Samsung News shutting down in some regions on 21 December 2026

What Samsung is discontinuing

Samsung is preparing to shut down Samsung News, the news feed built into the home screen of Galaxy phones. According to Engadget, users in South Korea and India have received notices saying the service will end later this year.

The shutdown covers more than the app itself. Samsung News widgets and the media page on the home screen will also stop working on 21 December 2026 in the affected regions.

It is not yet clear whether the change will reach other countries. Engadget contacted Samsung to ask whether American Galaxy owners should expect the same move, but had not received a reply at the time of writing. Outlets such as SamMobile say it is highly likely the service will be retired in other markets too, though that remains unconfirmed.

A long line of rebrands

The news panel has had a turbulent history. It first appeared in 2017 as Bixby Home, was renamed Samsung Daily in 2019, and became Samsung Free a year later. None of these versions managed to win a large audience among Galaxy owners.

The current Samsung News branding arrived in 2023, and Engadget suggests it may prove to be Samsung's last attempt at a rival to Google Discover. Recent versions of One UI already enable Google Discover by default, which gives Samsung little reason to keep investing in its own aggregator.

The timing is notable. The shutdown comes only months after Samsung announced a major update that added short-form videos from publishers such as ABC News and USA Today to the platform.

Part of a wider pattern

If the shutdown spreads beyond South Korea and India, Samsung News will not be the first One UI feature replaced by a Google equivalent. In 2021, Samsung made Google Messages the default texting app on its phones instead of Samsung Messages.

That shift continued in April 2026, when Samsung officially discontinued Samsung Messages in the United States and directed users to Google Messages.

The wider market context matters as well. Engadget notes that news aggregators face difficult conditions, with AI features in services such as Google Discover changing how people read news on their phones.

What Galaxy owners can do

Users who rely on Samsung News can switch to Google Discover before the service closes. Press and hold an empty area of the home screen, swipe left, and select Google Discover instead of Samsung News. The news panel can also be turned off completely by tapping the settings icon on that screen and disabling the Media Page toggle.

There is one catch. Samsung says preferences from its News platform will not transfer to other aggregators, including Google Discover. Anyone following specific publications will need to follow them again in whichever app they choose.

Home screen widgets should be removed as well, since they will stop working after the shutdown. For readers who never used the panel, the change simply means one fewer preinstalled app on the phone.