Galaxy S26 Ultra Stuck on Setup After One UI 9? Samsung Confirms the Bug. Try These Fixes

Samsung’s One UI 9 update was supposed to be the easy part of owning a Galaxy S26 Ultra this fall. For a small but loud group of owners, it has turned the setup screen into a dead end. Reset the phone after updating, or reboot it at the wrong moment, and it can stall on the welcome screen with a message that reads “The webpage is unavailable,” leaving Samsung’s top flagship unable to reach the home screen.

Samsung has confirmed the bug and says it’s working on a fix. It hasn’t said when that fix ships. Here’s what’s going on, who’s affected, and the workarounds that are getting people unstuck right now.

What the One UI 9 setup bug does

The first widely shared report came from a Galaxy S26 Ultra owner on Samsung’s South Korean community forum. After the One UI 9.0 update, the phone went to a black screen with no lock screen or home screen, just an error saying a Samsung account policy page couldn’t load, followed by “Cannot load webpage.” “Since the UI 9.0 update, this keeps appearing on my phone screen,” the user wrote, in a machine translation quoted by Android Central.

Because the failure happens inside setup, it mostly bites people who factory-reset after updating, or whose phones drop back into the post-update welcome flow. 9to5Google bluntly called affected units “basically paperweights.” That’s fair while you’re staring at it, though the phone isn’t damaged and the data on it isn’t the problem.

A Samsung community manager replied on the forum with the cause:

“The development team has confirmed that this issue occurs when using an unstable system WebView on certain networks.”

WebView is the Android component apps use to show web pages inside themselves. Samsung’s setup wizard uses it to load account terms and sign-in pages. If that page won’t load, setup won’t move forward.

It isn’t the only One UI 9 setup error

This is the second setup-screen failure tied to One UI 9 in about two weeks. On October 12, Android Authority reported owners of the Galaxy S26, S25 and S24 series, plus at least one foldable, getting stuck on an XML “Access Denied” screen after the update installed. Samsung didn’t comment at the time, and it’s still not clear whether the two problems share a root cause.

Neither problem appears to be widespread. 9to5Google, Android Central and Android Headlines all note that the reports so far come from a limited number of owners, and the original WebView report came from Korea. But Samsung has been pushing One UI 9 to Galaxy phones in the U.S. all month, including the Galaxy S25 and S24 lines, so American owners are running the same software.

How to get past the stuck setup screen

None of these is an official fix, and sources differ on one key detail. Android Central and Android Headlines, relaying Samsung’s advice, say to sign in over Wi-Fi rather than mobile data. 9to5Google reports that switching from Wi-Fi to mobile data helped some people. Both point to the same thing Samsung did: the network you’re on matters. If one fails, try the other.

If your phone is stuck on “The webpage is unavailable”

1. Switch networks. If you’re on mobile data, connect to Wi-Fi, as Samsung suggests. If you’re already on Wi-Fi, try another network or turn Wi-Fi off and use mobile data.
2. Force a restart. Hold the volume down and power buttons together until the phone reboots, then try setup again.
3. Go offline. Several owners got through by booting into Safe Mode (hold volume down when the Samsung logo appears), then turning on airplane mode or disabling Wi-Fi and mobile data so setup can’t try to load the page.
4. Sign in later. Once you reach the home screen, update Chrome and Android System WebView from the Play Store, then add your Samsung account. If sign-in still fails in the app, Android Headlines suggests using Samsung’s account website instead.

If you see the XML “Access Denied” screen

Android Authority’s readers had luck with the same playbook: force restart, Safe Mode, and cutting the connection. If you can’t reach network settings, turn off your router, pull the SIM card or move out of Wi-Fi range. Some people found a later restart simply worked, which hints Samsung may have changed something on its servers.

Should you hold off on One UI 9 or a reset?

If your Galaxy is already running One UI 9 and working, you don’t need to do anything. Just avoid a factory reset for now unless you have to. If you do need to reset, or you’re setting up a replacement phone, update Chrome and WebView first and be ready to switch networks or go offline during setup.

If you haven’t installed One UI 9 yet, there’s no harm in waiting a week or two for Samsung’s patch. Owners of the Galaxy S24 and S25 have another reason to be patient: 9to5Google also rounded up reports of worse battery life since the update, including an S25 owner who said they’re charging “3 to 4 times a day.” Those complaints aren’t widespread either, but they add to the picture of a rocky rollout.

The bigger frustration is that setup is the one screen you can’t troubleshoot from inside the phone. Samsung knows the cause. A quick fix for the setup wizard, and a clear note in the release notes when it lands, would go a long way.

Sources: Android Central, 9to5Google, Android Headlines, Android Authority. Photo by Amanz on Unsplash.