When Samsung invited us out to San Francisco to check out the Galaxy S26 series, my first stop was a beeline for the Privacy Display demo. Available solely on Galaxy S26 Ultra, this is one of those features that is just impressive from the first time you use it. When activated, Privacy Display changes how the pixels in your display emit light, making it harder or near-impossible to view the display at an off-angle. At its default setting, it definitely works, but the contents of the display are visible at less-sharp angles. Samsung has a “maximum” setting that takes this up a notch, and that setting makes it even harder to see the contents and narrows the field-of-view even further.
First and foremost, Privacy Display doesn’t kick in all of the time. You can toggle it on and off as you wish, but you can also have that process automated. If you want your messaging app, or a social app, or really anything you want to be hidden, you can select it through the settings and Privacy Display will automatically kick in when you open that app. Samsung’s demo had this set up with Google Messages, and it works really well, kicking in immediately as the app opens up.
A bigger deal, though, is that Samsung has built Privacy Display with the ability to only apply to small portions of the Galaxy S26 Ultra’s display. Specifically, it can hide your notification pop-ups.
Ben Schoon
I was equally excited when this feature was announced a couple of months ago. I never cared for screen protectors, neither for the actual screen protection (I use a case with raised bevels that should protect the device better than a flimsy plastic sheet in case I drop it), nor to shield the display from prying eyes, but I would definitely use this native implementation at the hardware level. Having the option to selectively obscure certain apps, like online banking, dating, and messaging, and incoming notifications is convenient and very impressive — the sort of feature Apple fanboys would endlessly gush over, and ironically Samsung, as a leading manufacturer of displays, can deliver.