Galaxy S10 One UI 3.0 Android 11 update pulled due to bugs

By JC Torres/Jan. 21, 2021 6:51 pm EST

Samsung has been making good on its commitment to roll out major Android upgrades faster, and while it's still not as fast as most would wish, it's still a lot better than Samsung's old ways. That said, there would inevitably be some bumps along the way and, unfortunately, it seems that Galaxy S10 owners had the bad luck of running into them. No sooner had Samsung released Android 11 for these phones did users run into numerous and seemingly unrelated problems, forcing the company to put a halt to the rollout.

In the old days, Samsung rolling out a major Android release for a one-year-old flagship might have been a hit or miss thing. Fortunately, the company has turned over a new leaf and, after the 2020 models got their turn, Samsung started pushing One UI 3.0, which comes with Android 11, to the 2019 Galaxy S21 series. Unfortunately, it wouldn't get a happy ending, at least not yet.

Numerous complaints have sprung up, especially on Reddit, about the problems they encountered upon upgrading to this latest version. These cover a wide range of issues, from overheating to larger battery drain to noticeable camera blur. There doesn't seem to be a common cause for these except for that firmware upgrade they all just installed.

It's still not certain where these are the exact reasons for it but Samsung has now pulled out the update both from its regular OTA servers as well as its SmartSwitch app. Unfortunately, the lack of official acknowledgment also leaves already affected users with very little recourse. Downgrading to an older version might not be possible, at least not without wiping data.

Users have rightly been extremely disappointed at the quality of this update but, to be fair, Samsung can't exactly be accused of rushing it out the door since the public beta began back in November. This also wouldn't be the first time it managed to botch a major upgrade and one can only hope that it would serve as hard-earned lessons to improve its processes and QA for the next releases.