Samsung accidentally leaks its own Galaxy S23 FE, Galaxy Buds FE and Tab S9 FE
You’d think that tech firms would manage not to leak their own products by now, but apparently not: Samsung seemingly just leaked its more affordable Fan Edition (FE) Galaxy phone, earbuds and tablet on its own website.
Whether down to an employee mistake or as part of a deliberate marketing strategy, we now have lots of details about the Samsung Galaxy Buds FE as well as photos of the Galaxy Tab S9 FE and Galaxy S23 FE.
Here’s what just leaked [via SamMobile].
Samsung Galaxy Buds FE: key features
Assuming the information displayed was genuine, the Samsung Galaxy Buds FE have a single driver and three mics in each earbud, active noise cancellation and up to 30 hours of play time with ANC turned off; that drops to a still-decent 21 hours with ANC enabled. They have Bluetooth 5.2 and a larger, tipped design, and as before there’s the familiar compact charging case with USB-C on the back. They’re SmartThings Find-compatible and feature an ambient mode, auto device switching and Samsung’s Bixby digital assistant.
The price of the Samsung Galaxy Buds FE hasn’t been announced – or accidentally published – yet, but previous rumors suggested $99 in the US, which is likely to be £99 in the UK.
Samsung Galaxy S23 FE and Samsung Galaxy Tab S9 FE: what do we know so far?
In addition to the leaked photos, Samsung has also been publishing teaser images of the forthcoming Samsung Galaxy S23 FE – the first FE phone since the Galaxy S21 FE. They show the rear camera assembly with three lenses arranged vertically and the headline, “The New Epic”. That would appear to corroborate previous rumors that the S23 FE would be getting a camera upgrade this year.
According to the rumor mill, the SE will have a 6.4-inch Dynamic AMOLED with full HD+, 120Hz refresh rate and HDR10+. The selfie shooter is reportedly 10MP, and the main camera is 50MP alongside a 12MP ultrawide and an 8MP telephoto with 3x optical zoom.
The Samsung Galaxy S23 FE is believed to have the Exynos 2200 and Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 chips from last year’s Galaxy S22 series, although leaked benchmarks indicate that Samsung has optimized it to deliver better performance than before.
The Galaxy Tab S9 FE has leaked elsewhere too: it’s appeared on the Google Play Console database alongside its budget sibling, the Galaxy Tab A9. Alongside renders of the new tablet there are some specifications: it appears to have a 1440 x 2304px display, an Exynos 1380 chip and 6GB of RAM. As expected, it’s running Android 13.
We don’t know when these devices will actually launch, but one of the leaked images of the Galaxy S23 FE shows a date of 4 October, which seems like a likely date for a Fall product launch: much later and you’re leaving it dangerously late for the holiday season. And given the fact that Samsung is teasing while also deliberately or accidentally leaking complete product pages, it’s clear that the Fan Edition devices are ready to roll.
