One of the things that made the Samsung Galaxy Note range what it as, besides the larger screen which became rather popular, was the iconic S-Pen. With the apparent demise of the Note line, Samsung enthusiasts were left without an S-Pen option for their pockets, but it seems that might not be the case for long.
According to a report on Weibo (via 9to5Google), Samsung will be offering the S-Pen as an accessory for the Galaxy S8, though it likely won’t be in the box with the phone, nor will there be an S-Pen storage area within the phone. Despite these two obstacles, the S-Pen will be a welcome return for many Samsung users.
It’s really a smart move for Samsung, given there’s not likely to be a new Note device for a while; giving Galaxy S8 users the S-Pen is likely to calm some of upset that the exploding Note 7s caused. If there’s going to be a larger Galaxy S8 Plus, and odds are there will be, then an S-Pen will make it into a quasi-Note replacement.
Pricing, and even the inclusion itself, have yet to be confirmed by anyone, but it does seem somewhat likely to eventuate. Expect the S-Pen to be around $29 when/if released as a Galaxy S8 accessory.
Will we see the Samsung Galaxy S8 teased at Mobile World Congress 2017? It seems not, with rumours the company will go late to buy a bit more time to develop the product. We’ll know soon enough.
Maybe they should have one “vanilla” S8, and just make the S8 Edge the Note Device…and maybe call it S8 Pro or something. And of course it better have a silo to stow the S-pen in it, I’m not going to spend an extra $150 to have a stylus dangling by a lanyard from the phone (or stow it in a case and make an already large package even larger)
I agree. If there’s no storage slot in the S8 then it’s not much use. Now if the new Tab S3 had S-pen capability I’d be way more interested. It’s the S-pen that stops me gping for the Pixel XL.
If the phone doesn’t store the stylus then its a stupid idea. I’m interested in the Note 8 if it comes out but not a S8 without a stylus or slot for it.
I don’t know what a digitizer adds to the cost but if they were planning a new note with a different stylus (from the Note 7) then they have a lot of styluses lying around unexploded. Sounds like they are adding them to chromebooks also.