Samsung’s new notification tray in One UI 7 sucks, but it doesn’t have to

That said, One UI 7 is far from perfect. After living with its final form for three weeks now, I’ve got my share of nitpicks, and none of them rank higher than what Samsung did to its notification tray. Like Motorola, Asus, and several other companies before it, the Galaxy S25 series ships with notifications and quick settings split into two separate pages, following Apple’s design from the iPhone X nearly eight years ago. Samsung’s sheer market share, however, means this is likely to be the first time millions of Android fans see this sort of layout, and I have a pretty strong feeling they aren’t going to be happy.

Understanding why this split design in One UI 7 is so frustrating took me some serious time to figure out, but after a couple of weeks — and, crucially, a few days of swapping back to the old layout, which does still exist — I think I’ve cracked the case. Let me explain.

One UI 7’s notification problem is a matter of inches

Or, perhaps, fractions of those inches

While I can only speak to my own personal experience on the Galaxy S25 Ultra, checking my notifications — or, for that matter, toggling anything on One UI’s quick panel — has been pretty frustrating. Frequently, I’ll swipe down from the top-right corner, expecting to see my various customized toggles, only to find myself staring at a blank notification tray. Other times, I’ll think I’m swapping down to access a notification, only to find I’m too far to the right. This is despite Samsung’s instructions within its panel settings, which claim a swipe from the “top right corner” is all it takes to view your quick settings, while swiping down from any other portion of the status bar opens notifications.

It’s that note that finally clued me into why I find Samsung’s layout so frustrating where, say, Apple — the obvious inspiration behind this change, let’s be completely honest here — succeeds. It’s not just because the iPhone’s Dynamic Island (and, in prior generations, its camera notch) takes up far more space than Samsung’s front-facing camera, though that’s certainly a part of it. On the iPhone, you know with complete confidence that you’re swiping down from the left or right side of Apple’s selfie cutout. There is no ambiguity, no frustrating surprise, in the way I’ve found on the Galaxy S25 Ultra.

But in my eyes, it’s not so simple. Instead, Samsung’s problem is that the dividing line between the quick panel and notifications lies to the right of its hole punch. It’s completely arbitrary, invisible to the naked eye, but using a makeshift ruler and the handy-dandy S Pen, I was able to determine exactly where a swipe down from the status bar converts from one page to another. Surprise: It’s nowhere near the top-right corner Samsung tells its users to swipe down from, and on a device as large as the Galaxy S25 Ultra, being imprecise about this space is a pretty big problem.

In the above photo, I’ve marked on my planner’s built-in ruler exactly where the division lies within fractions of an inch. I did so by using Air view with the S Pen to see exactly where my pointer would land on the status bar. From that right corner, you can move up to 13/16ths of an inch to the left and still activate the quick settings menu. At 7/8ths of an inch, however, One UI transitions to the notification tray.

That leaves an additional half-inch space on the Galaxy S25 Ultra where you’re able to activate notifications, even if you might be trying to reach your quick panel. Likewise, delivering nearly an inch of space outside that top-right corner practically guarantees that, at least on occasion, you’ll swipe down from the wrong side of that divide, activating quick settings rather than viewing your notifications. It is, unfortunately, extremely frustrating.

Lest I sound too negative, I do appreciate a couple of the options here. Samsung does allow you to swap back to the old, combined layout, though that toggle could eventually disappear for good. It’s also possible to swap the two sides, locking notifications to the top-right corner instead. While I found this to be the more comfortable experience, I can’t pretend it’s particularly enjoyable or comfortable, especially on the semi-rare occasion where I’m holding the device in my left hand, nor does it solve the inherent problem of undescribed boundaries.

Samsung can improve notifications and quick settings in One UI 7

It just needs to make one of a few key changes

Short of Samsung adopting a true Dynamic Island clone on the Galaxy S26 — hey, never say never — the company does still have a few options to improve this layout ahead of One UI 7’s broader launch. The most obvious solution is to add some kind of visual marker, indicating exactly where you should swipe to load notifications or quick settings. This could act as some kind of small indent in the status bar, though that feels more like a placeholder fix than anything.

Samsung could go full Apple here, locking either the quick panel or notifications to the left and right side of the camera cutout, depending on user settings. The Galaxy S25 Ultra’s footprint is nearly identical to that of the iPhone 16 Pro Max, so asking users to reach all the way across that massive 6.9-inch display isn’t out of the question. Frankly, though, I don’t particularly like Apple’s approach on the iPhone — especially on larger iPhones — and I’d like to see Samsung shy away from that here.

The best option, in my eyes, is to have quick settings actually perform as the panel edit tool describes. Make it so the swipe has to be inward diagonally from the top-right corner, and leave the rest of the status bar for notification access. Combined with either visual or haptic feedback — or, frankly, both — we could be looking at a solution that lets Samsung have its cake and eat it too. I can only speak for myself, but I access my notification tray far more often than I need to toggle Wi-Fi on or off.

To a certain extent, though, I can’t help but feel like these are temporary solutions to an odd problem. As I mentioned, Samsung isn’t alone here — even Google is working on a potential split redesign for these two pages. But with an audience the size of, well, the galaxy, Samsung is bound to have the most impact on how users experience loading notifications in Android, and right now, I’m not sure it’s a particularly good implementation. At the very least, let’s hope the option for a combined page, which solves the problem entirely, never goes away.