Samsung testing Metalenz face biometrics for future flagship phone, leaker says

Early testing firmware for a forthcoming flagship smartphone from Samsung appears to include facial recognition technology from Metalenz.

Samsung electronics leaker “SPYGO19726” reports on X that the software in development for the Galaxy S27 Ultra refers to “Polar ID v1.0,” a “polarized-light authentication system” among its biometric security features. The posts relate claims of Polar ID delivering facial unlock with latency of 180ms and improved spoof detection.

Polar ID is a face biometrics solution consisting of a metasurface flat-lens system and accompanying software developed by Metalenz. It runs on a Qualcomm Snapdragon processor and was integrated with Samsung’s Isocell Vision 931 sensor in early 2024, raising the prospects for an advanced native facial recognition system with lower manufacturing cost than Apple’s Face ID.

Metalenz also reached a licensing agreement with STMicroelectronics in July to ease the manufacturing, and by extension adoption of its metasurface technology.

Metalenz’ facial recognition is based on capturing polarization signatures from a single image in the near-infrared spectrum. The polarized signature is combined with traditional facial recognition techniques for authentication and biometric liveness detection.

Those looking forward to an Android smartphone with faster and more secure native face biometrics will have to wait, as the S27 Ultra is not the next model Samsung is planning to release. The Galaxy S26 series is rumored to be slated for a launch in February of 2026, according to Android Central.

Further down the road, Metalenz could expand beyond facial unlock into medical applications, as CEO Rob Devlin explained in an interview last year. The company has expanded its patent portfolio this year as it attempts to position itself as the leader in a market Yole Group recently forecast will be worth $2 billion in revenue by 2029.

Article Topics

biometric liveness detection  |  face biometrics  |  facial authentication  |  Metalenz  |  metasurface  |  Polar ID  |  Samsung  |  smartphones