Samsung Galaxy Watch 9 & Galaxy Watch Ultra 2: All the AI Health Leaks and Rumors Before July 22

Samsung's next Galaxy Unpacked event is set for July 22 in London, and while the company hasn't officially named the products, a flood of leaks, certification filings, and a major Samsung Health overhaul have painted a clear picture of what's coming. Here’s the fact-checked breakdown of everything we know about the Galaxy Watch 9 and Galaxy Watch Ultra 2, including the AI health features that will anchor the launch .

Official Teasers Don’t Name the Watches Yet

Samsung confirmed the event on July 7, 2026, with a press release and a teaser video bearing the tagline "A New Shape Unfolds" . The video shows a ticket being printed, with a piece separating to form a shorter, rectangular shape — widely read as a hint at a wider foldable phone, not a watch . Samsung has opened pre-reservations with a teaser of up to $1,200 off, but the company has not officially named the Galaxy Watch 9 or Watch Ultra 2 in any teaser materials .

The event starts at 2:00 PM BST / 9:00 AM ET and will be livestreamed on Samsung.com and YouTube .

Hardware: Galaxy Watch 9 & Galaxy Watch Ultra 2 Leaked Specs

Multiple leakers, FCC certification filings, and firmware teardowns consistently point to two new smartwatches :

Galaxy Watch Ultra 2

• Processor: Qualcomm Snapdragon Wear Elite (3nm, model SW6100) — a shift from Samsung's Exynos chips, with a dedicated Hexagon NPU capable of running on-device AI models up to 2 billion parameters . Qualcomm claims 5x CPU and 7x GPU performance over the W5+ Gen 2 .
• Battery: ~784–800mAh rated capacity (marketed as 800mAh), up from 590mAh in the previous Ultra — roughly a 33% increase .
• RAM: 2GB .
• Storage: 64GB .
• Display: 1.5-inch Super AMOLED, 480 x 480 pixels — same size as the predecessor .
• Case Material: Titanium .
• Water Resistance: 10 ATM (100 meters) .
• Connectivity: Wi-Fi 6, Bluetooth 6.0, UWB, and 5G RedCap in the US and South Korea .
• OS: Wear OS 7 with One UI 9 Watch .

Galaxy Watch 9

• Processor: Same Snapdragon Wear Elite chip .
• Battery: 382mAh rated (marketed as ~400mAh) for the 40mm model; ~435–445mAh for the 44mm model .
• RAM & Storage: 2GB RAM / 32GB storage .
• Display: 1.3-inch (40mm) / 1.47-inch (44mm) Super AMOLED with sapphire crystal; resolutions of 438 x 438 (40mm) and 480 x 480 (44mm) .
• Case Material: Aluminum .
• Water Resistance: 5 ATM .

Both watches have cleared FCC certification — a strong regulatory signal that a launch is imminent .

The Biggest Internal Change: Snapdragon Wear Elite

The most consequential change in the Galaxy Watch 9 and Ultra 2 is the switch from Samsung's own Exynos W1000 chips to Qualcomm's Snapdragon Wear Elite (SW6100) . The 3nm chip uses a five-core architecture: one Cortex-A78C performance core at 2.11GHz and four Cortex-A55 efficiency cores at 1.96GHz . Crucially, the chip includes a Hexagon NPU that can run AI models with up to 2 billion parameters on the device itself, without needing a cloud connection .

This NPU is why the new AI health features (detailed below) require the new hardware .

AI-Driven Health Tracking Features

Samsung officially announced a major Samsung Health app revamp on June 4, 2026, describing it as an "AI-powered health platform" . The update began rolling out on June 8 and introduces five new AI health metrics that Samsung has confirmed will debut with the new Galaxy Watches :

• Vitals — Analyzes five overnight bio-signals (heart rate, HRV, respiratory rate, skin temperature, blood oxygen) against your personal baseline and flags meaningful deviations, reducing unnecessary alerts .
• Heart Health Score — A single daily score combining sleep, stress, activity level, and body composition data to assess long-term cardiovascular wellness. Replaces last year's "Vascular Load" metric .
• Daily Cardio Load — Tracks accumulated cardiovascular strain from exercise, suggesting optimal training targets and rest periods based on your recent history .
• Fitness Index — An overall fitness assessment comparing your heart rate, VO2 max, and step count against your demographic peers .
• Hearing Health — Monitors environmental noise exposure via the watch's built-in noise meter, providing personalized hearing health insights .

A noteworthy detail: the features exist in the Samsung Health app as of June 8, but they will not function until the new Galaxy Watches are connected, because they depend on the Snapdragon Wear Elite's on-device NPU .

Other Devices Expected at the Same Event

The July 22 event is expected to be Samsung's most product-dense Unpacked in years, with the smartwatches joining a broader ecosystem launch :

• Galaxy Z Flip 8 — Next-generation clamshell foldable .
• Galaxy Z Fold 8 — Standard book-style foldable .
• Galaxy Z Fold 8 Ultra — A new, wider "ultra" variant with a larger cover display, widely believed to be the "new shape" referenced in the teaser .
• Samsung Smart Glasses (Galaxy Glasses) — Samsung's first commercial Android XR smart glasses, developed in partnership with Google and Qualcomm .
• Galaxy Ring 2 — A possible second-generation smart ring .
• Galaxy Buds — A new pair of wireless earbuds is also rumored .

Key Caveats

Samsung itself has confirmed only the event date, location, and teaser tagline . All product names, specifications, and features above come from leaks, certification filings (FCC), firmware teardowns, and media reports — not from official Samsung product pages. Multiple well-sourced channels agree on the core details, but nothing is final until Samsung announces it on stage July 22 .