Nothing Phone 2 Review: Nothing introduced the Nothing Phone (1) in 2022, which is admired by all because of its unique Glyph lights on its back panel. Soon after the grand success of the Phone 1, the brand followed up on the success and introduced its next and latest smartphone, the Nothing Phone 2, which arrived in 2023 with the most interesting features and enhancements.
Nothing Phone 2 Long-Term Review
However, the Phone 2 has more or less similar features as its predecessor, but there are a few aspects where the brand has upgraded the functionalities. In contrast, here’s a detailed review of the Nothing Phone 2, whether the device is an upgrade to Phone 1 or not.
Nothing Phone 2 Design:
To begin with, the front section of the Phone (2) comes with a symmetrical thin bezel that looks really nice and has an iconic transparent back panel with a glass finish that is slightly curved in order to make the phone easy to hold. However, the back glass panel makes the phone really slippery and is absolutely a finger magnet. You will definitely notice a few of your finger imprints on the back due to its glass finish. As mentioned, the device is very slippery, so I would recommend using the phone with a nice protective case in order to avoid accidental drops.
On the flip side, the Nothing Phone 2 has flat edges that offer a nice and comfortable in-hand feel with an excellent weight distribution. At the back, there’s a dual camera setup with its camera lenses arranged in circular rings with a LED flashlight, and most prominently, it also has the iconic Glyph Interface with numerous mini LED lights arranged in a unique design, which looks really elegant when enabled.
Coming at the top of the phone, there’s a noise-canceling microphone at the top section of the phone 2, a SIM card tray, a microphone, a USB-C charging port, and a speaker grill at the bottom. On the right side, you can get a power on/off button on the right side and volume rockers on the left side of the phone.
Nothing Phone 2 Build quality:
In terms of durability and build quality, the Nothing Phone 2 has a solid metal frame, and with regards to its display, the display screen is protected with Corning Gorilla Glass 5 Protection on both the front and back panels, which can easily protect your device’s screen from accidental drops and scratches.
Does Nothing Phone 2 have an IP rating?
The simple and quick answer to this question is yes! The Nothing Phone 2 comes with an IP54 rating that makes the device water- and dust-resistant. The device can easily handle a few splashes of water, but being only an IP54 rating, do note that you don’t take your device near any water bodies as it can’t handle water submersion. However, in my opinion, a better IP rating like IP68 would have been excellent, as it would have made the device fully waterproof.
Nothing Phone 2 Display:
The Nothing Phone 2 holds a big, bright, and colorful 6.7-inch LTPO AMOLED display with an adaptive refresh rate of 120 Hz and 1600 nits of peak brightness, which worked really nice while viewing the screen outdoors on a bright sunny day. With a 240Hz touch sampling rate, it was felt that the display was quick and responsive, with no such lagging issue. With the 1600 nits and HDR 10+ support, I noticed the colors produced were so bright and colorful, and with a flat screen, I was seamlessly able to watch the videos or any social media content with some precise details. In contrast, the bezels are also thin, offering a lot of space for content viewing.
Nothing Phone 2 Performance:
The Qualcomm Snapdragon 8+ Gen 1 chipset, which is based on 4nm process technology (with Adreno 730 GPU), is not the greatest and latest chipset when it comes to the performance of the Phone 2, unfortunately. Although it can easily handle everything and anything that you throw at it, It proved to be really energy-efficient, as the Geekbench score of the Nothing Phone 2 included a single-core score of 1725 and a multi-core score of 4487, respectively. On the other hand, the performance came out to be as good as expected, with app opening and closing feeling normal without any lagging or slowing down.
With respect to the gaming performance, I played Pubg Mobile on my Phone 2. I received much better gameplay at HDR settings at 60 fps, while the display quality looked decent, with all the visuals looking nice and detailed. On the flip side, while playing COD Mobile, I got very high display quality and nice 60fps gameplay. Similar happened with the Genshin Impact, and it’s quite amazing that while playing the game I was getting the highest quality visuals and an amazing 60fps gameplay. The gaming experience was relatively smooth and responsive, but the frame rate was limited to 60 fps. Overall, the performance experience was nice, and you can enjoy a decent amount of gaming on the Phone 2.
Nothing Phone 2 Software Support:
Featuring the latest Nothing OS 2.0, which is based on Android 13, Nothing has promised that the Phone 2 will receive three major OS updates with four years of security patches every two months. This means that the smartphone will get all the new features and enhancements in the long-run.
Nothing Phone 2 Camera and Capability:
Although the Nothing Phone 2 sports a dual camera setup, they are working decently, and unfortunately, the cameras haven’t impressed me a lot. The camera details don’t look so amazing and have a poor dynamic range with extremely low-quality images initially, but after a few updates, the camera began performing well as compared to when it was performing earlier. In contrast, the cameras were capturing nice pictures with plenty of details and decent color saturation. The camera details are:
- Rear camera-
- 50MP Sony IMX890 main sensor with OIS support
- A 50MP ultra-wide Samsung JN1 sensor with EIS support
- Video recording-
- I was able to record videos in 4K at 60 fps.
- Front camera-
- 32MP Sony IMX615 sensor as a selfie snapper
- Video recording-
- I was able to record videos using a selfie camera with 1080p at 60 fps.
Glyph Interface-
The most interesting part of the Phone 2 is its iconic Glyph Interface, which includes a number of small LEDs arranged nicely on its back panel. Being the showstopper, the glowing Glyph lights are the biggest highlights of the phone. The Glyph lights have been customized in numerous ways as per your preferences and needs. They are:
- 33 individually addressable zones
- 10 new ringtones and notification sounds
- Get 10 classic Phone (1) ringtones and notifications in the voice of Phone (2).
- Glyph Timer
- Essential Notifications
- Volume Indicator
- Glyph Composer
- Glyph Torch
- Glyph Progress
- Auto Brightness
- Flip to Glyph.
- Charging Metre
- Bedtime schedule
- Google Assistant feedback
- A Glyph for Reverse Charging
Network and connectivity:
The Nothing Phone 2 supports 19 5G bands, including n1, n2, n3, n5, n7, n8, n12, n20, n25, n28, n30, n38, n40, n41, n66, n71, n75, n77, and n78, respectively, with each supported in India as well. The phone has Wi-Fi 6 support and Bluetooth v5.3 connectivity, respectively.
The battery and charging process:
In terms of battery life, the Nothing Phone 2 comes with a 4700mAh battery life and 45W wired charging support that can charge your device fully up to 100% in 55 minutes. While performing the battery test, I noticed that it had much better results, which is more than I expected. The battery backup is insane, as even after heavy gaming consistently for long runs and streaming videos, I was seamlessly getting the battery backup for almost an entire day, and if normally used, the battery will definitely get your second day covered as well.
On the flip side, the Phone 2 also has 15W wireless charging with dual charging support that can charge your device up to 100% in 130 minutes. Additionally, there’s 5W reverse charging support as well.
Sensors:
The Nothing Phone 2 incorporates each key sensor:
- In-display fingerprint sensor
- Front and rear ambient light sensors
- Accelerometer
- Electronic Compass
- Gyroscope
- Proximity Sensor
- Sensor Core
Nothing Phone 2 Price and availability:
The Nothing Phone 2 features three memory variants, including:
- 8GB RAM + 128GB internal storage: Rs. 39,999
- 12GB RAM + 256GB internal storage: Rs. 40,999
- 12GB RAM + 512GB internal storage: Rs. 42,999
Coming in two color variants, namely Dark Grey and White, you can easily get your Nothing Phone (2) with some exciting bank offers and discounts on your ICICI Credit cards, which are available on Flipkart, Amazon, and all the Nothing retail stores near you.
Is Nothing Phone 2 worth buying under ₹ 40,000?
Although there’s a lot likes in this phone, including its hardware unique design, good display, nice software experience, clean UI, impressive Glyph interface, decent performance, good battery life, and decent camera capabilities, in some aspects it’s disappointing, as there’s no 4K video shooting support for the front camera, no charger in the box, it’s slightly bulky in the hands, and average speakers as there are mono speakers, which are not so loud with average sound quality. Overall, this phone could be considered buying if you are looking for a decent-performing phone in the budget range of under 40,000, as it has covered all the important aspects that a proper mid-range device offers, and the software functionalities and other features will keep getting better with each coming update.
Pros and Cons of Nothing Phone 2
PROS
- Smooth and intuitive user interface
- Impressive build quality with a comfortable in-hand feel
- Glyph interface is more seamlessly integrated than in previous versions
- Satisfactory battery life
- Decent performance from the selfie camera
CONS
- Primary camera encounters difficulties in capturing distant subjects
- Charging speeds are only mediocre
- Relatively high price point
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