TheSamsung Galaxy S9andS9 Plusare the culmination of Samsung’s smartphone philosophy. They are big, they’re beautiful, and they are easily some of the most advanced machines that have ever graced our collective pockets. But they’re not perfect, and issues can arise. That is why we scoured forums, comments, and news to find the most common problems with the Galaxy S9 and S9 Plus, and how to fix them.

In one of the more notorious issues that has hit the Samsung Galaxy S9,multiple usersare complainingthat their entire gallery of images has been sent to another contact, with no indication on their side that this had happened. While the impact seems to have been minimal so far, this is a bug with potentially disastrous side effects.

Thankfully, it might not be as bad as all that.On closer inspection, it seems that the only people affected are those who are on T-Mobile and share a plan with another person, who also has a Galaxy device. That’s a fairly specific subset of the population, and not one that seems particularly large. Still, no fix has been presented for the issue yet, so what can you do to stop all your media being shared with another person?

Workaround:

Issue: Bluetooth not pairing to device/refusing to reconnect

Users havebeen complainingfor monthsthat intermittent connection issues are striking the Galaxy S9 and S9 Plus, with problems including periodic drops in connection, an inability to pair, and a refusal to reconnect to car-based Bluetooth systems. It seems that the periodic drops in connection have been fixed via a software update, but some Bluetooth issues persist.

Possible solutions:

Issue: Dead zone on the touchscreen

Users onSamsung’s official forumsas well asmultipleRedditthreadsare reporting that sections of the touchscreens on their Galaxy S9s are completely dead, and not reacting to their touch. In most cases, the dead section seems to be a band laidhorizontally across the deviceandisn’t in the same placefor each person. Some people have attempted factory resets and changing sensitivity options in the phone’s settings, but so far none of those methods have been reported to work.

Samsung confirmed it is looking into the issue,Engadget reports. The company released the following statement:

“At Samsung, customer satisfaction is core to our business and we aim to deliver the best possible experience. We are looking into a limited number of reports of Galaxy S9/S9+ touchscreen responsiveness issues. We are working with affected customers and investigating. We encourage any customer with questions to contact us directly at 1-800-Samsung.”

Bug: Very dark super slow-motion video

Some users are reporting thatsuper slow-motion videoon their S9 devices is showing up withdramatically increased levels of darknessin lower lighting conditions. This bug does not affect all S9 units, but if it affects yours, then you will notice a dramatic difference in the lighting between your Auto camera mode and when you switch to your Super Slow-Motion mode. This can be seen in the video below.

The bug does not seem to be because the mode requires more light than standard video, as one user’s normal videoshows good indoor lighting.

Issue: Can’t record voice calls

If you record your phone calls for security or archival purposes, then it seems that you will not be able to do so on the Galaxy S9.Accordingto multiple users, no matterwhich call-recording softwareis used, the S9 will only pick up one side of the conversation, and will not record the person on the other end of the call.

So far it seems that this issue only affects the international version of the Galaxy S9 equipped with the Exynos 9810 processor, and the Snapdragon 845 is unaffected by this limitation.

Bug: Smearing or pixelation around black objects/black crush

If you have noticed that black areas don’t look quite right on your S9 Plus thenyou’re not alone.Users have noticedthat black areas in media and images arefailing to blend properlywith other colors, resulting in areas that look pixelated, blurred, or just plain odd. When comparing anS8 Plus and an S9 Plus side by side, the issue becomes very clear (S9 Plus on top).

It seems that this is an issue only with the Galaxy S9 Plus, and only affects some units when below 40 percent brightness.

Glitch: Samsung Pay is not working

Given it’s Samsung’s payment service, you would expect Samsung Pay to work with the Galaxy S9 right out of the box. Unfortunately, this is not the case, andmultipleusersare reportingSamsung Payis showing up as an “incompatible app.”