Nothing Phone 4a review: More gadget than phone (complimentary)

The fourth generation of Nothing’s mid-tier phones continues to carve out its own mark with the Nothing Phone 4a,
bringing plenty of flair. If you aren’t familiar with Nothing as a brand, it carries itself with a design-led
disruptor identity. The Nothing Phone 4a continues to embrace this playful tone, but the design focus sometimes
misses the mark without functionality to fully back it up.

Thankfully, most of these misses aren’t in fundamental areas, meaning the Nothing Phone 4a is overall a solid device
for a good price.

Display and design

In a world where every major smartphone brand is looking more samey-samey Nothing has made the conscious decision to
stand out. You’ll have no problems spotting your phone on a table with a transparent backing that exposes “the
hardware” underneath. The brand’s clear position is simple: we’re having fun with our tech again.

The 4a comes in four colourways: white, black, blue and pink (which is new to the lineup this year). Personally, I
think they’re a little too late if they’re going for a Barbie-hype tie-in; a Brat-green phone would’ve hit the mark
better, but I digress.

While retailing for under $700, nothing about this phone feels cheap (please excuse the pun). It genuinely feels
like a premium package. It has a lovely, large 6.78-inch display with a 120Hz refresh rate that’s nice and bright.
The size of the handset is just right, except that some of the button positioning takes getting used to. 

The Nothing Phone 4a ships with a pre-applied screen protector and a protective case. While clear, the latter has a
sort of matte inside that obscures the fun backing of the phone, so I quickly ditched it. Now, a case won’t do much
to protect from spills, but neither does the build of the phone. It just has an IP64 rating, which protects against
splashes rather than submersion. Similarly priced devices have at least IP67.

The lock/unlock button is set under the volume buttons, while it’s the opposite on many other brands. This meant I
had a habit of putting the volume up rather than locking the phone. On the opposite side, Nothing houses the
Essential Key, introduced on the Nothing Phone 3a. It might be one of the more polarising features on the device. A
colleague mentioned that they often hit it by mistake, and I had the issue a fair few times as well. Once I became
accustomed to where all the buttons were, the Essential Key became one of my favourite aspects of the device.

Essentially (groans) it’s a button mapped exclusively to the “Essential Spaces” app. One click starts the capture
process, where you can tap the screen and take a screenshot, start typing to quickly take a note or tap the
microphone icon to start recording. A double click opens the Essential Space app, or you can hold the Key down to
immediately jump into a voice memo.

The app is where all your captures live. AI generates a task list, event reminder or relevant transcript. From here,
you can add the various captured moments to their own collections, much like you “save for later’ on a range of
social media platforms. It’s not as organised as it could be definitely comes in handy.
The Key functions as an extra level of accessibility to reminders, tasks and events captured however you like in a
quick moment.

While the organisation of the Essential Spaces app is a learning curve, the simple use of the Key was a game-changer
in how I use my phone. It’s akin to carrying around a dictaphone. A quick thought about what I needed to get from
the supermarket or idea for work became more fleeting and less chore-like. However, I can see where it may bug other
people who don’t come to enjoy the feature. In that case, it would be handy if you could remap the Key to other
functions.

The Glyph Bar—the lights on the back of the device that really help Nothing’s phones stand out has a less
exciting but perhaps more practical design on the 4a. Now arranged as six lights in a row, as opposed to the Glyph
Interface (three lights spread out in a circular fashion on the previous 3a model). You can set custom
visualisations for different contacts when they call, or use it as a torch, and it will flash when you have
notifications. 

Another great use case is for setting timers (slightly vague but perceptible); however, it’s not quite fully fleshed
out. You can only set a timer through the notification centre or via the settings app. If you start one via the
timer app, it won’t show up on the Glyph. 

Performance and battery life

The 4a runs on Android 16 with the Nothing OS skin, of course. You have the option of using Nothing’s icon pack (like
me) or using the default Android (boring!) Personally, Nothing’s skin looks better with the device’s widgets, and I
like a bit of uniformity.

Speaking of the device’s widgets, there are several fun options that really lean into Nothing’s overall pixelated
aesthetic. One version of the screentime widget features a smiling face that turns red and angry once you hit your
limit for the day, while a version of the pedometer widget features a person making their way across the view as you
progress on your step goal. It’s not clear exactly by what metric it’s prompted, but if you’re behind on your steps,
you’ll get an almost pedestrian light “WALK” reminder flash at you, and it’s genuinely exciting when you reach the
end and are rewarded with a flashing 100% message.

You can tell the development team is putting genuine thought into these details that “surprise and delight” the user.
While there’s beauty in the overall design-led focus of the brand, there’s little issues here that leave the
features underpowered. Want to check how your screentime is going? How many steps have you taken? Well, you’ll need
to go into the right apps manually to see that. Or set up the alternative views of the widgets that just display the
data, sans fun graphics. Larger widgets are able to do both, but they take up so much space that the convenience of
the small versions is lost.

The Nothing Phone 4a is powered by a 5,080mAh battery and Qualcomm Snapdragon 7s Gen 4 processor. The device is nice
and zippy with no lag. In terms of battery life, the large battery does the job. You can expect to get around seven
hours of screen time per recharge, about enough for a full day’s use and a bit for most people. Playing more
demanding games like Genshin Impact does drain the battery down faster, but it runs smoothly with no lag
and without heating up the device too much.

It’s also worth noting that Nothing only offers three years of software updates and six years of security updates for
the Phone 4a. While that’s not entirely bad, competitor brands like Samsung offer six years for similarly priced devices. 

Cameras

The Nothing Phone 4a features a 50MP main camera setup with an 8MP wide lens and a 50MP 3.5x optical zoom lens.
The 3.5x telephoto lens is a notable upgrade from the 2x optical zoom in the previous model. It’s not a common feature for
phones in this price point, and it’s quite decent, capturing good detail. On the front, you’ll find a 32MP
selfie camera. Overall, the Nothing Phone 4a shoots well in both regular and low-light conditions. It captures
a nice amount of details, but don’t go expecting professional-level photography.

At the very least, you’ll get shots you’re happy to throw up on socials. Expect similar results on other mid-range
devices like the OPPO Reno 15 F 5G, if
you’re looking to take photography more seriously but are limited on price, the $849 Google Pixel 10a pushes the bar just that
little bit further with one of the better shooting experiences you’ll find for less than $1,000.

Nothing Phone 4a – Final Thoughts

The Nothing Phone 4a is a very fun piece of tech. If you’re after a new phone and have a budget of around $600 to
$700, it will serve you well, with perfectly acceptable battery life, camera quality, and performance. Or maybe you’re just looking to shake up your style and enjoy a bit of whimsy. 

If you want to experience more of Nothing’s quirkier Glyph design and money isn’t an issue, then the Phone 4a Pro could be another option,
although you won’t see much of a boost in specs for $300 more.