Smart Widgets, enhanced Color Palette, AR Zone, Galaxy S22 inspired Camera feature, RAM plus, and more. You can check the new Android 12-based One UI 4.1 update features and changelog for your Samsung Galaxy S21 series smartphones below.
Check out Samsung One UI 4.1 changelog below
Camera
- It’s easier than ever to capture great photos and videos.
- Enhanced night portraits
- Take stunning portraits, even in low light. Night shots are now supported in Portrait mode.
- Get the full director’s view
- You can save your director’s view videos with separate front and rear videos so you can edit them later, even after you’re done recording. When you play them back in the Video player, you can switch between different views such as split-screen or picture-in-picture.
Gallery
- Do more with your memories. Gallery brings enhanced features for remastering and organizing your pictures and videos, and sharing is now easier than ever.
- Powerful remastering
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- Make your photos look better than ever. Sharpen blurry faces, fix distortion on TVs or computer screens, and increase brightness and resolution.
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- More suggestions
- Get help creating artistic portraits and exciting highlight reels. Gallery will suggest the best effects for your pictures.
- Add portrait effects
- You can now add background blur to any picture with a person in view.
- Portrait relighting
- Adjust the lighting for portraits, even after you’ve taken them, to make sure you always get the perfect shot.
- Convert unnecessary motion photos to still images
- Save storage space by converting motion photos to still images. Gallery will suggest pictures where motion isn’t necessary, such as documents.
- Share albums as links
- No need to invite people to shared albums individually anymore. Just create a link that can be shared with anyone, even if they don’t have a Samsung account or Galaxy device.
- All your invitations together
- Easily accept invitations to shared albums, even if you miss the notifications. Invitations that you haven’t responded to yet will appear at the top of your shared album list.
- Create time lapse videos
- Turn a picture into a vivid 24-hour time-lapse video. A button will appear for pictures of scenery including the sky, bodies of water, mountains, or cities. Your video will appear as if an entire day has passed.
AR Zone
- Express yourself like never before in augmented reality. Create your own emojis, stickers, doodles, and more.
- More decorations for your emoji stickers
- Show your own unique style by adding GIFs from Tenor as decorations for your custom AR emoji stickers.
- Background colors in mask mode
- Keep the focus on your AR emoji while wearing it as a mask. Choose from a variety of colors to use as your background.
Google Duo
- Stay in touch with high-quality video calls. One UI brings you exclusive features.
- Do more during video calls
- You can share another app’s screen during a video call in Google Duo. Watch YouTube together, share photos, explore maps, and more.
- Join video calls in presentation mode
- During a video call on your phone, you can join the same call on your tablet in presentation mode. Your tablet’s screen will be shared with other participants while audio and video continue on your phone.
Samsung Health
- Get deeper insights into your health and enhanced exercise tracking in the latest version of Samsung Health.
- Get insights about your body composition
- Set targets for your weight, body fat percentage, and skeletal muscle mass. You’ll get tips for reaching your goals.
- Build better sleep habits
- Track your sleep and get coaching based on your sleep patterns.
- Enhanced exercise tracking
- On your Galaxy Watch4, you can set interval training targets before you start running or cycling. You’ll get a report on your phone when you’re finished. Your watch can also give information about sweat loss when you run and heart rate recovery for aerobic workouts.
Smart Switch
- Transfer contacts, photos, messages, and settings from an old phone or tablet to your new Galaxy. One UI 4.1 lets you transfer more than ever.
- More transfer options
- You’ll get 3 options when transferring content to your new Galaxy. You can choose to transfer everything, transfer just your accounts, contacts, calls, and messages, or go Custom to choose exactly what you want to transfer.
- SmartThings Find
- Find your phone, tablet, watch, earbuds, and more with SmartThings Find.
- Get notified when you leave something behind
- Make lost belongings a thing of the past. You can choose to get alerts whenever your Galaxy SmartTag is too far away to connect to your phone.
- Find a lost device together
- You can share the location of your devices with others. If a device gets lost, you can get help from another person to scan for it nearby.
Sharing
- One UI 4.1 gives you even more ways to share with others.
- Share your Wi-Fi network
- Use Quick Share to share your current Wi-Fi network with someone else. The person you share with will be able to connect automatically without entering the password.
- Include editing history when you share pictures and videos
- When you share pictures and videos with Quick Share, you can include the complete editing history so the receiver can see what’s changed or revert back to the original.
- Share tips with others
- Find something useful in the Tips app? Tap the Share icon to send it to a friend.
More features and improvements
Color palette
- Customize your phone with unique colors based on your wallpaper. Your custom color palette now appears in more apps, including apps provided by Google.
Smart suggestions
- Your Galaxy just got a lot smarter. When you start adding an event to your calendar, your device will suggest a title and time based on text messages and other activity on your phone. You’ll get similar suggestions in Calendar, Reminder, Keyboard, Messages, and other apps.
Clean up shadows and reflections in Photo Editor
- Shadows and reflections will be removed automatically whenever you use the Object eraser.
Add emojis to your calendar
- In addition to stickers, you can now add emojis to a date on your calendar to express your feelings.
Take quick notes while you browse
- Keep track of your sources with new clipping options for Samsung Notes. You can include content from Samsung Internet or Gallery when you create a note using the quick panel or the Tasks edge panel.
Choose apps for text correction in Samsung Keyboard
- Choose which apps you want to get automatic text corrections in. Turn it on for writing apps to keep your spelling and grammar in check, and turn it off for texting apps where you want to be less formal.
More widely available keyboard options
- Keyboard layouts, input methods, and features for specific languages are now available in more regions, so you can type easily no matter where you are. You can always switch back to your previous layout in Settings.
Customize your sound balance
- In Accessibility settings, you can adjust the left/right sound balance for connected devices, such as speakers or headphones, separately from the sound balance for your phone speakers. This allows you to get the perfect balance out of your headphones without affecting how your ringtone and speakers sound.
New actions for Bixby Routines
- You can now create routines that change your watch face or turn on advanced settings like Protect battery.
Customize your virtual memory
- Choose the size of your phone’s virtual memory with RAM Plus in Device care. Go with more to boost performance or less to save storage space.
Game optimizing service
- CPU/GPU performance during early stages of gameplay will not be limited. (A performance management feature based on device temperature will be maintained.) The “Alternate game performance management mode” in Game Booster will be provided. 3rd party apps to bypass the Game Optimizing Service will be allowed.
Note: Some apps will need to be updated separately after the One UI 4.1 update.
Apple collaborated with OpenAI to power Apple Intelligence features. The ChatGPT maker continues to create obstacles for Google. In a recent move, OpenAI discussed a potential AI partnership with Samsung.
TheInformation (via Reuters) reported that OpenAI has recently discussed powering AI features on Samsung-made devices. It seems the ChatGPT-maker wishes an AI partnership with Samsung to expand its reach in multiple folds.
The company is considering developing a web browser to rival Google’s Chrome. OpenAI recently introduced its search engine called SearchGPT. It is available to limited users alongside internal testers and strategic partners.
Samsung x OpenAI
Samsung and Google’s close partnership doesn’t need any elaboration. The friendship isn’t limited to services, as both firms work across an ecosystem. However, it doesn’t stop Samsung from partnering with OpenAI in favor of better service.
As the AI phone market is growing rapidly, OpenAI may innovate further. Google doesn’t lag, but there’s still room for a potential alliance. Apple Intelligence-like features might be deployed on Galaxy phones after Samsung’s partnership.
OpenAI knows Samsung holds the command of the worldwide smartphone market. Expansion of its services will be quite broader than Apple if its partnership with Samsung pens down. For now, take this information as a grain of salt!
Apple x OpenAI
Apple leads the worldwide premium smartphone market. Google and Samsung introduced their AI phones in October 2023 and January 2024, respectively. It forced Apple to immediately enter the segment to normalize the innovation gap.
Google’s availing Gemini Nano AI model, but Apple joined hands with OpenAI. To create a difference, OpenAI powering some of the coolest AI features on recent iPhones. The move is to attract other vendors to adopt source AI from OpenAI.
Well, Apple still reportedly considering bringing Gemini AI on iPhones. The company believes that iPhone users should have different AI providers available. Hence, a multi-collaborative approach is also in the pipeline, at least from Apple’s end.
Samsung revealed its Project Infinity, which aims to make your Galaxy devices safer against cyber threats. Android is vulnerable due to its open-source nature, making regular security updates necessary for your Galaxy phone’s security.
Project Infinity of Samsung is a classified operation, working on safeguarding Galaxy devices and users around the clock for safer operations. Samsung Newsroom has recently published a blog post, revealing insights from specialist meetings.
Cyber Threat Intelligence
Samsung’s Cyber Threat Intelligence (CTI) taskforce is a reconnaissance unit within Project Infinity along with the Red (RED), Blue (BLUE), and Purple (PURPLE) Teams, which go beyond lab conditions to identify real-world dangers.
- RED and BLUE perform proactive attack and defense functions, seeking out vulnerabilities and taking measures against them.
- PURPLE is a special operations unit that acts as both a sword and shield for specific critical areas.
It’s worth noting that Samsung has deployed RED, BLUE, and PURPLE teams in various countries including Vietnam, Poland, Ukraine and Brazil. CTI is dedicated to identifying potential threats and stopping hackers from taking control of your device.
“Once we spot these kinds of threats, we collaborate with developers and operators to lock everything down for preventing attacks,” said Ranger, a CTI member.
Samsung Security Updates
Earlier this year, Samsung announced it to support flagship Galaxy devices for seven years. The new policy applies to all flagship Galaxy devices launched after the Galaxy S24 series. It’s the longest software support offered by any mobile brand.
These updates mean customers can safely use their phones for longer. As cyber threats become more common than you think, security updates are much more crucial to safeguard your Galaxy from any potential threat of vulnerability.
Owners of select Samsung Smart TVs, monitors, The Premiere 7 & 9 projectors, or The Freestyle 2nd Gen can stream Call of Duty: Black Ops 6, Flight Simulator 2024 and hundreds of other games with Gaming Hub Xbox Game Pass.
Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 and Flight Simulator 2024 are two of the most popular games of 2024. Thanks to Samsung Gaming Hub, you don’t need to download any of the Xbox Game Pass titles, no meaning no storage required – just jump in and play.
The company has also built an engaging gameplay experience designed by fans, for fans through The Six, challenging players’ knowledge and providing another way to interact with the world of Call of Duty: Black Ops 6.
Notably, Samsung’s Gaming Hub is available on a variety of Samsung screens. It includes the AI-powered 2024 TV lineup, monitors, projectors, The Premiere, and The Freestyle 2nd Gen projector, offering instant access to console-free gaming.
Anyone with a Samsung Smart TV will be able to use their remote to jump in and play. This way, Gaming Hub provides a co-branded experience, giving Call of Duty fans another way to engage with the franchise they love.
For starters: The Six offers daily trivia where players can answer a series of six questions in competition with other players around the world. Correct answers with the fastest response time will achieve higher scores.