Samsung's $4.99 Galaxy AI Premium: New Tools, Angry Users

What Galaxy AI Premium actually adds

The subscription is not a wall around everything. It is a paid tier on top of the free Galaxy AI features, with three new tools and higher limits.

According to SammyGuru, which found evidence of the service in Samsung's software, Galaxy AI Premium will include Gen Video — which generates AI videos from your photos — Bixby Action, which automates tasks across your apps, and Daily Briefing, for which no description was found.

The subscription also raises usage limits on existing Galaxy AI tools by four times. That matters because Samsung already caps some features on free accounts, and those caps are the quiet reason people might eventually pay.

The reported pricing is $4.99 per month or $47.99 annually. That is roughly £3.75 / AU$7.25 monthly, though local pricing will vary.

Samsung Galaxy AI Premium: price, features and availability

The free-forever promise is the problem

Samsung previously said 19 Galaxy AI features would remain free forever. The new subscription doesn't technically break that promise, but it tests how much users trust it.

The list of tools that stay free, according to the Galaxy AI Premium interface, includes Browsing Assist, Now Brief, Creative Studio, Smart Capture, Samsung Keyboard, Photo Assist and Personal Agent. Those are the headline features most people associate with Galaxy AI.

But "free" now comes with usage limits, and the paid tier exists to raise them. That is a softer version of charging — and a familiar one. Apple has already hinted that Siri AI will have usage limits, and Google's Gemini has tiered plans too.

The early reaction from Galaxy users has been negative, according to TechRadar's report. The complaint is less about the $4.99 and more about the direction: features that were sold as part of the phone now have a meter attached.

Why Samsung is testing this now

On-device AI is expensive to run, and Samsung has been giving it away for two years. A paid tier is the obvious next step — if users accept it.

Galaxy AI launched with the Galaxy S24 series as a free bonus, with Samsung saying it would remain free until the end of 2025. That deadline has passed, and the company has been quiet about what comes next.

A $4.99 subscription is small enough to look harmless and large enough to matter at Samsung's scale. If even a fraction of Galaxy owners subscribe, it becomes a recurring revenue line that hardware sales alone cannot match.

The reported exclusivity to the Galaxy S27 series, at least initially, is a classic Samsung move: use the new phone to seed the service, then expand it to older devices once the habit forms.

What it means for you

If you own a Galaxy phone, nothing changes yet. The free Galaxy AI features you use today — Photo Assist, Now Brief, Samsung Keyboard and the rest — remain free, but with usage caps. The paid tier only adds the three new tools and raises those caps.

Availability outside the US has not been announced. The $4.99 figure is from code strings, not an official price, so UK and EU pricing will likely differ once Samsung confirms the service. The Galaxy S27 series is expected to launch in early 2027, and that is the earliest Galaxy AI Premium could appear.

Galaxy AI Premium is a test case for the whole industry: can phone makers turn on-device AI into a subscription after giving it away for free? Samsung's answer will be watched closely by Apple and Google. For now, the smart move for Galaxy owners is to use the free tools and wait for official pricing.