Samsung has traditionally been poor when it comes to releasing timely software updates and security patches. Sadly, that has been the case this time as well, with the Samsung Galaxy S8 and the Galaxy Note 8 running on Android Nougat for a long time.
The company has been testing out the Oreo build for the devices via the Galaxy Beta Programme for a while and finally we hear news of the stable build rolling out to a few Galaxy Note 8 users.
The build number of the update is R16NW.N950FXXU2CRA1.DM and the software updates the Android version to 8.0.0 and the Samsung Experience version to 9.0. However, it is worthy to note that Samsung hasn’t officially confirmed the update yet but there are a plenty of users on Reddit suggesting that the update has hit their Galaxy Note 8 (N950F).
Android Oreo brings a slew of features to the table apart from system optimisations. A few of them include Notification Dots, Picture-in-Picture, smart text selection, new lively emojis and more.
A Reddit user has even posted an extensive changelog which includes:
- Update to the keyboard
- Picture in picture support (so far I have noticed it in YouTube and google maps)
- App specific long press menus from launcher (can no longer put apps to sleep from that menu or open app settings)
- Secure folder can be set to stay unlocked until the screen goes to sleep
- Autofill API support (with bio-metrics) for all apps, and browser
- Colored media notifications
- Notification categories
- Customization options for notification badges
- Keyboard uses gify for gif search support (doesn’t work in gboard with stock messaging still)
- More edge lighting options
- Ability to ONLY view Samsung cloud items
- Ability to backup Samsung secure folder in Samsung cloud
- Bluetooth, high-quality audio codecs
- Manage passwords of Samsung and third party apps with Samsung pass
The update is rolled out in parts and may even take more than a week to reach your device. You can manually check for the update by going into Settings » Software update » Download updates manually.
