Samsung Galaxy S26 Ultra may skip the RAM boost you want

Newer flagship Android phones nowadays come with 16GB of RAM. Samsung is the only outlier, sticking to 12GB RAM as standard on even its Ultra flagship. Unfortunately, the company seemingly intends to stick to the same RAM and storage configuration on its 2026 flagship: the Galaxy S26 Ultra. That’s despite Galaxy phones packing more AI features than ever before.

The Galaxy S21 Ultra was Samsung’s last flagship phone to ship with 16GB of system memory as standard. Since then, the company has stuck to 12GB RAM as standard, offering a 16GB variant in select Asian markets.

With 16GB now considered the standard on premium Android phones and AI features needing plenty of RAM, you’d think Samsung would bring the Galaxy S26 Ultra in line with its competitors.

But as @UniverseIce reveals in a post on X, Samsung will stick to the same RAM and memory configurations for the S26 Ultra. That means the base variant will feature 256GB storage and 12GB RAM, with 512GB and 1TB being the other two storage tiers.

The RAM will remain the same across all variants. And like before, the S26 Ultra will get a special 1TB variant with 16GB RAM for China and other nearby markets.

At least as previously revealed, Samsung will use faster LPDDR5X RAM modules with 10.7Gbps speeds —up from 8.5Gbps modules used in the S25 Ultra. This should speed up memory bandwidth-limited tasks, like image processing and night shots.

For comparison, Google equips its entire Pixel 10 Pro lineup with 16GB RAM. Even the recently launched OnePlus 15 comes in configurations with 12GB or 16GB of RAM.

Non-Ultra phones might not see RAM or storage boosts, either

As for the regular Galaxy S26 and S26+, they will supposedly be available in 256GB and 512GB storage with 12GB RAM. Again, that’s the same as the S25 and the S24. The only bright side? It seems Samsung will not launch a 128GB variant of the base Galaxy S26, something which it has done for the last few years.

With Apple bumping the iPhone 17’s base storage to 256GB, Samsung purportedly had no choice but to drop the 128GB tier as well.

NAND and RAM prices have seen a huge spike in recent months due to heavy demand from AI servers and limited production capacity, leading to higher component costs for Android makers. It’s possible Samsung decided against equipping the Galaxy S26 Ultra with 16GB RAM for this reason.