14 DAY TRIAL // As the world’s number one phone maker, Samsung is working on bringing Android 9 Pie to its devices, and by the looks of things, there’s a good chance the Galaxy S9 flagship is going to be the first model to get the update.
A recently-discovered benchmark serves as evidence that the South Korean firm has already started testing the Android 9 update for the Galaxy S9, though it’s worth mentioning that there are absolutely no specifics available as to when the public rollout could start.
The GFXBench listing was spotted by SamMobile and it indicates that Samsung is testing Android 9.0 on the Galaxy S9+ (SM-G965F). The OS version is listed as “Invalid Android Samsung ss Edition,” a common thing for Samsung’s custom Android version when showing up in benchmarks.
Launch possibly planned for early 2019
While it’s important to keep in mind that this is just an internal test that Samsung has silently started, the company is expected to kick off a public preview of the new Android version on its flagship devices sometime in the coming months. Samsung used a similar approach for the Galaxy S8 as well, and it’s likely to allow S9 users to try out early versions of its Pie update as well.
As for the public launch of Android 9 for its phones, very little is known at this point, though once again, Samsung might use a roadmap similar to the one for Android 8 Oreo.
The Galaxy S8 started receiving Android Oreo in early 2018, and this could be an indication that the S9 itself could also be updated to Android Pie at some point next year.
In the meantime, however, Samsung is projected to take the wraps off the more substantially-upgraded Galaxy S10 in early 2019 as well, with people familiar with the matter suggesting the unveiling could take place as soon as January. Most likely, the Galaxy S10 will ship with Android 9.0 Pie out of the box.
