Samsung Galaxy AI just got more personal and grounded

For the second year in a row, a story New flagship Galaxy phones from Samsung It is not related to hardware changes. For better or worse, the Galaxy S25 features few physical changes from its predecessor, and many of the more substantial improvements come thanks to the new AI features Samsung has integrated into One UI.

The highlight of these is what Samsung calls the Personal Data Engine. Over time, One UI 7 will collect and analyze data about how you use your S25 to personalize the software experience. This customization will be more evident in two new features called Now Summary and Now Bar. The first will generate morning, midday and evening summaries of information that may be relevant to you. For example, in the Morning Brief, you might see today’s weather, a calendar of your upcoming meetings, and news stories that might interest you.

The latter, on the other hand, is a new widget that you can access from the S25’s lock screen and just below the digital clock when the phone is unlocked. The Now Bar will automatically create a Rolodex of reminders that you can browse throughout the day. One widget might have directions from Google Maps, while another might have a 45-minute timer you set earlier in the day.

It’s all basic stuff, but Samsung is betting that these features — and the ones I’ll break down — will save S25 users time by reducing the amount of switching between apps they have to do. According to the company, any usage information recorded by the personal data drive remains safe and private within the S25’s Knox Vault security zone.

The Galaxy S25 also includes a series of interconnected features that fall broadly under a concept Samsung calls AI agents. These agents are powered by multi-modal machine learning models, which means they can analyze images, videos, audio, and text. Samsung rolled these out across One UI 7, though you’ll most likely encounter them through Samsung’s sidebar.

The most interesting among the new clients is called AI Select. It’s based on the Smart Select tool featured in previous Galaxy phones. When invoked, AI Select will scan the screen and suggest actions based on what it sees. As mentioned earlier, the model that supports this feature is multimedia, so it is not limited to just reading text. For example, let’s say you bring up AI Select while watching a YouTube video. In this context, the tool will offer you the possibility of creating a GIF for you. Again, the idea here is to simplify a procedure that may previously require multiple applications and steps.

Meanwhile, Samsung has been refining existing AI tools to make them even better. Notably, Sketch to Image, now known as Draw Assist, is more precise and detailed and includes the option to import existing images.

Separately, the Galaxy S25 series will ship with an improved version of Research circle. For starters, Circle to Search is a way to access Google Search from almost anywhere on your phone without switching between apps. You can activate the feature by long pressing your phone’s home button. Circle to Search arrived at the beginning of last year, and Galaxy S24 and Pixel 8 owners were among the first to gain access. The latest version of Circle to Search can recognize phone numbers, emails, and URLs, allowing you to call, email, or visit a website with one click. Additionally, Search Circle now also includes integration with Google Overviews of artificial intelligence.

These improvements are not limited to Samsung devices, and Google is in the process of rolling them out to all Android phones.

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