We first heard a possible time frame for Samsung's Pie update from the company's French Samsung Members community. In a post about possible changes to expect from Pie, a community moderator had suggested that we would have to wait until January 2019 before the Pie features and changes would reach users. That time frame has now been reiterated in a post on the Samsung+ app.
Samsung Galaxy Pie update isn't coming before 2019
The Samsung+ post talks about some of the general Android Pie features, such as Adaptive Battery, new emojis, and Actions and Slices, instead of what we can expect from Samsung's customizations and additions. But it mentions a similar time frame for when we can expect the update to roll out to Galaxy phones. Well, “early next year” could mean anytime from January to March, but January will hopefully see at least some markets get the update. We know Project Treble might not be of much help, but that doesn't mean Samsung shouldn't be trying its best to release Android Pie as quickly as possible.
The Samsung+ post doesn't mention a specific device, but the Galaxy S9 is sure to be updated first. Samsung will kick off a Galaxy S9 Android Pie beta program in the near future, allowing us to test the new Samsung Experience 10 UX. Samsung Experience 10 will bring a new dark theme for the entire OS, along with features such as Scene Optimizer in the camera app and an updated Always On Display look. You can see an early Android Pie build running on the Galaxy Note 9 in the video below to see the kind of changes to expect from the next major version of Android on Galaxy devices.