Nothing Phone (2a) Review - Best Designed Mid-ranger
After using the Nothing Phone (2a) as our daily driver for three weeks, we share our thoughts and experiences with the stunning mid-ranger.
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| Nothing Phone (2a)'s unique and eye-catching design |
To recap, the Nothing Phone (2a)'s the company's first mid-ranged smartphone. It incorporates the brand's iconic visuals into a form factor using more affordable materials without compromising on sturdiness or performance.
It has a 120Hz 6.7-inch Gorilla Glass 5 protected LTPO screen, a 4nm Dimensity 7200 octa-core processor, Mali-G610 MC4 GPU, LPDDR5 RAM, 128GB/256GB storage, and a 5,000mAh battery with a 45W fast charging.
At the back are the dual 50MP rear cameras while in front is the 32MP selfie camera.
It is running on Android 14-based NothingOS 2.5. Other features include WiFi 6, 5G, 4G, Bluetooth 5.2, NFC, OTG, GPS, dual Nano SIM, In-display fingerprint scanner, steroe speakers and an IP54 water and dust resistance.
In the Philippines, it is priced at only PHP 18,990 for the 8GB/128GB variant.
Let's dive into the review!
For our review part 1: Nothing Phone 2a Unboxing and First Impressions
Multimedia Experience
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| Nothing Phone (2a)'s display |
In front is the aforementioned 6.7-inch flexible LTPO AMOLED screen with a 2,412 x 1,080 resolution, a 30-120Hz variable refresh rate, a 240Hz touch sampling rate, and a 2,160Hz PWM dimming support.
It is Gorilla Glass 5 protected and it supports HDR10+.
The panel is just bright enough to be readable under direct sunlight at maximum brightness. The colors are vibrant while the contrast is deep. Text and detail are crisp at 1080p resolution.
It supports 10-points of multi-touch which makes it good for multitasking or games that support multiple simultaneous touch inputs. It responds quickly and accurately to our taps and gestures.
The Nothing Phone (2a) is unique in its price range because it is one of the few smartphones with a near-perfect symmetry of bezels around the panel. The bezels aren't the thinnest, but it is satisfying to see.
On the upper part of the panel is the punch hole for the selfie camera. On the top bezel is the super slim earpiece that doubles as the second speaker.
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| Nothing (2a)'s bottom-firing speaker |
For audio, the phone is equipped with stereo speakers. The first is the bottom-firing speaker and the second is the aforementioned earpiece. Around the phone are three HD microphones used for noise cancelling in calls and audio recording.
The sound from the earpiece speaker is slightly less powerful than the bottom-firing speaker but together create an immersive sound with decent power and clarity, loud maximum volume and minimal distortion. To get the best sound quality, settle at 90 percent volume as the maximum volume has some noticeable distortion.
The microphones do a good job of picking up sounds from a meter away while the noise-cancellation for calls is good too.
Cameras
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| Nothing (2a)'s rear camera bump |
As mentioned earlier, the phone is equipped with a 50MP f/1.88 main camera with OIS and a 50MP f/2.2 ultra-wide angle camera with an LED flash.
The stock camera app's modes include Photo, Video, Portrait, Expert, Time-Lapse, Pano and Slo-Mo. The night mode (crescent moon icon) button appears on the corner of the viewfinder when the app detects a low light scene.
The Pro mode allows for controls of ISO (100-6400), Shutter Speed (32-1/8,000 sec), EV (+-3), Focus, and White Balance. Users can also switch between 1x and 2x crop zoom. Users who want more control over the files can also save photos in RAW format.
Rear Camera Samples
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| Nothing Phone (2a) daylight 1x |
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| Nothing Phone (2a) daylight 2x |
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| Nothing Phone (2a) daylight ultra-wide |
All daylight images from the rear camera module produce surprisingly consistent results in terms of color, contrast and detail. What we noticed was the oversharpened clouds that made them appear unnatural.
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| Nothing Phone (2a) indoors 1x |
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| Nothing Phone (2a) indoors 2x |
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| Nothing Phone (2a) indoors ultra-wide |
The above images were taken in a well-lit coffee shop. The resulting images from the 1x, 2x and ultra-wide were consistent. All three have similar color and contrast. However, the 2x crop is noticeably softer.
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| Nothing Phone (2a) lowlight 1x |
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| Nothing Phone (2a) lowlight 2x |
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| Nothing Phone (2a) lowlight ultra-wide |
For low light, the sharpness and detail were affected by the slight noise build-up. The ultra-wide has some noticeable lens flares too. Colors remained saturated while contrast is decent.
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| Nothing Phone (2a) night mode 1x |
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The Night mode improves the sharpness, detail, and contrast while reducing noise and grain, especially in bright areas for 1x, 2x and ultra-wide. There was no lens flare either.
Overall, the rear camera produced good images that just need tweaking to get the best possible result. However, the 2x's sharpness in indoors and low light are softer than we expect in this price range.
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| Nothing (2a)'s selfie camera |
The 16MP f/2.45 selfie camera is on the punch hole on the display
Camera modes include Photo, Video, Portrait, Panorama and Night mode.
Selfie Camera Samples
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| Selfie daylight |
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| Selfie portrait |
Daylight selfies from the Nothing Phone (2a) are decent. You immediately notice the sharpness and detail. The colors of most elements in the frame are accurate except for the skin tones.
The portrait mode's edge detection is impressive. It almost didn't struggle with fine hair fibres.
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| Selfie indoors |
Indoors, the image is similar to daylight where the sharpness and detail is good while the colors are mostly accurate except for skin tones. In this case, the skin tones are orange.
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| Selfie low light |
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| Selfie night mode |
In low light, the selfie camera's images have more grain and noise which affects the detail and sharpness of the overall image.
The night mode managed to recover the sharpness, detail and color of the subject but the moving objects and the background remained muddy from the noise reduction.
Overall, the front cameras produce images with very good color, contrast, sharpness, and detail but struggle with skin tones. The night mode could use some tweaks too.
The rear camera can record up to 4K at 30fps or 1080p at 60fps. The footage is acceptable in sharpness but even in daylight, noise is apparent. The limitation of only having EIS is seen due to its shaky footage.
If you want more stabilized footage, use the Ultra Steady mode. It has a pretty large crop and is limited to 1080 at 60fps.
The selfie camera can record up to 1080 at 60fps. Like the main camera, the footage is decently sharp but shaky.
Performance
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| Nothing Phone (2a) AnTuTu and GeekBench results |
To recap, the Nothing Phone (2a) features the 4nm MediaTek Dimensity 7200 octa-core processor, Adreno GPU, 8GB/12GB LPDDR5, and 256GB/512GB of storage.
During the AnTuTu test, the phone's temperature increased by 5 degrees while the battery lost 5 percent power.
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| Nothing Phone (2a) 3DMark and CPDT results |
Nothing Phone (2a) benchmarks:
- AnTuTu - 673,769
- Geekbench 6 - 1,138 (single-core), 2,572 (multi-core)
- 3D Mark WildLife - 4,176 at 25.01 average fps
- CPDT - 673.03 MB/s sequential read speeds and 490.45 MB/s sequential write speeds
The Nothing Phone (2a) scores in AnTuTu, Geekbench, and 3DMark are in the range of what we expected from this combination of chipset and software.
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| Genshin Impact graphics settings |
On Genshin Impact, it is set on the low graphics settings as the default. Playing the game is mostly smooth when wandering around the world but when in combat with many animations, the phone stutters occasionally.
In our experience, the phone can handle the majority of tasks like navigating through the OS, opening apps, web surfing, and social media without struggling.
Fast In-Display fingerprint sensor
The phone has an optical In-Display fingerprint sensor and face unlock for security. The initial setup and subsequent uses are quick and it detects our biometrics instantaneously. It works even if your finger is a little sweaty.
The face unlocks only struggles when the camera is dirty or when we are wearing a mask and sunglasses. The screen brightens up when used in the dark. Face unlock even has a super bright mode that can be set in the settings.
Regarding connectivity, we have the following: WiFi 6, 5G, 4G LTE, Bluetooth 5.3, NFC, OTG, GPS, GLONASS, Beidou, Galileo, and dual nano SIM.
Connection is usually stable for WiFi and we get 4 to 5 bars of mobile data signal most of the time.
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| PCMark Battery Benchmark results |
Inside the phone is a large 5,000mAh battery. It lasted more than 18 hours on our usual PCMark Battery benchmark. In daily use, we were consistently getting around 6 hours of on-screen time even when constantly connected to 5G, WiFi and Bluetooth devices.
Decent battery despite its slim design!
The battery charges via USB-C with the 45W wall charger which charges the phone 100 percent in around 80 minutes.
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| Nothing (2a)'s unique UI |
It is running on NothingOS 2.5 based on Android 14. It comes with visual refinements to the iconic Nothing Interface while adding more functionality. This includes the Glyph Interface at the back. Even though there are less number of Glyph LED lights when compared to the Nothing Phone 2.0, it has enough to have useful integrations like volume level. You can also tinker with it to have the lights sync with music visualisations when playing music.
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| Android 14-based NothingOS 2.5 |
Visually, NothingOS is still one of the more unique and beautiful skins out there without adding bloat or too many features. This is a benefit as it makes navigating through the OS and settings easier when there are fewer items.
Pros - Unique and iconic design, clever use of build materials, 120Hz LTPO AMOLED screen, Symmetrical bezels, Solid Specs, Good CPU and GPU performance, Decent camera performance
Cons - Shaky video with only EIS, skin tones in photo and video can be improved via firmware, IP54 water and dust resistance rating compared to the competition isn't the best
Nothing Phone (2a) Specs
Display: 6.7-inch Gorilla Glass 5 protected flexible 10-bit LTPO AMOLED screen w/ 30-120Hz refresh rate, 240Hz touch sampling rate, 2160Hz PWM dimming, HDR10+, FHD+ 2412 x 1080 resolution at 394 ppi
CPU: 2.8GHZ 4nm MediaTek Dimensity 7200 Pro octa-core processor
GPU: Mali-G610 MC4
RAM: 8GB/12GB LPDDR5 RAM
ROM: 256GB/512GB
Back Camera: 50MP f/1.88 w/ OIS + 50MP f/2.2 ultra-wide-angle
Selfie Camera: 32MP f/2.4
Battery: 5,000mAh w/ 45W fast charging
OS: Android 14 w/ NothingOS 2.5
Connectivity: WiFi 6 2x2 MIMO, 5G SA/NSA, 4G LTE, Bluetooth 5.3, OTG, NFC, GPS (L1+L5), GLONASS, BeiDou, Galileo, QZSS, SBAS, dual SIM (nano)
Sensors: Accelerometer, light, orientation, proximity, gyroscope, sound, magnetic
Others: In-Display fingerprint sensor, IP54 water and dust resistance, stereo speakers, 3x HD microphones, Glyph Interface, USB-C, Colors: White, Black
Dimensions: 161.74 x 76.32 x 8.55 mm
Weight: 190 g
Price: PHP 18,990 (8GB/128GB), PHP 20,990 (12GB/256GB)
Verdict
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| Nothing Phone (2a) handheld |
Nothing Phone (2a) has one of the best build and design for its price range. It is rare for a company to lean in completely to the materials' strengths. Others would make plastic or polycarbonate look metallic. The body is lightweight and easy to hold too.
It has a stunning 120Hz FHD+ LTPO AMOLED screen with symmetrical bezels. It even is decently bright enough to be readable under direct sunlight. It also has immersive stereo speakers.
The cameras perform well in daylight and indoors but struggle in low light and with skin tones.
It has one of the most premium yet unique designs in its class. It's definitely an eye-catching phone.
The specs are solid and can do what most people want and need to do. It may struggle with more demanding games though.
The 5,000mAh battery paired with fast 45W SUPERVOOC charging allows it to last up to 6 hours of on-screen time after being connected to 5G and WiFi all day while also serving as our hotspot.
We recommend it if you want a good-performing phone with the best hardware and software visuals in its price range.
If you are its target audience or market, go for it. If you are a mobile gamer, look elsewhere.
What do you think guys?
Build/Design - 4.75
Multimedia Experience - 4.5
Cameras - 4.25
Performance - 4.25
Average - 4.44/5
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