- According to reports, Samsung is close to ending an agreement with perplexity
- The agreement could be announced this year and see perplexity replace Gemini as the predetermined assistant of the Galaxy S26
- It is not clear what this would mean for Gemini on Samsung phones.
At this time, Google Gemini is the standard assistant of AI on Android phones, and Samsung in particular has strongly incorporated Gemini into its devices. But that association could not last much more.
According to a Paywalled report on Bloomberg (through the Android Police), Samsung is close to finishing an agreement with perplexity, which would see the assistant of the latter integrated in Samsung’s phones.
As reported, the agreement could be announced at the end of this year, but it seems that perplexity will not appear in the best Samsung phones until the beginning of 2026, with Samsung apparently pointing to send it as the default assistant of AI in the Samsung Galaxy S26 series.
Deep integration
According to the reports, the agreement would see Samsung preinstalling the perplexity application in these phones, as well as integrating their Samsung Internet characteristics. Apparently, there are even discussions to incorporate perplexity technology into Samsung’s Bixby assistant, although it seems that there is less certainty that it will end up being part of the agreement.
Beyond that, Samsung and perplexity have apparently discussed the construction of operating systems with AI with AI agents “that can take advantage of the functionality of perplexity and a variety of other assistants of AI.” However, that sounds further if it happens at all.
It is not clear what this agreement would mean for the Samsung association with Google. If the perplexity is sent as the default option in the Samsung Galaxy S26 series, and presumably other Samsung phones, then, at least, Gemini would be a bit marginalized.
But that does not necessarily mean that the characteristics of Gemini we have seen in the Samsung Galaxy S25 series will be absent; Instead, you can have the option of multiple AI services.
If Samsung will really announce this association this year, then we should have a clearer idea in a short time.
