Samsung Galaxy Note 20 Ultra may have a big display problem

August 29, 2020 steezy

Samsung Galaxy Note 20 Ultra owners, as well as people who bought the Galaxy Tab S7 and Galaxy Tab S7 Plus, are reporting an annoying screen tint problem.

As reported on the r/samsung and r/galaxytab subreddits (via Notebookcheck), the 120Hz displays of these new Samsung devices take on an unusual green hue when at lower brightness levels. And changing the refresh rate setting has little to no impact, according to users trying to troubleshoot the problem.

This problem only seems to affect Note 20 Ultra models with the Snapdragon 865 Plus chipset. Models that use the Exynos 990 chip haven’t been confirmed to have this issue yet, but the Galaxy S20 Ultra Exynos version did when it debuted earlier this year.

We reached out to Samsung about this display issue but the company did not have a comment at this time.

An image of the Note 20 Ultra's display. — An image of the Note 20 Ultra’s display. (Image credit: efuentay216 on Reddit)

The OnePlus 8 Pro also faced this tint issue earlier in the year, as did the OnePlus Nord. There were reports of the iPhone 11 Pro also suffering from this unwanted verdancy back in June.

Having a green tint at low brightness is a unique quirk of OLED displays, according to a statement OnePlus gave when commenting on the problems with the Nord. However this doesn’t explain why the Galaxy Tab S7, which has an LCD panel, is affected.

An image of the Galaxy Tab S7 Plus' display. — An image of the Galaxy Tab S7 Plus’ display. (Image credit: Account_93 on Reddit)

The root of the problem perhaps lies with Samsung Display. Samsung Display sells its displays to other phone makers, including OnePlus and Apple. This seems to be the only common link between the phones known to have this problem, as the devices’ chipsets, maximum refresh rates and underlying display technology all vary.

A comparison of the Galaxy Tab S7's display (right) to the user's LG IPS monitor. — A comparison of the Galaxy Tab S7’s display (right) to the user’s LG IPS monitor. (Image credit: Final_Paladin on Reddit)

Fortunately, the problems faced by OnePlus, Apple and Samsung’s S20 Ultra were solved via software patches, so hopefully it’ll be similarly easy for Samsung to fix the Note 20 Ultra, Tab S7 and Tab S7 Plus this time around. Otherwise, the only answer may be a disruptive and expensive device recall.