Samsung Skimps On Pressure Sensitive Home Button For Galaxy A8 (2018)

The Galaxy A8 and Galaxy A8+ (2018) were recently announced by Samsung. They’re the first premium mid-range handsets from the company to feature the Infinity Display. This means that the handsets have on-screen navigation buttons since the Infinity Display mandates the removal of hardware buttons. Many would have expected the digital home button on the Galaxy A8 (2018) to be pressure sensitive like it is on the Galaxy S8 and Galaxy Note 8. It turns out that Samsung has skimped on the pressure sensitive home button for the new Galaxy A handsets.

Samsung introduced the Infinity Display earlier this year with the Galaxy S8 and Galaxy S8+. Since the flagship devices don’t have a conventional home button, Samsung made the transition easier by making the area around the digital home button pressure sensitive.

This made the software key feel like a real button. Users could change the pressure sensitivity and even choose to unlock the phone with a hard press of the button. The exact same functionality was offered on the Galaxy Note 8 as well.

Naturally, with the Infinity Display making it to the Galaxy A8 (2018), people would have expected that the new handsets’ software home button would be pressure sensitive as well. Turns out, it’s not.

This has been revealed in the Galaxy A8 (2018)’s user manual which doesn’t mention an option to hard press the home button. The only way that users can rely on the home button to wake up the device is by double tapping it when the Always On Display is enabled.

Those who don’t like to enable the Always On Display will just have to use the power button to wake up the device. They can also make use of the fingerprint sensor at the back to wake up the device.

Samsung has not made it clear why the Galaxy A8 and Galaxy A8+ (2018)’s home button is not pressure sensitive. Perhaps it was a cost-saving measure or it just wanted to differentiate its mid-range handsets from the flagships.

Either way, this isn’t something that users will be too thrilled about.

Adnan Farooqui
Categories: Cellphones
Tags: Galaxy A8, Galaxy Note 8, Galaxy S8, Samsung