Samsung has confirmed to Android Police that Galaxy S21, S21 Plus, and S21 Ultra will no longer come with Magnetic Secure Transmission (MST). This is a feature that allows Samsung Pay to be used on traditional ‘swipe’ point of sale machines that do not have near field communication (NFC) for contactless payment. Future models will also not come with MST with Samsung citing the widespread adoption of NFC as the reason.
Samsung acquired LoopPay in 2015 which powered this feature. Samsung went all in on Samsung Pay when it first launched with features like this and a somewhat lucrative rewards program, recently Samsung announced that Pay purchases would no longer earn rewards points. Interestingly the LoopPay founder released details of a new all in one card ‘OV Valet’ that they have been working on as well.
