Samsung has put a lot of effort into highlighting a clear dividing line between its Galaxy Ring and the wearable’s main competitor, the Oura Ring: that is the lack of a monthly subscription.
The company made that clear to me at a pre-launch product reveal earlier this month. Specifically, that the choice to not include a subscription was a permanent decision and that it had no plans to charge monthly now or in the future. Read that story here.
But a footnote in a slide during Samsung’s Galaxy Unpacked presentation, spotted by Android Authority, uses more careful language in regards to subscription options— possibly leaving that door ajar.
“[The] Galaxy Ring must be paired with a Samsung Galaxy smartphone with Android 11.0 or above and a minimum 1.5GB Memory. Samsung Health app (v6.27 or above) and Samsung account login is required. Service availability may vary by country or region.
“Currently available Samsung Health features that use the Samsung Galaxy Ring are provided without monthly subscription. Different terms may apply for future Samsung Health features.”
This statement isn’t as explicit as Samsung’s “free until 2025” warning that is tacked onto company news about Galaxy AI features. But there’s no escaping that this disclaimer reads like it gives Samsung a route out of its commitment to not charging a subscription.
As it stands, all of the indicators point to Samsung not asking its Ring customers for a monthly fee. Samsung Health is, and has always been, free. As are the measurement tools on its Galaxy Watches throughout their history. That bodes well for Samsung’s promise that it will not charge a subscription—it has no concrete history of doing so.
But as I pointed out in my Galaxy Ring story a couple of weeks ago, the invention of AI is costly to build and expensive to run. Samsung has hinted that charging for Galaxy AI is a real possibility. Also, there is crossover in features between the Ring and other Galaxy devices. For example, Energy Score and Wellness Tips are available on both the Ring and Galaxy Watch.
There may be a workaround here where Samsung charges for a subscription to Galaxy AI across all of its devices, which includes the Galaxy Ring, without directly creating a Galaxy Ring subscription. Samsung’s argument would then be that users aren’t paying for a Galaxy Ring monthly plan, rather they’re buying access to its most advanced AI toolkit, as Google does with Gemini Advanced.
If Samsung does go down this path, it wouldn’t be the first time the company has undercut the competition with temporarily aggressive pricing. It routinely enhances trade-in prices for iPhones when a new product is launched. In 2015, it ran a “Test Drive” promotion that let iPhone owners try out a Galaxy phone for a month, for $1, which was popular at the time. We will have to see what happens in 2025 when the free period for Galaxy AI runs out.
