Overview – New Kid on the Block
Nothing is the latest startup trying to shake up the smartphone market. Founded by former OnePlus co-founder Carl Pei and backed by iPod inventor Tony Fadell among other tech veterans, Nothing attracted attention with its transparent Ear 1 earbuds previewing its unique design ethos.
The London-based company has since convinced Qualcomm, one of the powerhouses in mobile silicon, to invest and partner on products including the much anticipated Phone 1.
Nothing is taking pages from the OnePlus launch playbook – deliver surprisingly premium and well-designed phones at affordable prices to carve out a niche. But can lightning strike twice for Carl Pei? Does the Phone 1 have enough firepower as a first generation release to legitimize Nothing‘s long term goals centered around smart connected devices and an ecosystem play?
Let‘s dig deeper into the specs, software experience and real-world performance of the Phone 1, besides availability and pricing details across regions.
Pricing and Availability – Mass Market Appeal with Caveats
The Phone 1 manages to compete head-on with 2022‘s best mid-range to flagship phones on raw hardware capabilities and asking price:
| Variant | Pricing |
|---|---|
| 8GB/128GB | £399/$484 |
| 8GB/256GB | £449/$545 |
| 12GB/256GB | £499/$606 (coming later this summer) |
In Europe and the UK, these prices undercut the Samsung Galaxy S22/Plus by 33%, the S22 Ultra by over 40%, and even the OnePlus 10 Pro 5G by around 17%. More importantly, while not reaching Apple‘s coveted premium build quality and brand aura levels, it matches up respectably to the iPhone 13 mini in cost.
In India where it retails officially, the Phone 1 compares even more favorably – costing almost half of the S22+ and other Android flagships from Chinese brands like Xiaomi and Realme.
However, Phone 1 loses out significantly when you come to actual sales availability in two key lucrative geographies currently:
- USA – It lacks support for the right 5G bands and CDMA compatibility required across carriers. As such, no official sales or even the option to use with limited functionality.
- China – Struggles with regulatory clearances which is unsurprising given geopolitical dynamics. A launch seems uncertain.
Carl Pei has confirmed Nothing is working on their next smartphone for the US market featuring next-gen connectivity, but that is not expected before late 2023 at the earliest.
Design – Standing Out with Transparent Style
The Nothing Phone 1 rejects the ubiquitous metal and glass sandwich design adopted by every smartphone brand today. Instead you get an industrial looking frame made from recycled aluminum, complemented by transparent glass back panels.
But that see-through downstream effect is elevated beyond being a mere novelty by the Greco-inspired Glyph Interface.
These consist of over 900 LEDs perfectly aligned across the back cover arranged in specific patterns. They perform practical functions like:
- Visual aid for wireless/reverse charging rates
- Low battery notifications and charging progress indicator
- Unique light shows during calls, notifications from different apps
- Camera flash enhancement for better night photos
As far as aesthetics go, while strikingly different from other phones on first glance, the transparent back and white LEDs combination is a very smart implementation of the company‘s ‘retro-futuristic‘ vision.
It looks modern yet somehow familiar due to the clear casing stereotypically associated with 90‘s electronics. Reviewers also praise how Nothing pulls off a balanced, symmetrical design not cluttered or overdone.
Upfront you get a flexible 6.55-inch OLED 120Hz display which is crisp, with excellent contrast and brightness levels matching expensive rivals. The chin and forehead are thicker than something like the Galaxy S22 Ultra, but that‘s understandable for structural integrity reasons on a mid-range phone with so much glass.
Specifications – Upper Mid-range Firepower
The Phone 1 is powered by Qualcomm‘s Snapdragon 778G+ 5G platform featuring an octa-core CPU based on the 6nm fabrication node. This includes:
- 1x Cortex-X1 core @ 2.5GHz
- 3x Cortex-A78 cores @ 2.4GHz
- 4x Cortex-A55 efficiency cores @ 1.8GHz
It is paired with an Adreno 642L GPU promising great graphics plus up to 12GB LPDDR5 RAM and 256GB UFS 3.1 storage.
Let‘s analyze how these specifications compare with other phones in various price bands:
| Specification | Phone 1 | Galaxy S22 | Zenfone 9 | iPhone SE 2022 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| CPU Core Config | 1xX1 + 3xA78 + 4xA55 | 1xX2 + 3xA710 + 4xA510 | 1xX2 + 3xA710 +4xA510 | 2 perf + 4 eff |
| Max CPU Clock Speed | 2.5GHz | 2.8GHz | 3.2GHz | ~3.2GHz |
| GPU | Adreno 642L | Adreno 730 | Adreno 660 | A15 Bionic GPU |
| RAM | 8GB/12GB | 8GB | 8GB/16GB | 4GB |
| Storage | 128GB/256GB | 128GB/256GB | 128GB/256GB | 64GB/256GB/512GB |
In terms of raw CPU and GPU capabilities, the Snapdragon 778G+ falls below Qualcomm‘s flagship 8 Gen 1 silicon as well as the A15 Bionic and Zenfone 9‘s Snapdragon 8+ Gen 1. However, it holds a strong lead over the iPhone SE‘s dated processor.
ThePhone 1 closes the gap somewhat against the Zenfone 9 and Galaxy S22 in memory and storage configurations. But pure performance should fall short despite respectable specs for a mid-ranger.
Let‘s confirm synthetic benchmark results from expert reviews:
|| Geekbench (Single / Multi Core) | 3DMark Wild Life |
|-|:-:|:-:|
| Phone 1 | 778 / 2833 | 4673 |
| Galaxy S22 | 1163 / 3476 | 8923 |
| Zenfone 9 | 1302 / 4111 | No data |
| iPhone SE 2022 | 1728 / 4605 | No data |
There is clearly a large deficit versus the S22 and iPhone SE in CPU speeds, even more so in graphics horsepower based on the preliminary 3DMark figures.
Having said that, the Snapdragon 778G+ should easily meet needs for gaming, multi-tasking and productivity workloads given sufficient cooling and software optimizations. Where it falls uncomfortably short is intensive creative work like video editing where Adreno 642L may bottleneck output quality and time.
The Phone 1 matches against direct rivals in the price category like the Nord 2T, Realme GT Neo 3 and Moto Edge 30 nicely though.
Battery Life and Charging – All Day+ Juice
The Nothing Phone 1 packs a large 4500mAh battery which is at the upper end in the price segment. Coupled with a relatively lower resolution 1080p screen that shaves off cycles from the GPU, most reviews confirm all day battery life comfortably.
PCMark tests peg it at a Work 3.0 runtime score of 146 hours which is excellent. The Phone 1 will require charging once every 1.5-2 days with light to moderate use especially given cellular network standby power draw.
Charging and wireless charging capabilities are competitive too:
- 33W fast charging (USB Power Delivery)
- Up to 50% in 30 minutes per Nothing OS
- 15W Qi wireless charging
- 5W reverse wireless charging
Do note while the supported charging spec is high, the Phone 1 does not ship with an appropriate charger. So you will need to purchase that separately or use another fast charging USB PD accessory in your inventory.
There are however gaps in the wireless charging department – the coil does not support the faster 15W iPhones work at, and is missing key bands required for charging above 5W on US market phones in particular.
Cameras – Great Versatility within Limits
The Phone 1 borrows camera hardware specifications almost directly from the OnePlus Nord 2:
- Primary: 50 MP f/1.8 wide lens with OIS and Sony IMX766 1/1.56" sensor
- Ultrawide: 50 MP f/2.2 FOV 114-degrees without OIS but with autofocus (a first at this price range)
- Front: 16 MP f/2.45 fixed focus lens
These lenses allow for flexibility in framing shots with the secondary camera capturing macros as well thanks to autofocus. Photos and 4K videos boast plenty of detail in day light while night capture is pretty decent too though misses out on the Night Mode type algorithms we see even on lower end Samsung phones.
DXOMark tests give the phone a score of 113 which matches up exactly to the OnePlus Nord 2 indicating very similar real world results should be expected. Compared to leading camera phones however, you miss out on:
- Telephoto or periscopic optical zoom capabilities seen on the S22 Ultra, iPhone 13 Pro Max etc
- Absence of OIS on ultrawide hurts low light landscape shots
- Mediocre front camera quality and lack of autofocus
- Significant room for improvement in image processing and portrait segmentation
So overall, while unlikely to replace your primary iPhone or Pixel for travel or important events, the Phone 1 does claim impressive specs on paper translated to social media ready and casual shots perfectly on par with its mid-range station.
Nothing OS – Resource Friendly and Promising
Being based on a lightweight build of Android 12, Nothing OS adopts a stock-like interface similar to Oxygen OS once seen on OnePlus phones before the Oppo merger led to bulkier OS versions.
You will appreciate the lack of bloatware apps and faster, smoother experience compared to something like OneUI or MIUI. Specs enthusiasts will also like the relatively ‘pure‘ implementation of Android 12 underneath, basically unchanged.
However, coming to significant customization, things like always-on display, themes,Modes, 3rd party icon packs that power users expect are missing currently. Nothing promises faster and more frequent updates focused on adding these options over the coming months rather than once a year Android updgrades.
There are also bugs being reported with notifications, lockscreen and stability of some system apps that need fixing. But the underlying foundation of Nothing OS reassures it can mature into a fan-favorite alternative by avoiding heaviness and adding useful personalization.
Glyph ringtones that sync with the LEDs flashing provide nice differentiation already. Expanding this to more notification customization as well would increase the ‘delight‘ element.
The Road Ahead – Iterating Hardware and Software
As a plucky upstart taking on market heavyweights, Nothing has made an assured start to their smartphone ambitions with the Phone 1. Delivering on affordable pricing, flagship grade design and transparency around trade-offs sets strong expectations for product evolution.
Nothing‘s leadership have already confirmed they are working on launching the Phone 1 in the US and North America by next year. This model will add support for CDMA and mmWave 5G connectivity to become fully compatible across major carriers.
An iterative Phone 2 model also seems likely by late 2023 or early 2024. This should upgrade core hardware like the SoC, improve wireless charging and IP ratings, add a telephoto lens and expand internal storage. Refining software stability and bringing missing Oxygen OS-like customizations is also a priority.
If they continue targeting value flagships in the sub-$600 segment with a clearly differentiated brand image buoyed by ecosystem devices like TWS earbuds, Nothing can hope to establish themselves as serious long term players.
Carl Pei perhaps sees even bigger ambitions down the line if we read into his vision around the Glyph interface and smart connected devices. But before taking on Apple or Samsung, delivering on far more affordable products preventing ‘good enough‘ inertia is vital.
The Phone 1 sets the ball rolling on that front competitively enough. What remains to be seen is how well Nothing grinds out after sales support and sustains pace of innovation post the hype phase.
