Samsung’s Galaxy S10 is one of the first non-Pixel or Android One phones to get Google’s Digital Wellbeing feature, as spotted by XDA Developers. The budget Nokia 6 and Nokia 8 phones also received the feature today, which came included with the new Android 9 Pie update for those phones.
Digital Wellbeing is a feature that was initially exclusive to Pixel phones running Android 9. Then it made its way over to Android One phones. The feature, similar to Apple’s Screen Time, lets users manage their phone usage by monitoring app usage time and keeping track of how many times the phone is unlocked and the number of notifications received. There’s also a Wind Down mode, which gradually turns the phone to grayscale mode and limits the number of notifications.
There’s no confirmation yet on whether the Digital Wellbeing feature will be included in the rest of Samsung’s S10 lineup, including the S10 Plus or the S10E, but we should know more in the coming days before they start shipping March 8th.
It’s interesting that Digital Wellbeing will be offered out of the box on Samsung’s S10, which also includes an Instagram mode built into its camera. It’s a choice that almost seems at odds with what those features offer. Samsung is encouraging its users to engage more on social media while also providing this tool to help people manage their phone addictions.
While Samsung’s flagship S10 starts at $899.99, it’s nice to see that the same Digital Wellbeing tools are available on lower-end Nokia 6 and 8 phones.