It's well and truly over for Samsung's iconic Galaxy Note lineup

It's well and truly over for Samsung's iconic Galaxy Note lineup: the last Note smartphones, the Galaxy Note 20 and Note 20 Ultra, will no longer receive any software updates. Support has ended exactly five years later, and Galaxy Note 20 and Note 20 Ultra owners will need to upgrade to a newer device if they don't want to use outdated software.

The Galaxy Note 20 series debuted in August 2020 running Android 10 and One UI 2.5. At the time, Samsung’s policy guaranteed three major OS upgrades, which the phones have since received. For the past two years, they’ve been on security-update-only support, and now, even those updates are coming to an end.

With the Note 20 series reaching the end of its life, the Galaxy Note brand is now officially history. For fans of the S Pen, that means there are only two ways forward. The Galaxy S Ultra models have effectively taken over as the Note’s spiritual successor, offering the same integrated S Pen experience the lineup was known for.

The other option is a Galaxy Z Fold smartphone, but there's a catch: you will need to buy an older model, as the Galaxy Z Fold 7, Samsung's latest flagship foldable, doesn't support the S Pen. Furthermore, if you pick up an older Fold, like the Fold 6, the S Pen will be a separate purchase and also need to be carried separately, as the Fold lineup doesn't have an S Pen slot.

In short, Samsung has closed the chapter on the Galaxy Note for good. But while the company has retired the name, the Note DNA lives on in the Galaxy S Ultra series, and will hopefully continue to do so in the years to come.