With as few upgrades as the Samsung Galaxy S25 Ultra brought to the table, Samsung still felt like it was a good idea to bring a notable downgrade to the phone as well. The S Pen has lost Bluetooth functionality, which means Air Actions and gestures no longer work. According to Samsung, people just weren’t using the features enough.
With the Bluetooth S Pen saying bye as a built-in option, it wasn’t hard to believe yesterday’s news pointing to the chance of a standalone Bluetooth-enabled S Pen sold separately. The info came from a Samsung-owned blog, so it needed little confirmation. However, the OEM has just clarified that was an error and Bluetooth is gone for good.
Samsung Confirms That It Made a Mistake in the Blog Post Confirming a New Bluetooth S Pen
Just yesterday, we reported on a post on the Samsung Insights blog, which innocently reported on ways you can use the S Pen to improve your productivity. One of the entries on that list was that you could use the S Pen for gestures—and if you’ve been following along, you’ll know that the lack of Bluetooth means this is no longer a function it has.
A snippet of the blog post is in the image below, and as you can see, it mentions gesture navigation and talks about a separate Bluetooth S Pen. Needless to say, this was pretty interesting news, as the S Pen in the phone lost its Bluetooth functionality but it seemed that the OEM planned to released a standalone stylus with that functionality. It came from an official Samsung blog post, so there was little reason to doubt its authenticity.
Well, Samsung has managed to save itself from accusations of being a shameless cash grabber, as it has come out to clarify that the section of the blog post in question was merely an error. Checking the page now, the seventh item in the list is now gone entirely, so there’s no mention of the phantom S Pen any longer.
The Era of the Air Actions and Bluetooth-Enabled S Pens Is Dead and Gone; How Do You Feel?
So, it’s confirmed. Samsung has killed Bluetooth functionality with its 2025 S Pen, and even if I didn’t use those features more than a little, I liked that they were there—especially the remote shutter functionality. It’s very unlikely that Samsung will realize its mistake and backtrack, so don’t hold your breath on that one.
However, I can’t help but feel like it was such an unnecessary downgrade, even if the feature wasn’t being actively used all that much. With how slow Wireless PowerShare is, it’s hard for me to believe it’s used enough to warrant the extra hardware it requires, but that doesn’t stop Samsung from keeping it in. The cost difference of a Bluetooth S Pen versus the current one is probably minimal. All it’s gotten them is bad press.
For some people who have pre-ordered their Galaxy S25 Ultras, the fact there’s no longer any hope for a way to get an S Pen that can work with gestures likely hurts. But that’s an assumption. If you own a Galaxy S Ultra device, how do you feel about the death of the Bluetooth-enabled S Pen? I’d love to know in the comments!
