Samsung's Galaxy AI includes features for search, live translation, writing help, note summarizing, and photo editing. A few of them are genuinely useful for everyday tasks. The rest can be turned off if you prefer a simpler phone experience.
Samsung has packed a lot of AI features into recent Galaxy phones. Some are genuinely useful from day one. Others sound impressive in a store demo but add friction to things you could do faster without them.
This guide covers the five Galaxy AI features that are worth your time, how to use each one, and — equally important — how to turn off what you do not want.
Circle to Search — the one most people keep
Circle to Search lets you draw a circle around anything on your screen and instantly search it. You can circle a product in a photo, a word you do not recognize, a restaurant sign, a QR-style barcode, or a plant in an image.
How to use it: Press and hold the home button or navigation bar at the bottom of your screen. A glow appears around the edges. Draw a circle, scribble, or tap anything on the screen. Search results appear without leaving the app you were in.
Why it is useful: You stay in whatever you were doing — a message, a photo, a web article — while you look something up. No need to screenshot, open a browser, and type.
To turn it off: Settings → Advanced Features → Circle to Search → toggle off.
Live Translate — useful for travel and phone calls
Live Translate works during phone calls and translates both sides of the conversation in near real time. You speak in English, the other person hears a translated version, and their reply is translated back to you.
How to use it: During a phone call, tap the translation icon that appears on the call screen. Select your language and the other person's language. Both of you hear the call through the translator.
Also works for text: Open the Samsung Keyboard in any app and look for the translation button. Type in English and it converts your text to another language before you send it.
Why it is useful: Makes calls with family or service providers who speak a different language much less stressful. It is not perfect — accents and fast speech can trip it up — but it handles slow, clear conversation well.
To turn it off: Settings → Advanced Features → Galaxy AI → Live Translate → toggle off.
Chat Assist — rewrites your messages in a different tone
Chat Assist appears inside Samsung's Messages app and some other apps. It can rewrite what you typed in a more professional, casual, or concise tone with one tap.
How to use it: Type your message in the Samsung Messages app or another supported app. Look for the sparkle or AI icon near the text field. Tap it and choose a tone: Professional, Casual, Polite, Concise, or similar options. A rewritten version appears. Accept it, edit it, or ignore it.
Why it is useful for some people: If you are writing a message to a landlord, a school, or a doctor's office and want it to sound more formal without a lot of effort, this saves time.
Why some people skip it: If you already write naturally, it adds an extra step. The rewrites can sound a little generic.
To turn it off: Settings → Advanced Features → Galaxy AI → Chat Assist → toggle off.
Note Assist — summarizes long notes automatically
Note Assist works inside Samsung Notes. After you write or record a long note, it can summarize it, pull out action items, and format it more clearly.
How to use it: Open Samsung Notes and create or open a note. Tap the AI icon at the top of the screen. Options appear: Summarize, Format, Auto correct, Translate.
Where it shines: Meeting notes, shopping lists that got long, recipes you jotted down quickly. It turns a messy paragraph into a clean bulleted list in one tap.
Less useful if: You write very short notes, or you do not use Samsung Notes at all.
To turn it off: You can leave Note Assist installed and simply not use it. If you want to remove the icon from the Notes toolbar, open Samsung Notes → Settings → AI features → toggle off Note Assist.
Generative Edit — remove unwanted objects from photos
Generative Edit is in the Samsung Gallery app. It lets you circle an object in a photo — a photobomber, a trash can, a parked car — and erase it. The AI fills in the background behind it.
How to use it: Open a photo in Gallery. Tap Edit, then look for the Generative Edit or Object Eraser option. Circle or tap the thing you want to remove. Tap Generate or Erase. The AI removes the object and reconstructs the background.
Why it is useful: It works surprisingly well on simple backgrounds like grass, sky, sand, or plain walls. For busy or complex backgrounds, the fill can look patchy.
Honest limitation: Do not use Generative Edit to remove or add people in a way that misrepresents what happened in a photo. AI-edited photos shared as real can mislead people — a small but real consideration.
To turn it off: There is no global toggle — it lives inside the Gallery edit screen and only appears when you choose it. Just do not tap it if you prefer unedited photos.
How to turn off Galaxy AI features you do not want
If you find Galaxy AI suggestions popping up in places you did not expect, you can manage everything from one place:
Settings → Advanced Features → Galaxy AI
Here you will see a list of AI features with toggles. Turn off what you do not use. The phone works exactly the same without them — they are additions, not requirements.
You can also go to Settings → Privacy → Permission Manager if you want to review which apps Galaxy AI features have access to and tighten permissions further.
What to try next
If you are curious whether the AI features on your phone are sharing your data in ways you are not comfortable with, the ChatGPT privacy settings guide explains the kinds of settings to look for — many of the same principles apply to phone AI tools. And if you want to understand AI more broadly, the beginner's guide to ChatGPT is a plain-English starting point.
