Samsung Galaxy S26 Ultra battery could be smaller than expected

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Talk of a 6,000 to 7,000mAh battery is wide of the mark, according to one leaker.

Galaxy S25 Ultra from the back
(Image credit: Tom's Guide)

Last month, reports surfaced that the Samsung Galaxy S26 Ultra — still a year away, given the Galaxy S25 only went on sale last week — will smash its predecessor in terms of stamina thanks to new battery technology. Korean media put the capacity at 6,000 to 7,000mAh — or a 20% to 40% increase on its predecessor.

If that sounded too good to be true, it may well prove to be so. On X, the leaker @PandaFlashPro — who has been claiming a few Samsung insights of late — has poured cold water on the idea of a big increase, and instead predicted a far more modest gain.

The use of quotation marks is interesting, suggesting a verbatim quote from somebody else, which adds an extra layer of separation to the claimed five sources.

Nonetheless, @PandaFlashPro seems pretty sure. When it was pointed out that the 5,500mAh cell might be an early prototype, the leaker suggested the actual final capacity might be even lower: “Even [if] it’s not complete 5500mAh it’s like 5396mAh.”

It’s worth noting that 5,500mAh still represents a 10% gain on the 5,000mAh battery in the Samsung Galaxy S25 Ultra, which should be celebrated. With the energy-efficient Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Elite for Galaxy chipset, it lasted an impressive 17 hours and 14 minutes in our battery test. While that’s a hair behind the iPhone 16 Pro Max at 17:35 and even more adrift of the OnePlus 13 at 19:45, it still leaves the Pixel 9 Pro XL (12:54) in the dust.

An extra 500mAh battery combined with the usual generational improvements in efficiency could make it the phone to beat for power users in 2026 — especially if Samsung ups the charging speeds from 45W.

As you might expect, it’s quite early in the cycle for a full picture of the Samsung Galaxy S26 to have formed, but there are a couple of early rumors to keep tabs on. The Ultra model has been tipped to feature a massive 324-megapixel main camera, and there’s talk of Samsung abandoning the hole-punch camera (though there’s some argument over whether that’s likely). For the non-Ultra versions, it looks like Samsung’s Exynos chipset may make a return in some territories, after missing out on the S25 series due to poor yields.

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Alan Martin
Alan Martin

Freelance contributor Alan has been writing about tech for over a decade, covering phones, drones and everything in between. Previously Deputy Editor of tech site Alphr, his words are found all over the web and in the occasional magazine too. When not weighing up the pros and cons of the latest smartwatch, you'll probably find him tackling his ever-growing games backlog. He also handles all the Wordle coverage on Tom's Guide and has been playing the addictive NYT game for the last several years in an effort to keep his streak forever intact.

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