When Nothing announced their Nothing Phone (4a) series of phones, they first released the regular and very-budget Nothing Phone (4a) before telling us there would be a Pro model as a follow-up. That Pro model is here and the one to focus on in the US, because it’s the only (4a) device to be sold here.
We’ve been able to test the Nothing Phone (4a) Pro for a solid month at this point and have really found this device be a pleasant, pleasant surprise. This is still technically in that budget realm of phones, but almost everything about it punches above its price. From the design to the software and cameras, this a phone that should absolutely not be slept on.
It’s so rare these days to test a phone and find it as refreshing as the Nothing Phone (4a) Pro. This phone isn’t trying to copy anyone or anything and is truly its own product. It’s all metal, the camera box on the rear is certainly an acquired design taste, and everything else just wraps it up into being this unique and fun package that I think so many people will love.
It also helps that the (4a) Pro from Nothing starts at $499 and tops out at $599. That’s the price of a Pixel 10a and I’d take this 10 out of 10 times over a 10a.
But that’s a lot in an intro! Let’s dive a bit deeper into our Nothing Phone (4a) Pro review.
Why buy the Nothing Phone (4a) Pro?
DISPLAY. We’ll talk about the phone’s unique design in a minute, but I have to start with what I believe is the star of the show, the display. The 4a Pro has a large 6.83″ AMOLED display with a resolution of 2800×1260 and an adaptive refresh rate from 30Hz to 144Hz. It can hit peak brightness of 5000 nits and lands outdoors at 1600 nits. This thing is a beauty.
The minute you turn on the 4a Pro, you are welcomed by this big, bright and crisp display that is as smooth as it gets. Objects float to the surface, colors pop and come to life in contrast with Nothing’s black and white theme, and the touch responsiveness is top tier.
Like with any great phone, all of the display controls are here as well, with dark theme (an an extra dark theme), adaptive brightness, HDR boosting, and extra features like status bar toggles for unwanted icons.
But really, features aside, you’ll just love looking at and interacting with this display. It’s large and can be a bit much to manage at times, but once you throw on a video, read an article on our lovely new theme, or scroll your favorite apps until your thumbs bleed, you’ll find that everything looks incredible. This is a top tier display in a package that only runs $499.
SOFTWARE. When it comes to choosing an Android phone, at least for me, the software experience is as important as the camera or the display or battery life. If the software is junk, isn’t updated often, looks bad, or changes the way Google intended Android to work, it’s very hard for me to stick with it. The Nothing Phone (4a) Pro has excellent software. Nothing knows software like few others.
This phone ships with Android 16 out of the box and Nothing OS 4.1 on top of it. Nothing keeps the important pieces as they need to be here, most notably with notifications, the launcher, and settings. This is close to the Pixel experience, and that’s a good thing. Both Samsung and OnePlus have changed (aka broken) launchers and notifications in ways that are baffling and make their phones tough for someone like me to use.
But with the basics of Android right, Nothing enhances with really great lock screen widgets, an impressive set of home screen widgets, one of the cleanest themes/skins in the Android business, and some experimental features, like AirPods support. It also happens to have a “Wallpaper Studio” that generates wallpapers using AI – it is amazing. Here’s an album of a few I made with it.
This is such a well-put-together software experience. The theme is simple yet beautiful, there are widgets here I wish were on other phones I use, and the clocks and fonts and animations and haptics all combine in this way that gives Nothing phones their own vibe.
I will note that Nothing isn’t as fast as Google or Samsung when it comes to updates. I do feel like they are improving here, plus they have beta programs for testing new builds, but they aren’t going to get you Android 17 first, for example.
This Phone 4a Pro is scheduled to receive 3 years of Android updates and 6 years of security patches.
DESIGN. The design of the Phone (4a) Pro is going to be a conversation starter. I’d imagine that there will be a big split on who likes and doesn’t like this latest design attempt from Nothing, but I happen to fall in the group who likes it. This thing is fun, playful, awkward, odd, premium, and a joy to hold.
When you pick up the Phone (4a) Pro, the first thing you’ll notice is that it is incredibly thin at just 7.95mm. The all-metal aluminum body then quickly takes your attention away from that by letting you know that we’re dealing with premium materials and a feeling that we haven’t had in years from a phone because everyone switched to rear glass for wireless charging. So no, there isn’t wireless charging, but you do get a bit of a throwback feel (in a good way) because of this metallic case.
And then you look up top and see whatever the hell this camera setup is. Nothing has given us their classic clear back design, only now in a smaller footprint. We get the triple camera and the newest version of their Glyph light system. There are reds and greys and whites and different materials and textures. It’s ugly up there, but I also appreciate the attempt at not giving a shit and the Nothing designers just letting it all fly, whether it works or not. There is this personality to the phone that so many phones lack these days. It’s just unapologetically Nothing and that’s cool with me.
You also get a phone that’s surprisingly nice in the hand at all times. There’s great balance to it for such a large phone. The flat sides and the metallic matte finish allow for easy gripping, ports and speakers all properly line-up, and the buttons are about the clicky-est I’ve used with the most confirming of clicks with each press.
I’m all for phones taking chances and doing something different with designs. The Nothing Phone (4a) Pro is exactly that.
BATTERY LIFE. This phone has a large 5080mAh battery with 50W wired fast charging. In my testing, I was pushing that battery to well over 4 hours of screen on time each day and going to bed with 30% or more charge remaining. That’s pretty typical use for me and I’d call this more than acceptable in the battery life department.
For charging, 50W wired speeds are plenty (0-50% in 22 minutes; 100% in 64 minutes) for those times where you need a quick top-off before an outing or to fully charge in the morning if you don’t feel like plugging in at night. I mention that because I’m the guy with a wireless charger next to his bed and have had to charge in the morning with this phone. There is no wireless charging on the Phone 4a Pro.
Overall, battery life and charging speeds are just fine, but yes, I do wish wireless charging could magically work through this metal backside.
HAPTICS. Nothing is one of the companies that understands haptics. They put little bumps and vibrations into almost every action on this phone because that makes phones more interesting to use.
When typing, you get a very satisfying level of feedback that makes touch-typing feel faster. Notification vibrations bring through a sharpness that is assuring without being obnoxious. And swiping away a notification or bringing up the app switcher confirms your action with the subtlest nudge.
I still think OnePlus is the haptics king, followed by Google. I’d then put Nothing in 3rd place, pretty close to Google here.
CAMERAS. Nothing gave us a triple rear camera system here that’s made up of 50MP main (f/1.88), 50MP periscope (f/2.88), and 8MP ultrawide sensors. This is a similar camera system to the one in the Nothing Phone (4a) that I tested and didn’t love, but it does get a 50MP Sony sensor as the main vs. the 4a’s Samsung sensor.
For the most part, the cameras are tuned like with the 4a in that they are really boosting colors and contrast to levels that might not be the most believable at times. However, it has also really nailed some shots by not going so overboard with processing. The camera certainly loves to go wild with reds and oranges, but it can also dial back and bring out a natural look that’ll standup against phones like the Pixel 10 Pro.
I found the zoom to be impressive, macro shots to be top tier (look at the depth on the quarter shot below), portraits to bring a soft and real bokeh (my cat), and low light performance that gets the job done.
It’s odd to say this, but the more I look at pictures taken with this phone compared to those with my Pixel 10 Pro, my eye is starting to favor the punchy playfulness of the Nothing camera. In a world that is increasingly dark, a bit of color is a nice change.
Why skip the Nothing Phone (4a) Pro?
WIRELESS CHARGING. I don’t mean to whine too much about this, but charging this phone has been kind of a pain in the ass and that’s only because I’m a man with systems. I charge my phones at night with wireless chargers and this phone doesn’t have wireless charging. To test it, I’ve had to physically plug the 4a Pro in each night (poor me!) or the next morning, which also means the phone can’t act as a bedside clock and is an extra step away from me using it if I need to (I have to unplug it – again, poor me!).
This is not the end of the world, I just have to point out that when a phone lacks wireless charging in 2026, it is something that’ll change your everyday flow if you are used to wirelessly charging things. But hey, this metal is nice and maybe you’ll just not even care once the phone is in your hand.
PERFORMANCE AT TIMES. This phone is not a performance king. Your day-to-day usage probably won’t notice that isn’t, unless you game. My typical day involves mostly generic apps like Chrome and Instagram and Telegram and that sort of thing, which this phone easily handles by way of its Snapdragon 7 Gen 4 chip, UFS 3.1 storage, 12GB of LPDDR5X RAM, and 144Hz display. Most things look and run great!
However, I play only a couple of games (Pokemon GO and Pokemon TCG Pocket) on the regular and both struggle at times on this device. The animations can stutter, I feel like I’m tapping things an extra time or two because something doesn’t load when expected, and the overall experience in those games just doesn’t meet other devices.
So if it struggles with those two games, both of which are as unoptimized as any, I do worry that heavier games might really struggle. I don’t believe this is a gaming device, although Nothing does claim it’ll do 120fps in Battlegrounds Mobile and 90fps in Call of Duty: Mobile.
DESIGN. As much as I mostly like the design of the 4a Pro, I get that some of you might look at the back of this thing and go, “What in the hell…” That camera area is wild and I can’t make any sense out of what the Nothing design team was trying to do up there other than just fit a bunch of random things into a small, glass-enclosed space. That’s part of the joy I get out of looking at it, but you may find nothing but disgust. I like the personality and you may hate it. You tell me.
Time to buy a Nothing Phone (4a) Pro?
The Nothing Phone (4a) Pro is an excellent phone for the price and an easy one to recommend to just about anyone. It’s different, it’s fun, the camera can get the job done, and that display is worth it even as big as it is.
At $499, this is probably the best value in smartphones at the moment. If you are on a budget, just buy this phone.
