Samsung demotes four Galaxy A series phones to biannual security updates

Some older models have been removed from the list altogether

Samsung recently pushed Android security patches to the Galaxy S21, Galaxy S20, S9, and some A series phones. The company uses three tiers for rolling out security updates — monthly, quarterly, and biannual — and regularly changes which models are on which cycle. The latest update to the schedule impacts a number of Galaxy A series phones.

The Galaxy A20s, A30s, A50s, and A70s have now moved to the biannual security update cycle. Previously, these models were all updated on a quarterly basis. Last month, the Galaxy A10s was demoted to the biannual cycle as well. Samsung has confirmed that devices launched in 2019 or later will be eligible for a minimum of four years of security updates and since all the aforementioned phones were launched in 2019, they will be eligible for Android security patches going into 2023.

This means that these phones will now receive two updates per year that will include patches for Android OS-related security issues released by Google as well as Samsung-specific vulnerabilities. The Samsung Galaxy A20s, A30s, A50s, and A70s launched with Android 9 Pie and, as promised, have received two years of Android version updates.

Samsung has also removed some older models from the list completely, meaning they won't get any further security updates. This applies to the Galaxy A2 Core, Galaxy J4 Core, Galaxy J7+, Galaxy Tab E 8 Refresh, and Galaxy View 2.

While Samsung has promised four years of security updates for most of its recent smartphones, this doesn't stop the company from demoting certain models to a slower release cycle in order to prioritize updates for newer phones. Samsung has been pretty good at keeping its promises, though, and is now one of the more reliable Android OEMs when it comes to keeping its phones updated and secure.

For more information on the update cycle and the full list of Samsung devices eligible for security updates, check out this page.

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