For a while now, Samsung has been slowly pushing some of the features we’ve traditionally associated with flagship Galaxy S and Note phones to its midrange and budget phones.

We saw the introduction of metallic unibody designs a while back and earlier this year, the Samsung Galaxy A 2017 family became the first non-flagships from Sammy to come with premium features, namely a metal and glass body alongside IP68 dust and water resistance. These are features that are still common in the high-end market, but not all high-end devices have them.

Apparently, Samsung has more in store for those who can’t afford the flagship Galaxy S8, Galaxy Note 8 or even the upcoming Galaxy S9. With the debut of the Galaxy Note 7, which didn’t go as planned, Samsung introduced a new feature for biometric authentication – an iris scanner. As the name suggests, this is a feature that scans your eyes in order to grant you access to your phone, just like it already happens with fingerprint scanners.

As expected, iris scanning technology made it to the Samsung Galaxy S8 and Galaxy Note 8. It will also be included on the Galaxy S9 and according to a new report coming from South Korea, 2018 will see more Samsung devices get this feature, including the budget Samsung phones.

Samsung Galaxy S8 and Galaxy Note 8 have a 2MP iris camera resolution and while the feature is quite impressive, the report, which comes from The Korea Herald, says that the Galaxy S9 will get a better 3MP iris camera lens. This sensor is meant to improve the overall quality of iris scanning, where the sensor will be quicker and better at recognizing eyes of users when donning eyeglasses, when in a dark or bright environment or even when eyeballs are moving.

Now, these changes on Samsung Galaxy S9 have more to do with hardware, but that’s not everything that Samsung is reportedly working on. Apparently, the tech giant is also working on new software that will recognize users’ irises more accurately and safely. This software and the general iris scanning technology will also be expanded to Samsung’s budget smartphone lineup as the company pushes its mobile banking initiative to more markets.

Perhaps this move is aimed to bolster the presence of Samsung Pay across the globe. At the moment, only a handful of Samsung phones support this feature and on the list, there aren’t any budget phones. Since these phones are usually sold in developing markets – markets where Samsung Pay hasn’t arrived yet – the push for iris scanning technology in budget phones could also mean the Korean tech giant has plans to roll out the digital wallet service to more of these developing markets. Users can log in to the service using a fingerprint or iris scanner.

For the uninitiated, Samsung Pay is a mobile payment and virtual wallet service that is limited to Samsung devices. The service allows people to use their phones as they would do with credit cards or cash as well as send and withdraw money from their associated bank accounts. According to the report, if iris scanning technology doesn’t make it to budget phones by the end of 2018, they will definitely be on board starting early 2019.

Having an iris scanner on a budget Samsung Galaxy J or Galaxy A phone will for sure be a dream come true for many, especially since the feature is considered to be the safest biometric authentication compared to fingerprint scanning or even facial recognition.

Would you like to see the addition of iris scanning technology to budget Samsung Galaxy phones? Let us know in your comments below.

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