Nothing is still establishing its feet in the smartphone world. The business has established quite a decent audience in the cheap and mid-range areas, and the Nothing Phone 2a Plus solidifies its position more solidly. It's not a flawless phone and suffers from limited availability in the U.S., but it delivers lots of value for a low price.
The Pixel 8a is now the greatest inexpensive phone you can purchase, and the OnePlus 12R is one of our favorite bargain phones, so Nothing has some strong competition with its Phone 2a Plus.
With the Google Pixel 9a approaching, would it make sense to buy the Nothing Phone 2a Plus or wait for Google's next offering? I've set out to address that burning question and more in this review so you can make the proper option for your smartphone requirements.
Price And Release Date
As is the case with Nothing, the Phone 2a Plus comes with a cheaper price tag than most of its big competitors. It comes with a $399 pricing, which is $100 cheaper than the Pixel 8a and OnePlus 12R, which have identical features and performance levels. Officially, the phone released on July 31, 2024.
Unfortunately, acquiring the Nothing Phone 2a Plus in the U.S. is tough. The company's website provides a Sign-Up option on the order page to alert you when the phone is in stock. If you're ready to pay more than the $399 pricing, you can approach third-party dealers on sites like NewEgg and spend close to $799, but paying that much on the phone isn't ideal. You can also snag it from Amazon for a little over $399.
At this stage, if the phone appeals to you, patience is important. Ideally, Nothing will stock the phone in the United States again, and you'll be able to nab one at the retail price. In the interim, check out some of the top phone bargains to snag a different handset at a significant price.
Read Also: How To Install A New Android Version On An Old Phone?
Design
The design could be the most notable outstanding characteristic of the Nothing Phone 2a Plus (albeit it appears very identical to the non-Plus version of the phone). It boasts a transparent design that allows you view some of the innards of the phone. It features wacky LED strip lights that make up its Glyph Interface on the back of the phone, which can be utilized for numerous applications. It's evident that Nothing went out of its way to produce a phone that sticks out visually.
You can acquire the Nothing Phone 2a Plus in two distinct hues - a sleep gray and a dark black. We tested the gray version, and it's really striking and will grab anyone's eye if you're using the phone while out and about.
Display
For the screen, Nothing crafts a 6.7-inch AMOLED (1084 x 2412) with an adaptive 120Hz refresh rate — the same screen featured in the Nothing Phone 2a. For the $399 price, you can't be dissatisfied at the offering, since it's adequately huge and colorful.
Nothing claims the phone can peak at 1,300 nits of brightness, but our testing topped out at 959 nits. That's still plenty of brightness for a cheap phone, but it's notably different from the company's advertised brightness.
Cameras
The cameras fall nicely within the anticipated level for a phone at this $399 price range. However, the business didn't enhance the Plus version - it has the same 50MP main and 50MP ultrawide cameras as the previous phone. Even though they're not an enhancement, they're still absolutely decent cameras capable of capturing the moment in varied lighting circumstances. Except for low light – it could stand to improve greatly there.
Nothing did enhance the selfie camera with this edition of its phone, now delivering a 50MP camera on the front of the phone instead of the 32MP lens on the Nothing 2a. It's a good upgrade, although the difference in images isn't all that evident between the two devices.
All expected modes are featured with the Nothing Phone 2a Plus — time-lapse, panorama and slow-mo are all there, allowing you to shoot all types of sights and settings. An AI-driven algorithm (since you can't have a phone in 2024 without some AI feature) identifies faces in the frame and raises the resolution, even if the face isn't in focus.
Video capture works well, with the camera allowing 4K 30FPS capture, which is excellent, but it would have been wonderful to get 4K resolution with 60FPS for action photos. You get some basic exposure control while shooting video to set up the photos you desire, but the possibilities won't equal those of more costly phones.
Read Also: Nothing Phone 2a Review
Battery Life
Nothing tends to deliver great battery life with their phones, and the 2a Plus is no exception. It doesn't rival the OnePlus 12R, which gives some of the most insane battery times we've ever seen, but it's decent. After all, 14 hours and 8 minutes is nothing to snub your nose at in our battery drain test, and it completely demolishes the Google Pixel 8a's 11 hours and 21 minutes in the same test.
The budget-friendly 2a Plus supports 50W cable charging, which again falls short of OnePlus but is more than fast enough to charge the phone rapidly. We managed to obtain 41% in only 15 minutes, so even if you just have a limited time to charge, you can have enough juice to go through the night.
Software
Visually, Nothing creates some of the best Android skins on the market. They blend in so perfectly with the overall appearance of the phone. The eye-catching dot matrix design language encompasses everything from the icons of the programs to the typeface, and it looks amazing.
The Glyph Interface still offers it that added layer of functionality to attach the light patterns to specific alerts so you can see what's occurring even when your phone is face-down.
The program is cool, but it's also quick and smooth. In my testing, I never had any difficulties with the phone accomplishing what I needed promptly, which is always good from a budget-friendly phone like the Nothing 2a Plus.
Thomas Hardy
Nothing is still establishing its feet in the smartphone world. The business has established quite a decent audience in the cheap and mid-range areas, and the Nothing Phone 2a Plus solidifies its position more solidly. It's not a flawless phone and suffers from limited availability in the U.S., but it delivers lots of value for a low price.
The Pixel 8a is now the greatest inexpensive phone you can purchase, and the OnePlus 12R is one of our favorite bargain phones, so Nothing has some strong competition with its Phone 2a Plus.
With the Google Pixel 9a approaching, would it make sense to buy the Nothing Phone 2a Plus or wait for Google's next offering? I've set out to address that burning question and more in this review so you can make the proper option for your smartphone requirements.
Price And Release Date
As is the case with Nothing, the Phone 2a Plus comes with a cheaper price tag than most of its big competitors. It comes with a $399 pricing, which is $100 cheaper than the Pixel 8a and OnePlus 12R, which have identical features and performance levels. Officially, the phone released on July 31, 2024.
Unfortunately, acquiring the Nothing Phone 2a Plus in the U.S. is tough. The company's website provides a Sign-Up option on the order page to alert you when the phone is in stock. If you're ready to pay more than the $399 pricing, you can approach third-party dealers on sites like NewEgg and spend close to $799, but paying that much on the phone isn't ideal. You can also snag it from Amazon for a little over $399.
At this stage, if the phone appeals to you, patience is important. Ideally, Nothing will stock the phone in the United States again, and you'll be able to nab one at the retail price. In the interim, check out some of the top phone bargains to snag a different handset at a significant price.
Read Also: How To Install A New Android Version On An Old Phone?
Design
The design could be the most notable outstanding characteristic of the Nothing Phone 2a Plus (albeit it appears very identical to the non-Plus version of the phone). It boasts a transparent design that allows you view some of the innards of the phone. It features wacky LED strip lights that make up its Glyph Interface on the back of the phone, which can be utilized for numerous applications. It's evident that Nothing went out of its way to produce a phone that sticks out visually.
You can acquire the Nothing Phone 2a Plus in two distinct hues - a sleep gray and a dark black. We tested the gray version, and it's really striking and will grab anyone's eye if you're using the phone while out and about.
Display
For the screen, Nothing crafts a 6.7-inch AMOLED (1084 x 2412) with an adaptive 120Hz refresh rate — the same screen featured in the Nothing Phone 2a. For the $399 price, you can't be dissatisfied at the offering, since it's adequately huge and colorful.
Nothing claims the phone can peak at 1,300 nits of brightness, but our testing topped out at 959 nits. That's still plenty of brightness for a cheap phone, but it's notably different from the company's advertised brightness.
Cameras
The cameras fall nicely within the anticipated level for a phone at this $399 price range. However, the business didn't enhance the Plus version - it has the same 50MP main and 50MP ultrawide cameras as the previous phone. Even though they're not an enhancement, they're still absolutely decent cameras capable of capturing the moment in varied lighting circumstances. Except for low light – it could stand to improve greatly there.
Nothing did enhance the selfie camera with this edition of its phone, now delivering a 50MP camera on the front of the phone instead of the 32MP lens on the Nothing 2a. It's a good upgrade, although the difference in images isn't all that evident between the two devices.
All expected modes are featured with the Nothing Phone 2a Plus — time-lapse, panorama and slow-mo are all there, allowing you to shoot all types of sights and settings. An AI-driven algorithm (since you can't have a phone in 2024 without some AI feature) identifies faces in the frame and raises the resolution, even if the face isn't in focus.
Video capture works well, with the camera allowing 4K 30FPS capture, which is excellent, but it would have been wonderful to get 4K resolution with 60FPS for action photos. You get some basic exposure control while shooting video to set up the photos you desire, but the possibilities won't equal those of more costly phones.
Read Also: Nothing Phone 2a Review
Battery Life
Nothing tends to deliver great battery life with their phones, and the 2a Plus is no exception. It doesn't rival the OnePlus 12R, which gives some of the most insane battery times we've ever seen, but it's decent. After all, 14 hours and 8 minutes is nothing to snub your nose at in our battery drain test, and it completely demolishes the Google Pixel 8a's 11 hours and 21 minutes in the same test.
The budget-friendly 2a Plus supports 50W cable charging, which again falls short of OnePlus but is more than fast enough to charge the phone rapidly. We managed to obtain 41% in only 15 minutes, so even if you just have a limited time to charge, you can have enough juice to go through the night.
Software
Visually, Nothing creates some of the best Android skins on the market. They blend in so perfectly with the overall appearance of the phone. The eye-catching dot matrix design language encompasses everything from the icons of the programs to the typeface, and it looks amazing.
The Glyph Interface still offers it that added layer of functionality to attach the light patterns to specific alerts so you can see what's occurring even when your phone is face-down.
The program is cool, but it's also quick and smooth. In my testing, I never had any difficulties with the phone accomplishing what I needed promptly, which is always good from a budget-friendly phone like the Nothing 2a Plus.