AirDrop Support Rolling Out to Samsung Galaxy S26 Devices This Week

[MacRumors]

AirDrop support is coming to Samsung's Quick Share feature on Galaxy S26 devices this week, allowing owners to directly share files and media with iPhones and Macs.

In a Sunday newsroom announcement, Samsung said the rollout is starting today in Korea, with devices in the U.S. to follow later this week. The feature will expand to more regions and on more Galaxy devices at a later date, including Canada, Latin America, Europe, Southeast Asia, Hong Kong, Japan, and Taiwan.

Owners of Galaxy S26, S26 Plus, and S26 Ultra devices will need to enable the feature in their phone's Quick Share settings menu, using a new Share with Apple devices toggle.

Last November, Google announced Quick Share compatibility with AirDrop on Pixel phones. The feature was initially limited to the newest Pixel 10 devices, but has since been expanded to the Pixel 9, Pixel 9 Pro, Pixel 9 Pro XL, and Pixel 9 Pro Fold.

Article Link: AirDrop Support Rolling Out to Samsung Galaxy S26 Devices This Week

 

[contacos]

Surprised Apple didn't block this yet over privacy concerns

 

[Jamie0003]

Brilliant, now do the same for AirPlay plz.

 

[winxmac]

Surprised Apple didn't block this yet over privacy concerns

Apple will not be able to block this if the EU forced them to use an open standard for Apple devices which is why Google and Samsung are now able to integrate the AirDrop functionality that some/most android users are envious of.

There are still some Apple-exclusive features that cannot be replicated by its competition.

 

[cicalinarrot]

Wish Apple just helped developing open standards, or at least established a reasonable period of exclusive usage of their technology and then let others in or adopt an open standard if it has caught up with their own.
I mean, the EU had to force them to drop their silly connector.

 

[jdavid_rp]

Apple will not be able to block this if the EU forced them to use an open standard for Apple devices which is why Google and Samsung are now able to integrate the AirDrop functionality that some/most android users are envious of.

There are still some Apple-exclusive features that cannot be replicated by its competition.

EU didn't force something like that yet, google just reverse engineered it last year and I suppose they're sharing the achievement with Samsung.
Apple if wanted could just do some changes to again hinder google's efforts, but then surely wouldn't sit right with the EU and provoke a political movement to actually make it mandatory.

 

[wohmiguel]

So... no more beaming? I would love to beam stuff with my Samsung friends.

 

[wohmiguel]

Wish Apple just helped developing open standards, or at least established a reasonable period of exclusive usage of their technology and then let others in or adopt an open standard if it has caught up with their own.
I mean, the EU had to force them to drop their silly connector.

They have helped develop open standards. They helped with the development of USB-C, literally pioneered the acceptance of Wi-Fi, took part in creating the Matter smart home standard... does them wanting to have something for themselves with their own devices immediately downplay every other stride they've made?

These are features of convenience. They should be treated as such.

 

[elvisimprsntr]

Samsung had a feature they called “bumping”.

Bumping uglies with strangers is how viruses are spread.

 

[atsou]

Thank God! We can buy now mobile without liquid glass b*st and copy paste stuff on Mac

 

[HouseLannister]

EU didn't force something like that yet

The EU made Apple adopt new Wi-Fi standards, and now Android can support AirDrop

Google's Pixel 10 works with AirDrop, and other phones should follow later.

arstechnica.com

 

[svish]

Fantastic to hear this. Waiting for more devices and countries to be supported. AirDrop is a very convenient feature and this will make it very easy to share files and photos to Mac.

 

[abcmax]

This is great news! Bluetooth file transfers were once possible between most phone manufacturers. It looks like a standardized protocol for transferring files between phones will once again emerge.

 

[cicalinarrot]

They have helped develop open standards. They helped with the development of USB-C, literally pioneered the acceptance of Wi-Fi, took part in creating the Matter smart home standard... does them wanting to have something for themselves with their own devices immediately downplay every other stride they've made?

These are features of convenience. They should be treated as such.

I said "just". I know very well they very often helped open standards grow and thrive. HTML5 over Flash is the best thing they've done to the world. I just wish that was their go-to solution. And that, when they decided that they have to get their own thing instead, it wasn't so heavily closed for so long.

But also, transferring files is not a feature of convenience at all, it's a fundamental feature of a multi-purpose electronic device. A very snappy and painless wireless method of transfer is a nice addition but... they've spend years making all alternatives absurdly painful.
It used to be the easiest thing on PCs and it's been artificially made very complicated on Apple devices because of how closed their environment is. Airplay feels like magic when it works but also like hell when it doesn't. And, again, until they've been forced to use USB-C, you needed a proprietary adapter to even use something like a USB pendrive. Which also was possible thanks to upgrades to get a half-decent internal memory browser.
Photo backup on a computer is still really, really bad. And it is because they want it to work poorly so that they can sell you iCloud (I don't feel like a conspiracy theorist, I've done this stuff for a living and there's basically no way to reliably transfer your photos to your Mac or PC without fighting to get it right. It makes no sense without considering iCloud).

I know they act differently with different features and I wish they had a standard. I don't want to find myself using for years something they developed as unique and cool but that grew old with time and locked me out of industry standards, as it happened with stuff like Lightning and Siri.

 

[TheMacDaddy1]

Apple will not be able to block this if the EU forced them to use an open standard for Apple devices which is why Google and Samsung are now able to integrate the AirDrop functionality that some/most android users are envious of.

There are still some Apple-exclusive features that cannot be replicated by its competition.

It is funny you say Android users are envious of. I had been an iPhone user from the 3G to the 16 Pro. I might have used air drop twice in all those years. Facetime maybe 3-4 times on purpose and always at the behest of one of my kids.

I moved to the Pixel 10 pro XL last year and it has Quick Share which now supports Airdrop and I yet to use it with any platform.

I do remember all of the possible security issues with air play and stories of people getting random dik pics on planes etc.

It is great that the EU forces Apple into things they really should have done because it is the right thing to do.

 

[Leon Ze Professional]

Better interoperability is a win, win for general consumers in my humble opinion. Good to hear Samsung is getting this feature on the S26 family.

 

[The Game 161]

Surprised Apple didn't block this yet over privacy concerns

They can't and simply won't and shouldn't

 

[darthbane2k]

This is disgusting. Absolutely disgusting. This isn't a win for consumers, this sort of nonsense will actually discourage Apple from innovating. Whats the point if your technology is going to be stolen and copied anyway?

 

[HouseLannister]

This is disgusting. Absolutely disgusting. This isn't a win for consumers, this sort of nonsense will actually discourage Apple from innovating. Whats the point if your technology is going to be stolen and copied anyway?

Might as well say you only want Macs to only access the Apple Internet and not the rest of the web. And iPhones should only be able to text other iPhones. Interoperability is a good thing.

 

[rxp]

Looking forward to this - I can finally drop files from my s24u to my m4 air.

 

[darthbane2k]

Might as well say you only want Macs to only access the Apple Internet and not the rest of the web. And iPhones should only be able to text other iPhones. Interoperability is a good thing.

Sorry what exactly were Macs lacking before allowing Samsung / Androids users to use Airdrop?

 

[HouseLannister]

Sorry what exactly were Macs lacking before allowing Samsung / Androids users to use Airdrop?

Nothing. Why does it always have to be a whats-in-it-for-me mentality? Apple wants to use open standards like WiFi and bluetooth, so they need to be interoperable with other devices that do the same. That's good for the rest of the world, not just Apple. Apple built their tech on the works of others, same as Samsung, Google, Microsoft, etc.

 

[Abazigal]

Apple will not be able to block this if the EU forced them to use an open standard for Apple devices which is why Google and Samsung are now able to integrate the AirDrop functionality that some/most android users are envious of.

There are still some Apple-exclusive features that cannot be replicated by its competition.

I suppose Apple could have tried to make this feature available only to android devices in the EU, but they likely decided it' wasn't a battle worth fighting, unlike third party app stores. 😏

 

[Anaxarxes]

Wish Apple just helped developing open standards, or at least established a reasonable period of exclusive usage of their technology and then let others in or adopt an open standard if it has caught up with their own.
I mean, the EU had to force them to drop their silly connector.

They already do it/did it with some hardware and codecs like ALAC, HEVC, ProRes, OpenCL, HLS, USB Type-C, HTTP5, Mini DisplayPort, Thunderbolt (with Intel), IEEE 1394, IEEE 802.11b, Qi2.

 

[constantsnags!]

I used to flip between Note and iPhone every few years. The app quality on iPhone always pulled me back…but I LOVED the S-Pen. I used it all the time. Using all Google’s apps worked well for me too. I’d actually love to see better interoperability again.