The Galaxy S27 Pro will be the final nail in the S Pen’s coffin

Source: Android Authority

Ryan Haines / Android Authority

Rumor Overview

How the hell is Samsung’s S Pen stylus still a thing in 2026? Smartphone manufacturers have shown themselves over the years to be incredibly eager to get rid of any component that even remotely complicates handset design — not even the eminently useful headphone jack could hold on — and yet Samsung’s comparatively gigantic stylus has somehow persisted.

Today, new rumors suggest that Samsung could finally be planning to expand its flagship lineup next year with an S27 “Pro” model (leak source). The Pro would be largely the same as the Galaxy S27 Ultra, but without the Ultra’s S Pen support. If Samsung really does deliver this option, it might as well declare the S Pen dead for good.

What do you think of Samsung’s rumored plans for the Galaxy S27 Pro?

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For as great as the S Pen can be, it’s also totally unnecessary

I was an early fan of the S Pen with the original Galaxy Note back in the long‑ago days, and I stuck with it up through the Galaxy Note 20. Early on, I really liked it; I was a slow convert to the everything‑touchscreen world that smartphones were pushing, and a stylus was a nice pair of training wheels, helping me feel like I was retaining some precision in much the same way I might have looked for an early phone with a hardware QWERTY keyboard.

Even as touchscreen input got a lot better, I still enjoyed the S Pen’s versatility, especially as Samsung outfitted it with more and more features in future generations. Air gestures were fun, but looking back now they feel a bit gimmicky. Sure, there’s some magic to gesturing around with an electronic toothpick, but at the end of the day I wasn’t getting anything done faster or accomplishing tasks that plain‑old touch input couldn’t handle.

“There’s some magic to gesturing around with an electronic toothpick.”

Despite all that, I remained an S Pen fan. For Samsung’s phones, at least, the S Pen was just one component in a larger conversation: Do I want a Galaxy S, or do I want a Galaxy Note? Later, the question became Do I want an Ultra model? You could argue that the presence of the S Pen may have been a driving force behind the creation of these alternatives, but they also offered many upgrades beyond native stylus support. That made the decision easier when you were saying “yes” to the whole bundle of top‑shelf phone features at once.

Air gestures were fun – Android Authority

The worst thing Samsung can do for the S Pen is single it out

Adamya Sharma / Android Authority

On the surface, more consumer choice sounds like a good thing. The source behind this Galaxy S27 Pro report describes the phone as an option that retains most of the S27 Ultra upgrades—except for S Pen support. If anyone at Samsung cares about the S Pen surviving another generation, I really hope this isn’t true, because the arrival of the S27 Pro could utterly decimate the S27 Ultra’s sales potential.

As I’ve tried to establish: I like the S Pen. Everything else being equal, I’d love to have one. But the problem is that things aren’t equal, and an S Pen demands sacrifice.

• We need room to store the stylus.
• We need a system to charge it (well, if Bluetooth connectivity ever comes back).
• We need to build a digitizer panel into the screen.

All of that has a cost—either direct or because it forces compromises elsewhere. When these trade‑offs are part of a larger “Ultra” package, they’re much easier to accept. Psychologically, we’re suckers for that “having it all” luxury upgrade; The Korea Herald reported that Ultra models accounted for a full 70 % of all Galaxy S26 pre‑orders in South Korea.

We’re suckers for that “having it all” luxury upgrade.

But what happens when we can have almost all those upgrades—except for one, somewhat awkward, archaic, bulky holdover from Samsung’s smartphone past? Call me a pessimist, but I foresee the vast majority of would‑be Ultra shoppers electing the Pro instead.

I’m hesitant to speculate about Samsung’s pricing, but just thinking about the possibilities makes me nervous. No matter how small the differential between the Pro and Ultra ends up being, it will be seen as a 100 % “S Pen tax.”

Zac Kew‑Denniss / Android Authority

• Best‑case scenario: a $50 premium (though I’d bet closer to $100).
• That premium will invite uncomfortable questions, prompting even S Pen aficionados like me to assess the real utility we get from it.
• Many shoppers who might have bought an Ultra in previous years will see the Pro as the smarter option—getting 99 % of what they want for less money.

If Samsung has to hike prices and the S27 Ultra starts north of $1,299.99, the Pro becomes even more attractive.

All this assumes the Ultra and Pro are otherwise evenly matched. If Samsung can use the S Pen’s absence to squeeze other upgrades into the Pro—perhaps a larger battery—that will give the new option an even better shot at stealing sales from the Ultra.

Admittedly, the S Pen has become more than just a tiny stylus we can tuck away in our Galaxy phone, and I wouldn’t be surprised to see it live on in Samsung’s tablet lineup. However, the S Pen’s home on phones has felt increasingly shaky in recent years, and I worry that Samsung creating a narrowly defined model whose value‑add is singularly “our best phone, but also with an S Pen” is just begging shoppers to save a few bucks and go with the Pro. If that happens, I don’t know that we’ll see any S Pen at all for the Galaxy S28.

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