September is a crowded phone-launch month, with more than 20 new models expected. Yet the phone Malaysian readers clicked through to buy most on ProductNation over the past three months is not on any of those lists. It is the Samsung Galaxy S22 Ultra, a flagship Samsung unveiled at its Unpacked event in February 2022.
Between July and September 2026, our buying guides logged more than 26,000 clicks on phone listings across nearly 700 different models. The Galaxy S22 Ultra came out on top, ahead of the HONOR X9c, a mid-range 5G phone from late 2024, and the Galaxy S25+. Samsung alone drew close to a quarter of every phone click we recorded.
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The new phones are missing from the top
The pattern is hard to miss. None of the ten most-clicked phones launched in 2026. The newest among them are early-2025 flagships like the Galaxy S25+ and the S25 Ultra. Around them sit models from 2021, 2022 and 2023: the Galaxy S22, the Galaxy S23 Ultra and the Galaxy Z Flip3.
One caveat matters. This is click data from our own buying guides, a measure of shopping interest rather than a national sales chart, and older phones have a head start because the guides featuring them have ranked on Google for longer and gathered clicks the whole time. So the list leans towards established models by design. Even so, the near-total absence of 2026 phones near the top is striking in a month built entirely around new ones.
Why an older flagship keeps winning
Price is one likely driver. The cost of a new Galaxy S flagship in Malaysia has climbed, with the cheapest new model rising about RM1,200 in a year. An S22 Ultra now more than four years old sells at a heavy discount while still offering a large screen, an S Pen and a camera that holds up. For many buyers, a former flagship at today's mid-range price is simply the better deal.
Foldables tell the same story. The Galaxy Z Flip3, Z Fold4 and Z Fold3, all from 2021 and 2022, pulled more clicks than several newer folding phones. Interest in the format is real, but it gathers around the older, cheaper units rather than the latest ones. Samsung's newest and cheaper S-series phone, the Galaxy S26 FE, only reached Malaysia recently from RM2,899, and whether it pulls attention from the older models will show up in the same click data over the coming months.
A launch month readers are shrugging at
This September is shaping up as one of the heaviest launch stretches in memory. Apple holds its iPhone event on 9 September, and a run of Android flagships and foldables follows through the month. On the evidence of our own data, the new arrivals face a Malaysian audience that is, for now, far more interested in phones it has been reading about for years.
The phone our readers most want to buy is one they could have bought four and a half years ago. We will run the same numbers again once September's launches have had a few weeks to settle, and see whether any of them break into the list.
Cover and photos courtesy of Evgeny Opanasenko and Jae Park on Unsplash. Chart by ProductNation.
