One of the more unique players in the phone world is back with two options for the midrange, and they’re a little different from everything else.
Phones can feel very same-same when you look at them, thanks in part to commonalities in design. A metal frame, glass front and back, and a few cameras lined up on the side or in a square, these are your options when it comes to buying a phone from most brands.
You might spot the odd difference here and there with designs — maybe some textured leather-like plastic versus a sleek glass look — but most phones look the same. They also tend to perform much the same.
But not every phone fits that approach.
Already like nothing out there in name, “Nothing”‘s take on phones is also a little bit different, delivering another touchscreen slab of glass and technology, but allowing you to see right through the hardware. Not only that, Nothing devices come with lights, a different take on Android, and even support for AirPods, something Android doesn’t normally factor in.
When Nothing released its first earbuds, they really were like nothing else out there. By the time we saw the Phone 2a, it was a curious take on the mid-range.
And now Australia is ready for two more phones in that category, as Nothing delivers the 3a and the 3a Pro.
Variations on a theme, each aim to bring Nothing’s unique style to lower price points, but also a reasonable amount of value, too.
The design keeps that transparent look with glass front and back, but also brings an IP64 water resistance rating to make it a little more weather friendly.
Both are the same size — 6.77 inches — and use a Full HD+ AMOLED screen with a 120Hz adaptive refresh rate. They also both use a Qualcomm Snapdragon 7s Gen 3 platform with support for 5G, plus either 8 or 12GB RAM depending on the model you buy, and either 128 or 256GB storage. You’ll also find a 5000mAh battery.
Where things differ is the camera experience, with the Nothing Phone 3a offering a 50 megapixel wide camera, an 8 megapixel ultra-wide, and a 50 megapixel 2X telephoto, covering three cameras on the back and a 32 megapixel camera up front. The 3a Pro improves on that with slightly more to work with, giving you that 50 megapixel main camera and 8 megapixel ultra-wide, plus a 50 megapixel 3x zoom camera supporting as much as 6x zoom with cropping.
In essence, the Nothing Phone 3a offers the sort of zoom range you might expect from the iPhone 16, while the 3a Pro fetches closer to what you get on the 16 Pro. It’s not quite the same, but you can see what Nothing is trying for.
And it’s not all. The operating system is that little bit different, complete with lighting control using Nothing’s Glyph system, and there’s even an AI-app on the way to let you organise your thoughts and ideas in “Essential Space”.
The idea will see you pressing a specific button on the phone — an actual physical button — and having that save an image or record a voice note, saving it to your “Essential Space” when it rolls out.
It’ll join six years of security updates for the Phone 3a and three years of Android updates, meaning support for up to Android 18, it seems, with Android 15 launching on the devices. It’s not quite the eight of Qualcomm’s flagship efforts, but it should hold people off for a few years.
Pricing in Australia will see Nothing’s Phone 3a launch from $599 in Australia, hitting retail via online and JB HiFi from March 11, while the 3a Pro will cost $849 when it lands on March 25.
