Samsung introduced One UI 5.1 at Unpacked 2023 when it announced the Galaxy S23 smartphone series. Now the update is available for a few older Galaxy devices and should continue to land on more phones and tablets in the coming weeks. One UI 5.1 brings a handful of improvements and features and even exceeds expectations for what should essentially be a minor update following One UI 5.0. And among the latest additions, you’ll find a new dynamic weather widget for the home screen.
In short, the new dynamic weather widget supports two sizes and comes with new animations. But for a more detailed explanation of how it all works, below you can find our complete review of this new One UI 5.1 feature.
One UI 5.1 dynamic weather widget reviewed
As mentioned above, Samsung’s new dynamic weather widget supports two sizes, but it’s worth noting that only the larger size, with a vertical footprint, supports the full set of animations.
These animations include a person that walks into the frame dressed for the occasion, i.e., matching the weather outside. If it’s sunny, the widget shows a stylized drawing of a person holding a water bottle. If it’s snowing, it’s a person wearing a scarf.
And if the weather is windy or rainy, the dynamic weather widget shows a person holding on to their coat or carrying an umbrella in their hand. These animations last for roughly four seconds, and they don’t loop. But they can be triggered again by tapping the small “refresh” button.
Oddly enough, Samsung appears to have missed a few weather types. In other words, the dynamic weather widget in One UI 5.1 doesn’t show the animated person in every weather. Assuming it’s fair or partly cloudy, for example, there’s no clever animation for One UI 5.1 users to enjoy. There may be other weather types that lack this animation. In total, we tested six kinds of weather. Four had animations. Two didn’t.
One UI 5.1 dynamic weather widgets can be stacked
One last nice feature worth mentioning is that these One UI 5.1 dynamic weather widgets are stackable. Samsung added stackable home screen widgets to Galaxy phones and tablets through the One UI 5.0 update, and of course, One UI 5.1 makes use of these new capabilities.
You can learn all about creating widget stacks or unstacking widgets in our One UI 5.0 guide. Or you can check out the screen recording demonstration below, featuring the new dynamic weather widget. Oddly, weather animations don’t start over automatically upon swiping through the widget stack.
Dynamic weather widgets are an interesting addition to the One UI 5.1 home screen. But it looks like Samsung may need to work a little more before it can polish this new feature to perfection.
If you wish to learn more about One UI 5.1 or the Galaxy S23 series, check out our videos below and our S23 Ultra review.
