Samsung Galaxy Note 8 release date, specs news & update: Phablet launches with upgrade program for Note 7 owners

The Samsung Galaxy Note 8 is coming next year, and Samsung is taking great care to do things right this time around.

After the unfortunate debacle concerning their previous phablet model, the Samsung Galaxy Note 7, rumors began spreading about the South Korean tech company possibly retiring the Galaxy Note lineup for good.

The massive global recall they had to do involved more than 2.5 million Note 7 units on top of giving them more than a handful of multi-million dollar lawsuits to settle. Samsung is expected to bounce back from their losses with the release of a Galaxy Note 8 along with a Galaxy S8.

The company has yet to release an official statement regarding the cause of the exploding units but has repeatedly stated that investigations are still ongoing. With regards to the production of the upcoming Galaxy Note 8, Samsung assured the anxious public that it is prioritizing safety by ensuring quality control measures are observed at all times during the different stages of production.

Reports about an upcoming Samsung Galaxy Note 8 came at the heels of the South Korean tech company's announcement about an upgrade program for Note 7 owners. They promised that customers in South Korea who have already traded in their Note 7 for any of the Galaxy S7 variants can still further trade up for either a Galaxy S8 or Note 8 when the said devices launch in 2017.

This upgrade program only requires users who have upgraded their Note 7 to an S7 to pay half the price of the phone before they can be eligible to trade up to an S8 or a Note 8 device.

However, it is still not clear whether this deal is exclusive to South Korean users or if it will eventually extend to global Samsung consumers.

The Samsung Galaxy S8 is expected to be announced at the upcoming Mobile World Congress happening in Barcelona in February 2017. The Samsung Galaxy Note 8 is also rumored to be announced alongside it.

Aside from better batteries, the Note 8 is expected to be a bigger version of the S8, which has been rumored to feature a curvy design as opposed to a flat version, a RAM boost, and two cameras on the back. The Note 8 may also come complete with an S-Pen stylus.