Nothing Phone (2a) Plus Review
Our final verdict on the new Nothing mid-ranger
Verdict
The Nothing Phone (2a) Plus has a nice screen, pleasant software, a great design, dependable cameras and excellent battery life. That it also has power to spare, good speakers and a funky set of lights on the rear are merely icing – but it isn’t without its flaws.
Pros
- Distinctive design
- Excellent battery life
- Dependable performance
Cons
- Slippy finish that attracts dirt
- Not the fastest charging
- No telephoto camera
Key Features
- High-res selfie cameraThe Nothing Phone (2a) Plus features a boosted 50MP selfie camera capable of 4K video capture
- Exclusive chipsetWe’ve not seen the MediaTek Dimensity 2030 Pro 5G in any other smartphone
- Metallic finishThe Nothing Phone (2a) Plus is available in a metallic grey finish, adding a shimmer to the phone’s visible internals.
Introduction
Smartphones are wonderful things. They hold our lives, digital, social and otherwise, in their metal and glass bodies, allowing a level of connectivity not even dreamed about in years past.
But not everything about them is convenience and wonderment, there’s a darker side too. Their bright colours, insistent sounds and gamified interfaces are precision-engineered to bamboozle our millennia-old monkey brains, simply put they are just a bit too stimulating.
This is a problem which many manufacturers don’t really put much thought into, after all, their job is to encourage you to buy more phones and use them longer, not the opposite. That is, except Nothing.
The oddly-named firm has staked out ground in a complex and saturated market by claiming itself to be a counterpoint to the likes of the others. And its devices, to some extent, bear witness to that ambition, with transparent backs and pushing monochrome interfaces. This is a company which is trying to sell the concept of nothing through a smartphone.
That’s a high concept, and whether it is enough against polished competition to really make a difference is yet to be seen. Regardless of how a smartphone is marketed, it is still a smartphone to be measured and compared against the rest. So does it do enough to earn a place in your pocket?
Design
- Plastic all around
- Distinctive back panel
- Glyphs light up with notifications
There’s no impression quite so important as a first impression, and seemingly aware of this, Nothing has gone all out to make the (2a) Plus stand out from the competition. If others are generally garden-variety copies of the standard iPhone, this is most definitely not.
To begin, we come to the very prominent rear. The entire rear panel is see-through, transparent plastic, showing a curated view of the phone’s insides with a metallic finish that separates it from the regular Phone (2a). There’s an NFC reader and more, while the cameras sit on an island around four-fifths of the way up the device.
Putting it mildly, it looks like very little else on the market. This is a rare phone with a visual identity clearly its own, and sticks out nicely.
The slightly early noughties influence in the design extends to the frame too. Glossy plastic is used in lieu of metal or glass, no doubt to keep costs down. With this kind of soft material come some concerns, I didn’t feel that the (2a) Plus would come out well after a scuffle with some keys in a trouser pocket. If you want to keep your phone pristine, you’ll need a case.
There’s one big benefit which comes from using plastic; weight or lack thereof. Although the display is large at 6.7 inches, and the phone is relatively thick at 8.5mm, it weighs a mere 190g. Compared to even the smaller iPhone Pro models it is a noticeable improvement and aids one-handed usability greatly.
On the left of the phone, there’s a volume rocker, while on the right sits a power button. The bottom houses a USB-C port for charging and data transfer, along with the SIM tray and the first of two front-firing speakers, with the second being the earpiece. Two colourways are offered, Black and Grey, which is a slight shame.
If Nothing had really wanted to embrace its style influences with the (2a) Plus, it would have been nice to see some 1999 iMac-coloured translucent plastics, but there are none to be seen.
One real innovation is the inclusion of the ‘Glyph’ system, a series of lights underneath the translucent casing which light up in different orders according to your preferences. Key to them is that they are only visible when the device is screen-down on a surface, so you aren’t looking at it. It’s an extension of the notification light, and a stylish, if inconsequential, addition.
In all, this is a memorable device at a point where it feels jarring to see something different in the mid-range space. There’s been such a sea of cookie-cutter designs for so long that something, anything, is a breath of fresh air.
Screen
- FHD+ resolution
- 120Hz AMOLED
- Bright enough for strong sunlight
If the outer design of the Nothing Phone (2a) Plus showcases some of the ambition that the firm has to help people unplug, there are no such efforts made with the screen. As usual it has a truckload of marketing terms attached to it, each of which is a signifier that a key ambition here was at least to match the competition.
This isn’t to disparage the device, it’s more recognition of the general state of smartphone screens. Like most others at the price point, it is 1080p in resolution, boasts AMOLED screen tech, has a 120Hz refresh rate and sports HDR capabilities. None of these are negative in any respect, they are just so similar to the competition as to almost not be worthy of mention.
The screen, like many others, is bright enough to remain legible in strong sunlight, as well as dim enough to work well for bedtime reading. It has vibrant colours, but not so much that things appear cartoonish, and with HDR, supported content looks great.
What it would have been nice to see is something like TCL’s paperlike displays, a secondary hardware solution to the problems defined by Nothing, rather than another good, but cookie-cutter panel. Instead of a screen designed to help reduce eye fatigue, it’s another effort which reinforces existing issues.
Coming to the refresh rate, it is variable but not in the same way as more premium devices. While they can refresh dynamically depending on the content shown, sometimes down to 1Hz, here we have three options: 60Hz, 90Hz and 120Hz. You have the option to set it constantly at the highest setting or the lowest setting, or to let the phone itself decide. For many people, the last option is likely to be the most sensible.
In all, there’s no disputing that the screen on the (2a) Plus is objectively a good one, it is just lacking a little of the thought so obviously put into the other areas of the device.
Camera
- Three 50MP sensors
- No telephoto
- Optical image stabilisation
Coming to the camera, on the surface we see something of a similar lack of ambition. There’s a 50MP f1.9 main sensor, flanked by a 50MP ultrawide on the rear, with a 50MP selfie sensor on the front, making the (2a) Plus quite a capable cameraphone.
Starting with the camera interface, it is a showcase for Nothing’s design work. There’s no massive profusion of modes, everything is stripped back and simple to access. Crucially, it’s quick to launch too, meaning you are less likely to miss important moments.
Image quality, at least from the main sensor, is great for the price class. Photos are sharp and detailed, displaying wide dynamic range and there’s enough saturation to offer pop without being over the top.
That said, these are photos firmly on the ‘Samsung’ side of the saturation debate, which if you aren’t invested in the smartphone world, means colours produced tend towards lurid at times. If you are like me and enjoy your photos a little livelier than most, images produced by the (2a) Plus will be right up your street. Those preferring a more naturalistic representation would be best to look elsewhere.
Low-light performance is also pleasant, though images have a tendency to be over-brightened. The tuning on the (2a) Plus tends to make images look a little as though they were taken during daytime, even later at night.
Performance on the ultrawide sensor, as is to be expected, is a little less potent than on the main snapper. Images still have a pleasant degree of saturation, however there’s less detail and sharpness, par for the course when it comes to smaller sensors.
The selfie sensor was something of a revelation. More megapixels do not a better camera make, however here the new 50MP sensor results in images that have a great level of detail, while still remaining flattering.
Performance
- 12GB of RAM by default
- MediaTek Dimensity 7350 Pro 5G processor
- Powerful enough for most tasks
If the (2a) Plus lacks ambition with its screen, and doesn’t make great claims with its camera, performance is a field where it tries to make a mark.
Inside it runs the MediaTek Dimensity 7350 Pro 5G, a chip not used by any other mid-ranger focused on power and efficiency. That’s backed up by 12GB of RAM, which can be ‘extended’ to 20GB using a feature called RAM Boost, but this is definitely an example of marketing getting ahead of engineering.
As might be expected with a modern mid-range smartphone, swiping through the interface is no issue for the (2a) Plus. Pretty much anything you can throw at the phone it handles with aplomb, even heavier games. Though you’ll need to drop from the highest graphics settings in some, the likes of PUBG ran flawlessly.
These subjective experiences are backed up by benchmarking, where the (2a) Plus achieved some interesting scores. With a 1147 single core score and a 2614 multi core score in Geekbench 6, it achieves a similar result in both to the likes of the Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra, a slightly long-in-the-tooth flagship, though it falls behind the likes of the Google Pixel 8a and Samsung Galaxy A55 5G.
All of this is backed up by 256GB of storage by default, which should be enough to see most people through at least two years of ownership. There’s no higher storage options available, or the ability to add more storage through a MicroSD card, as such if you need extra, then other devices may be a better choice.
Software
- Runs Android 14
- Customised with ‘Nothing OS’
- Emphasis on greyscale throughout design
If Nothing has chosen not to emphasise other areas, that’s at least in part because software is the basket which has received the most of its proverbial eggs.
Using its custom launcher, the firm has carved out a clear identity and design language of its own, all of which is applied thoughtfully and consistently throughout its design.
With dots reminiscent of an old mono LCD panel used throughout, the emphasis is on colour, or a lack thereof. The palette of the device is monochrome throughout, with apps on the home screen relegated to buttons sapped of vibrancy, or indeed their names. Unless you are very familiar with logos, you’ll be launching most from the app drawer.
Now, in addition to an attempt to be ‘different’, there’s a little science behind the theoretical benefits of such an approach. As alluded to before, our brains deal with a lot of complex stimuli, but fundamentally aren’t that different to those of humans thousands or tens of thousands of years ago.
We evolved colour vision in part to tell whether fruit is ripe or not, and as we know the riper the fruit, the more vibrant the colour. So applying this science to our unsuspecting eyeballs, app designers and others have been able to ‘game’ how we look at and choose content for a while. It’s the same concepts as applied to supermarket shelves, every product wants your attention and they’ve got different ways of attracting it.
The Nothing Phone (2a) Plus therefore removes colour, and then the theoretical temptation to doomscroll. Does it work? That’ll depend on individual use cases, in my case the answer was no, some things are just a little too tempting and impossible to ignore.
In any case, Nothing OS as it is called is pleasant to use. There’s a lot of widgets on the home screen which can be used and customised, anything from a button to activate the torch to an analog clock. Crucially, everything follows the same design language and looks visually cohesive.
There’s a few omissions, which means that although it works well it doesn’t achieve the same kind of usefulness as some rival options, the main contender being Motorola’s software. There’s no thoughtful gestures, or a desktop mode, but for the moment, Nothing OS is pleasant to use.
For the most part it is stable too, though I did experience an odd glitch, where when launching the camera from the lock screen the device would freeze and require a hard reset to work again.
Nothing promises three years of feature updates, four years of security updates, which is nice to see but which needs a caveat. As a small firm, Nothing occupies a slightly more precarious financial position than, say, Samsung. It’s all well and good to promise that much support, however if the firm folds you’ll be left high and dry.
Battery life
- 5,000mAh battery
- Wired charging at 50W
- No wireless charging
Of all the areas that have been a focus for Nothing with the (2a) Plus, relatively little energy has been devoted to talking up the battery life. That’s something of a shame, as battery life was an unexpected but definite high point of the device.
With an efficient modern processor and a large 5000mAh battery, the ingredients are certainly all there for good battery life, however what the (2a) Plus achieves is nothing short of excellent.
Starting with a full charge on day one, with two hours of sat nav across the course of the day, along with half an hour of calls and emails throughout, by 10pm I had around 65% left in the tank. That stretched through to the end of day two, this really is a two day smartphone. That’s with the big caveat that this will depend on your use case, if you like to game you’ll kill the battery in a day but that’s the same for any device.
When the time comes to recharge, fast wired charging is available at 50W, which isn’t the fastest on the market, but remains pretty speedy for the price point.
That being said, the device is fast to juice back up, in testing it managed to regain around 28% in 15 minutes, which is enough to make a difference in more difficult situations. The lack of wireless charging is unfortunate; it is becoming less of a luxury and more of a necessity as time passes.
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Should you buy it?
You want a powerful and stylish mid-range phone
The Nothing Phone (2a) Plus looks like nothing else on the market and flies through most tasks with ease.
You want a rugged smartphone
Though the Nothing Phone (2a) Plus has some basic waterproofing, it loves to dive from surfaces and doesn’t feel like it would enjoy the great outdoors.
Final Thoughts
That Nothing has created something with an identity and look all its own is then testament both to the ambition of the brand and the vision with which it was launched. Whether it is completely successful on its own merits is debatable, but it’s definitely memorable.
As things stand, this is a phone with a nice screen, pleasant software, a great design, dependable cameras and excellent battery life. That it also has power to spare, good speakers and a funky set of lights on the rear is merely icing. It’s a very well-rounded mid-range phone, but it isn’t without its flaws.
Though it is pretty, it doesn’t feel especially durable, and the back is slidey and captures finger grease like it is going out of style. Though the camera is dependable, there’s no telephoto option and though there’s fast charging, it doesn’t compete with the best on the market. The Nothing Phone (2a) Plus might be a jack of most trades, but it’s a master of none (aside from battery life, maybe).
So if you are in the market for a powerful and dependable smartphone and don’t want to spend a fortune, it should be near the top of your list. If you need the absolute most in power, or camera performance, you’d be best to look elsewhere however.
How we test
We test every mobile phone we review thoroughly. We use industry-standard tests to compare features properly and we use the phone as our main device over the review period. We’ll always tell you what we find and we never, ever, accept money to review a product.
Find out more about how we test in our ethics policy.
Used as a main phone for over a week
Thorough camera testing in a variety of conditions
Tested and benchmarked using respected industry tests and real-world data
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FAQs
Nothing has committed to three OS upgrades and four years of security patches.
Yes, but with an IP54 rating, it’ll only be protected from water sprays from all directions, and while it’s suitable for outdoor use, it’s not the IP67 or IP68 we’ve seen from similarly priced devices.
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Editorial independence means being able to give an unbiased verdict about a product or company, with the avoidance of conflicts of interest. To ensure this is possible, every member of the editorial staff follows a clear code of conduct.
Professional conduct
We also expect our journalists to follow clear ethical standards in their work. Our staff members must strive for honesty and accuracy in everything they do. We follow the IPSO Editors’ code of practice to underpin these standards.
Editorial independence
Editorial independence means being able to give an unbiased verdict about a product or company, with the avoidance of conflicts of interest. To ensure this is possible, every member of the editorial staff follows a clear code of conduct.
Professional conduct
We also expect our journalists to follow clear ethical standards in their work. Our staff members must strive for honesty and accuracy in everything they do. We follow the IPSO Editors’ code of practice to underpin these standards.
