Do not install the One UI 2.5 update if you value Gcam on your Samsung Galaxy phone

Samsung unveiled One UI 2.5 alongside the Galaxy Note 20 phones back in August as an incremental upgrade on the One UI 2.1 that debuted with the Galaxy S20 series. Sadly, it appears that the One UI 2.5 update introduces a rather notable issue for some enthusiasts. 

As reported a few weeks ago, an update broke Google Camera support for the Galaxy S20 series. That update, it has turned out, is the One UI 2.5 update. By a stroke of misfortune, I installed the One UI 2.5 update on my Galaxy S10+ and it ended up breaking all my Google Camera ports. While I've been able to get a working port, at the moment, no Google Camera port offers selfie photo functionality.

The reason is simple: Samsung removed selfie RAW capture permissions on One UI 2.5. As such, any app that requires RAW capture from the selfie camera of any phone on One UI 2.5 loses imaging functionality. To date, those permissions have not been restored, not even on the latest One UI 3.0 beta builds.

While this may seem trivial to some, there is—myself included—a significant portion of Samsung users who value Google Camera support, especially with the selfie camera, considering Samsung's less than satisfactory selfie processing algorithm that tends to smoothen images and leave them with little to no detail or textures. 

One can only hope that the company will re-implement selfie RAW capture permissions on future builds. Either that or improve the stock selfie camera algorithm.