Have one of these Samsung phones? Don’t update it right now

By Christine Romero-Chan Published October 3, 2024

Do you have an older Samsung Galaxy device, such as the Galaxy S10 or Galaxy Note 10, which came out in 2019? If so, you may want to hold off on the latest update for those devices, as 9to5Google is reporting that they’re getting bricked when the update is installed.

Samsung has gotten better about longer support for its devices over the past several years, but this also appears to have become a problem. For example, when the new update breaks your device and requires a factory reset to fix it.

The issue appears to be happening with multiple users across social media, especially on Reddit, over the past couple of days. Those who are using Galaxy S10 series (S10, S10 Plus, S10e, S10 Lite, S10 5G) or Galaxy Note 10 series (Note 10, Note 10 Plus, Note 10 5G) devices, and have updated to the recent release, have found out their devices are now bricked. The problem also appears to occur with the Galaxy M51 and Galaxy A90, though it’s not as widespread.

Devices bricked from this update appear to get stuck in a bootloop, which means that they never fully turn on. It looks like the issue stems from not the full system update, but rather a faulty Samsung SmartThings Framework update. Since the device cannot fully boot up for use, you cannot roll back the software.

The only way to fix this problem is to perform a factory reset through Android recovery.

If you’re not familiar with how to do this, you need to boot into recovery mode on a Galaxy S10 by first turning it off entirely,. Then press and hold the Bixby and volume up buttons, then press the Power button and hold it until the Samsung logo comes up on the screen. Once that happens, release the button and the phone should go into recovery mode. On the Galaxy Note 10 devices, you must press and hold the volume up and power buttons.

When the device is in recovery mode, use the volume buttons to navigate to Wipe data/factory reset from the menu and use the power button to confirm. Once this is confirmed, go back to the previous screen. Once it’s complete, select Reboot system now.

Yes, your data will be lost, but the phone should work again. It’s very likely that Samsung has pulled this update, so if you haven’t already updated, don’t try to. It’s also a good idea to turn off automatic updates to prevent things like this from happening in the first place.

Hopefully Samsung, rolls out another update to fix this problem (without causing another!).