Samsung’s Galaxy S21 Series Loses Its Monthly Update Rights

Robert Triggs / Android Authority

Samsung’s Galaxy smartphone lineup is widely known for its promise of updates. Not only does Samsung offer one of the longest update promises in the industry, but it also offers a consistent and regular update cadence, with updates arriving very diligently every month for most of its recent phones. Older flagship users have also been enjoying this update promise, but now, it’s time for some downgrade for Galaxy S21 users.

Samsung has downgraded the Galaxy S21 series from its monthly update cadence to a slower quarterly update cadence. Consequently, the Galaxy S21, the Galaxy S21 Plus, and the Galaxy S21 Ultra will receive updates once every three months instead of once every month. This downgrade is routine as Samsung slows down the update cadence as its devices age, but it’s still sad news for Galaxy S21 users.

The Galaxy S21 series was launched in 2021 with Android 11 out of the box. Samsung promised at least four years of Android updates, so the upcoming Android 15 update will be its last promised platform update. After that, the S21 series will continue to receive another year of security updates, so there’s still some good life left in the phones.

Newer Samsung flagships like the Galaxy S24 and S25 series come with a seven-year update promise, so you can hold onto them for even longer if you can. However, just how much Samsung has improved the Galaxy S-flagships over the years with incremental updates makes for a good debate.

Note that the Galaxy S21 FE (launched in 2022) is not part of this arrangement yet, so it will continue receiving monthly updates.

Are you still using the Galaxy S21 series? Has Samsung’s update schedule downgrade convinced you to upgrade? Let us know in the comments below!

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