Samsung has been on a roll with Android 12 updates since April.
The latest devices to join the list of Samsung devices being upgraded to Android 12 are local favourites Galaxy A32 and Galaxy A51. The two devices, which operate at the middle range of the Kenyan smartphone market, have made quite the inroads locally and, their users should be happy to be getting all the goodness that comes with One UI 4.1, the latest evolution of Samsung’s custom software, based off Android 12.
In the first 3 months of 2020, the Samsung Galaxy A51 was the top-selling smartphone in the world.
Unlike One UI 4.0, which was a major upgrade from One UI 3, One UI 4.1 is an incremental update that doesn’t bring much in the way of new features and designs. However, it does optimize a few things as well as do some housekeeping. Generally, behind-the-scenes stuff that users may not see but will acknowledge given how smooth their experience using the devices becomes after they upgrade.
The most visible change with One UI is users being able to dictate how much virtual memory (RAM) they can get. Previously, that was capped at just 4 gigabytes. Virtual memory on Samsung devices, dubbed RAM Plus, is simply an extension of the available memory by taking advantage of the device’s internal storage.
Obviously, users can expect to see upgraded stock Samsung apps like the gallery, browser, camera and others. On the gallery app, specifically, they can now edit and remove any sensitive location data from photos. There’s a complete changelog for the A32 here for reference.
Android 12, which debuted on Samsung Galaxy smartphones and tablets as One UI 4.0 last year, brings with it lots of new features and changes, key being an entirely new design language, Material You, as well as several new personalization options that further enhance the user experience. Others include doubling down on user privacy by letting apps only get an approximate location and not an exact one as well as displaying an indicator when a device’s camera(s) and/or microphone(s) are in use.
The Galaxy A32 5G, a variant of the Galaxy A32, has already been receiving the Android 12 update prior to its widespread rollout to the 4G variant of the device. Users of the Galaxy A51, which has been around for a while, are benefitting from Samsung’s latest software updates policy, which sees the device get several major updates throughout its lifetime.
