Samsung Pay to come pre-installed on new Galaxy phones

Samsung is hoping to boost adopting of its Samsung Pay service by pre-installing the app on almost all of the Galaxy smartphones it launches in 2017. The South Korean company is also working to bring Samsung Pay to third-party Android devices.

It’s somewhat surprising that Samsung Pay doesn’t already come pre-installed on Galaxy smartphones that are capable of using it. After all, Samsung bundles almost everything else in with its TouchWiz software, including third-party apps not everyone uses.

But that’s changing in 2017. “We have decided to pre-install Samsung Pay in Samsung Electronics’ smartphones to be released from next year,” the company said in a statement to Business Korea. Only budget devices without fingerprint scanners will miss out.

“When reducing costs, we think that fingerprint sensors can be installed from medium-priced products. We are considering mounting fingerprint sensors from the Galaxy J series.”

Just like other mobile payment services, Samsung Pay requires a fingerprint scanner for authentication. Having to enter a passcode to authorize payments kind of defeats the subject, and passcodes aren’t as safe as fingerprints.

Samsung is planning to bring Samsung Pay to third-party Android handsets with an app called Samsung Pay Mini. Although it won’t allow users to make contactless payments in retail stores, it will allow them to checkout with Samsung Pay when shopping online.

Samsung has already tried to launch Samsung Pay Mini on iPhone, but Apple rejected the app. Samsung has since stated it will give up on the App Store and focus exclusively on Android devices instead.