The first time we've seen an S Pen was back in the summer of 2011 when Samsung surprised
a lot of people by launching what was then considered a massive 5.3-inch smartphone.
I'm obviously talking about the original Galaxy Note, the product that is largely credited
to kickstarting the phablet market.
It could detect 256 pressure points and could only be used for basic stuff such as navigating
the device, grabbing screenshots using the built-in hardware button located on top, and
basic scribbling.
Looking at the S Pen-enabled apps that Samsung bundled on the original Galaxy Note, it is
retrospectively quite obvious that the software wasn't prepared to make full use of the stylus
at the moment.
Just to put things into perspective, note that the original Galaxy Note landed with
Android 2.3 Gingerbread on board.
The original S Memo app only came with a limited number of pencil, brush, and pen shapes.
but it nevertheless cemented its place as an essential part of the Note brand we know
and love today.
Although it felt experimental on the original Note, the S Pen really came into its own on
the Note 2.
To start off, Samsung redesigned the stylus entirely, making it longer, thinner, and more
ergonomic.
Also, S Pen on the Note 2 could detect 1024 different levels of pressure.
That's four times the sensitivity of the original S Pen.
One of the best things about the Note 2's S Pen was the Air View feature.
This allowed the user to hover the pen on top of an icon, email, or media to quickly
glance at a preview without actually navigating away from their current screen.
Another great feature introduced was called Easy Clip.
By pressing and holding the S Pen button, users could quickly outline and crop content
from virtually any screen and then pass on this crops to email, note-taking, and image
processing apps.
If the S Pen button wasn't very useful on Samsung's original stylus, the situation changed
for the better with the second iteration.
While the pressure sensitivity remained the same, the S Pen's design underwent a drastic
overhaul and now featured a squarish, symmetrical design.
This meant you could now store the S Pen in its slot without having to fiddle around for
the right side.
The biggest and best change, though, was the addition of the Air Command menu, which brought
the main S Pen functionality together in a single, half-circle menu that would appear
any time you ejected the stylus.
Thankfully, for those that were turned on by the Note series but turned off by the price,
Samsung released a stripped-back version of the Note 3 called the Galaxy Note 3 Neo.
Despite an overall drop in power, the Neo came with all of the same S Pen features found
on its premium counterpart.
When it comes to the S Pen and its features, the Note 4 was more of an iterative update.
The best new feature was undeniably Smart Select which made it possible to select text
on a website or document.
This made the S Pen truly feel like a PC mouse for the first time as you could copy and paste
lines of text with just a few gestures and taps of the S Pen.
With the Note 5, Samsung continued improving on the S Pen hardware by making the pen longer,
thinner, and smoother.
Samsung took the necessary decision to strip out much of the unnecessary features from
its S Pen-ready suite.
The Air Command menu also went through a design overhaul to match Samsung's then custom skin
TouchWiz's new look and less bloat-heavy aesthetic and added the option to edit which apps appear
in the menu.
Also, users managed to get their S Pens stuck by inserting it into the phone backwards.
This second problem has been often referred to as the Pengate scandal.
Fortunately, Samsung later rolled out a quick production line fix to make sure that the
stylus doesn't fit when inserted the wrong way.
Samsung upped the S Pen pressure sensitivity once again to a whopping 4,096 and kitted
it out with water resistance, making it feasibly possible to whip up a drawing underwater or,
as was likely more common, use the S Pen in the rain.
You also now couldn't put the S Pen in the phone backwards, so no more 'Pengate' problems
at least.
It also got some software upgrades.
The most notable was Animation select, which let users record 15-second GIFs by drawing
out a frame with the stylus.
Despite the major design shift of the phone, Samsung took a relatively cautious approach
and kept the design and basically functionality of the S Pen intact.
The notable changes came in the software department where productivity was once again a key focus.
Translate could now translate full sentences and not just individual words.
It also had Screen Off Memos and There was also the addition of Live Message for making
animated GIFs out of recorded stylus text, effects, and images to share with friends
and family.
the Note 9's S Pen represents an evolutionary milestone for the Note series' stylus.
The introduction of Bluetooth support is a revelation, letting users utilize the S Pen
as a remote control for all manner of regular smartphone functions.
These include opening the camera, switching between regular photos or selfies, control
music playback, flip through presentation slides, and much more.
All in all, the Note 9 S Pen is the next logical step in the stylus progression.
And I can't wait to see where it goes next.