Samsung answers questions about throttling in Galaxy S22 and other flagships

Samsung made tech headlines for the wrong reasons last week when it emerged that the company was throttling games via its Game Optimizing Service (GOS) but not slowing down benchmark apps. Furthermore, a list of 10,000 apps appeared online that were apparently throttled, with most of them not being games, to begin with.

Now, Samsung has issued a FAQ on its Korean-language support website regarding the GOS saga. In the machine-translated FAQ, the manufacturer reiterates that GOS “optimizes” CPU and GPU performance in order to prevent excessive heat.

Samsung clarifies list of apps

It also reiterates that a software update is coming for the Game Launcher that will bring a performance priority toggle to the Game Booster settings suite, stating that users can expect an improvement of ~10 frames per second in at least one game. 

Interestingly, Samsung claimed that a list of 10,000 apps that surfaced online wasn’t actually a list of apps throttled by GOS. Instead, it claimed that the list was “for the purpose of quickly determining whether a newly installed app is a game or not.”

Samsung GOS and benchmark apps

One disappointing turn of events was the fact that benchmark apps weren’t subjected to these same throttling measures, but the company clarified its position here:

The benchmark tool is not a gaming app, so it is not covered by GOS.

That’s not exactly great reasoning, as benchmark results are often used to gauge the performance of smartphones. So these benchmarks wouldn’t actually reflect the real-world performance experience.  

It’s worth noting that OnePlus received a similar level of flak for the OnePlus 9 Pro after it emerged that it was throttling apps but excluding many benchmark apps too. In fact, an Android Authority poll at the time found that almost three-quarters of respondents wouldn’t buy a phone that throttled performance for better battery life.

Circumventing GOS and warranties

Samsung also confirmed that it started to block GOS circumvention in One UI 4.0 last year and continued to clamp down with One UI 4.1 last month. The company noted in the FAQ that it’s now considering the removal of these measures so users can more easily disable GOS once again.

Furthermore, the company also sought to address concerns that it wouldn’t offer free repairs due to overheating when people used the upcoming performance priority option. It noted that free service would still be offered if the phone was within its warranty period.

Finally, Samsung said that other Galaxy phones with GOS (aside from the S22 series) would also receive updated optimization software. Presumably, this means that these phones would receive a performance priority option in the Game Booster too.