- The Galaxy S26 Ultra comes with a new privacy screen
- Some users complain that it causes eye strain and nausea.
- Other Galaxy S226 Ultra owners see no problems
Samsung’s 2026 flagship phone earned plenty of praise in our Galaxy S26 Ultra review, but we’re seeing a significant volume of complaints about one of its key selling points: the privacy screen that hides what’s on the screen from those around you.
This is done through some clever display technology tricks, and you can turn it on or off in the phone’s settings. However, as reported by Android Police and others, several users think that the screen refresh is not very pleasing to the eye.
“The new screen makes me nauseous” claims one Redditor who is returning his Galaxy S26 Ultra phone, while others are complaining of eye strain or finding the screen blurry compared to the screen of their previous smartphone.
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Obviously, this doesn’t affect everyone: as you’ll see if you scroll down the Reddit threads, some users don’t have any issues with the Galaxy S26 Ultra’s display, and we didn’t see any issues when reviewing the device ourselves. In fact, the overall reaction to the phone has been very positive.
Compromised screen quality?
Since most people say that they can’t notice anything unusual on the Galaxy S26 Ultra screen after turning off privacy mode, I guess there’s no point in continuing this discussion. All I can say is: good luck everyone. Hopefully when they move to the S27 Ultra, S28 Ultra or…March 9, 2026
Some of
Samsung hasn’t shared too many details about how Privacy Display works, but it essentially limits the light emitted by individual pixels. It means that the screen (or certain parts of it) can only be seen from directly in front of it.
However, even with Privacy Display disabled (which is the default setting), there are complaints on Samsung’s forums and social media about a degradation in screen quality, perhaps a necessary compromise for the added privacy option.
It’s worth remembering that there were similar complaints about eye strain when Apple released its Liquid Glass update for iOS, although such complaints seemed to have disappeared in the months since the initial release of iOS 26.
In any case, Samsung’s new display technology seems to be affecting different users in different ways. If you are a new Galaxy S26 Ultra owner, have you experienced eye strain? Let us know in the comments.
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