Is the Galaxy S26 Ultra’s Privacy Display better than a privacy screen protector? We tested bothWe put Samsung's hardware-level privacy tech against a high-end privacy screen protector to see which one is better for you.

Is the Galaxy S26 Ultra’s Privacy Display better than a privacy screen protector? We tested both

Credit: Adamya Sharma / Android Authority

TL;DR

• The Galaxy S26 Ultra’s Privacy Display is a hardware-level feature that controls light dispersion at the pixel level to hide screen content.
• While physical privacy screen protectors offer better side-angle “blackout,” they suffer from permanent screen dimming and come with a rougher matte texture.
• Samsung’s solution allows users to toggle privacy for specific apps or screen areas, making it a superior experience despite a slight privacy trade-off.

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One of the biggest selling points of the Galaxy S26 Ultra is the new Privacy Display feature. This is a hardware-level feature that controls how light is dispersed by the display’s pixels. But just how well does Privacy Display work, and can it give privacy screen protectors a run for their money? My colleague C. Scott Brown applied an expensive and branded privacy screen protector to a Galaxy S25 Ultra and compared it to the Privacy Display feature on the Galaxy S26 Ultra. Here’s our experience:

As Scott notes, the privacy screen protector actually did a better job of preventing people from seeing what was on the screen. However, the Galaxy S26 Ultra is much nicer to actually use, as privacy screen protectors have a matte texture that doesn’t let your finger glide across as smoothly as bare glass.

We put Samsung's hardware-level privacy tech against a high-end privacy screen protector to see which one is better for you.Aamir Siddiqui2026-02-26T12:30:25.000Z{}