When will my Samsung flagship receive Android Q: All we know about One UI 2.0

A couple of days ago, a rather logical rumor originating from sources close to Samsung revealed that the South Korean giant is working on a second iteration of its relatively new One UI interface, which succeeded Samsung Experience as the go-to user interface on the company's vast portfolio of smartphones. This updated and improved version of the user interface will roll along with Android Q to all eligible Samsung devices, whereas next year's Galaxy S11 series is even set to come with One UI 2.1. 
There's too little information at the moment, but the general consensus is that Samsung would include many of the flashy new software features inroduced at Google I/O back in May in its next interface. According to SamMobile, One UI 2.0 will incorporate all of the new Digital Wellbeing improvements unveiled at Google I/O back in May, including the distraction-battling Focus Mode, which aims to minimize notifications, alerts, and any other interruptions from certain predefined apps when enabled. It's unclear what other Android Q features will be incorporated into the software.

When it comes to any unique software features that Samsung might include in One UI 2.0, our guess is as good as yours. Who knows, we might get further improvements to Bixby, and hopefully, more powerful, system-wide Bixby Routines. Hopefully, Samsung will bring the useful automation feature to older devices like the Note 9 and Note 8, as well as the Galaxy S9 and S8 series. Of course, we can count on troves of incremental user interface improvements to be included as well.

What's the difference between Android One UI 2.0 and One UI 2.1?

As we mentioned a week or so ago, One UI 2.0 will be released alongside the next big major software update for Samsung's flagships at first, but will most certainly seep down to the lower-tier segments with time. Meanwhile, Samsung's future Galaxy S11 flagship series will be treated to One UI 2.1. This coincides with the debut of One UI last year, which launched as version 1.0 initially but the Galaxy S10 series came along with One UI 1.1.

Expected Android Q features to be included in One UI 2.0/2.1

There's no certainty that any of these will be included in the next iteration of One UI, but we can speculate.

Smart Reply & Suggested Actions

Android's smart notifications are also getting smarter and now works with all messaging apps. It's scoring smart replies that will suggest contextually-aware replies and even emoji straight in your notifications. Additionally, you Smart Reply will be suggesting relevant actions: if someone sends you an address, a context-friendly Google Maps button will pop up, allowing you to directly launch Google Maps with the address in the forefront. A rather useful small feature that will save you some time here and there. The feature will work with any messaging app you might be using. The feature will make use of on-device learning and wouldn't process data on Google's servers.

Security & Privacy

Privacy seems to be another important cornerstone of Android Q. Noteworthy privacy-centric improvements include enhanced location sharing, which now lets you share your location for as long as you're using a certain app, and automatically stop as soon as you exit the app. This is rather similar to iOS' take on location sharing, and is a great peace-of-mind feature to have. This would be a great addition to One UI and we strongly believe that Samsung will quickly adopt this feature.

More navigation options

Just as the Android Q beta introduced a more iOS-like navigation system, we suspect that Samsung could also alter its gesture-based navigation a bit as it's... not great at the moment. As a reminder, the latest Android betas allow users to go back by swiping from the sides of the screen instead of reaching all the way down to the navigation bar. Meanwhile, Samsung's approach is to substitute software navigation buttons for swipable areas near the bottom bezel, which isn't an optimal approach for navigation - for all intents and purposes, it requires you to stretch your fingers even further down than software navigation buttons do, defeating the purpose of gestures.