For a company that's barely four years old, Nothing has done a stellar job of bringing design-first products into already saturated audio and smartphone segments. The latest Phone (2a) is its attempt to shake up the humdrum offerings in the budget premium segment with a unique design that’s so very Nothing, yet with competent hardware to hit that lower INR 23,999 price point.
It's very clearly still a Nothing phone, with the semi-transparent rear panel and signature Glyph LED lights that help identify a Nothing phone from afar. Granted, the 2a rear panel is made of plastic (not glass) and doesn’t have quite as many light strips as the pricier Phone 2, but it doesn’t scrimp on any of the functionality, including the glyph timer/progress indicator capabilities and the Glyph notification alerts.
The build is premium for its segment, and even as it is sizable in the hand, the change of materials makes it reasonably light (190 g) for a 6.7-inch-screen device. You get Corning Gorilla Glass 5 screen protection for the display and IP54 dust/water ingress protection.
Owing to similar dimensions as the Phone 2, you get a 6.7-inch, 120 Hz AMOLED 1,080x2,412 pixel display with HDR10+ support and Nothing’s attention to detail: evenly sized bezels on all sides. The screen is bright enough at 1,100 nits for outdoor use, offers vibrant colours, and includes a snappy under-display optical fingerprint sensor for authentication. It’s a good display to show off the deep blacks in Nothing’s dot-matrix-themed Nothing OS, which runs on Android 14 and remains as clean as ever in terms of features and less bloatware, mistakes its segment peers are often guilty of failing at.
It’s the first Nothing device to turn to Mediatek for its Dimensity 7200 Pro chipset, which, coupled with 8/12 GB of memory and 128/256 GB of storage, keeps things humming along nicely on the 2a. Yet, this is clearly an everyday-use device rather than for heavy mobile gaming – performance throttles noticeably under sustained heavy gaming loads. Moderate usage will see the 5,000 mAh battery last a little more than a day between charges, and it takes about an hour to charge it fully if you have a compatible 45 W charger (none in the box).
On the rear, you get the horizontal dual camera setup that gives the 2a its eye-like design, and the choice of a 50 MP GN9 primary with OIS and a 50 MP ultrawide holds the 2a in good stead. The 2a turns out decent photos with good details and dynamic range (if a little oversaturated) across most lighting conditions, and the ultrawide performed well in well-lit conditions (less so in less-than-ideal lighting). For the price, if one could borrow a phrase from OnePlus, the 2a distils the core experience of Nothing at a price that’s nice.
Rating: 8/10
Price: INR 23,999 (8/128 GB) onwards
