Samsung is testing a paid plan for Galaxy AI, the set of AI features built into its phones. The test sits in an early access programme that you join with your Samsung account. Screenshots of the app taken on 8th November show two plans: a free one called Standard and a paid one called Max.
Galaxy AI has been free since Samsung launched it with the Galaxy S24 series in January 2024. It covers things like Photo Assist, which lets you move or delete objects in a photo and have AI fill in the gap, and Interpreter, which translates a conversation as it happens. When the Galaxy S26 launched in February, we went through the third generation of these features. So if you own a recent Samsung phone, the question is whether the features you use today will start costing money.
What stays free, with a limit
The free plan keeps seven features, which the app calls Standard AI features:
- Browsing Assist, which summarises and translates web pages in the Samsung Internet browser
- Now Brief, a screen of personalised updates you can set up with your own prompts
- Creative Studio, for making stickers, wallpapers and cards from text and drawings
- Smart Capture
- Samsung Keyboard
- Photo Assist
- Personal Agent
All seven come with usage limits, though. The test measures usage in credits, and once yours run out you either buy a credit pack or subscribe to Max. The screens show a pack of 3,000 credits. They don’t show how many credits the free plan gets each month, or how many credits a single action uses, like one Photo Assist edit.
The list also leaves out other Galaxy AI features, among them Call Assist, Writing Assist and Interpreter. The test doesn’t say whether those get limits too.
What you get with Max
Max comes with 40,000 credits a month and four times the usage of the free plan. It also adds three features the free plan doesn’t get:
- Gen Video, which the app describes as “Generate AI videos from your photos”
- Bixby Action, described as “Automate tasks across your apps”. Bixby is Samsung’s voice assistant, and Samsung hasn’t said which apps or tasks this covers.
- Daily Briefing, which has no description yet. It’s listed separately from Now Brief, which stays on the free plan.
The prices on the screens are placeholders. Strings inside the app give different ones: USD 4.99 a month, or about KES 650, and USD 47.99 a year, or about KES 6,200. Paying for a year would save USD 11.89, about KES 1,500, which is 20% off twelve monthly payments. Those prices can still change before Samsung launches anything.
At USD 4.99, Max would cost about as much as ChatGPT Go and less than Google AI Plus, which is KES 900 a month in Kenya. We went through Kenya’s paid AI plans last week, and almost one in five Kenyans online say they pay for an AI subscription.
The test’s welcome screen says “Subscriptions purchased during testing will be refunded later.”
What Samsung promised about free Galaxy AI
When Galaxy AI arrived, Samsung’s footnote said the features would be free “until the end of 2025”. That date passed, and the footnote now reads differently. Samsung’s Africa site, like its US one, says “Galaxy AI basic features provided by Samsung are free. Future releases may include enhanced features or new services that are offered on a paid basis.”
Max fits that wording. Gen Video, Bixby Action and Daily Briefing are new, and Max is a new service. The free plan is harder to square with it. Features like Photo Assist and Browsing Assist have been free since they arrived, and under this test they stay free, up to a limit. Samsung’s footnote says basic features are free, but it doesn’t say how much of them you can use.
Which phones would get it
The app doesn’t list devices, but it checks for a Galaxy AI version numbered 20271, which suggests the Galaxy S27 series, a phone Samsung hasn’t launched yet. The app also has no list of blocked countries, so access looks to be set by the region on your Samsung account.
Nothing in the test names Kenya. Galaxy AI already runs on the Galaxy phones Samsung sells here, and the free-features footnote on Samsung’s Africa site is the same as the one in the US.
If you use Galaxy AI today, nothing changes yet. This is a test you have to opt in to, and subscriptions bought in it get refunded. If Samsung launches the plan, the size of the free allowance is the number to look for. If the allowance is generous, most people won’t notice, and Max is an extra for heavy users. If it’s tight, you’d soon be paying to keep using features like Photo Assist that have been free for almost three years.
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