Nothing Phone 1 review: something else

The new phone can bring us back. With deeper interactions and bravery simplicity. It isn't the life-changing phone that Nothing makes it out to be, it's just a good device with flashing lights.

The unique light-up notification "glyphs" of the Phone 1 are a fashion flourish. There is nothing wrong with that since it is backed up by good performance and a fair price.

The phone is not coming to the US. When it goes on sale on July 21st, it will cost about $475 US for a model with 8 gigabytes of memory and 128 gigabytes of storage. The version I tested for this review has 12 gigabytes of RAM and 512 gigabytes of storage. It will be available in a number of countries, including the UK. Phone 1 won't be brought to the US since it doesn't have FCC certification.

Phone 1 has a light strip that blinks in combinations that the company calls glyphs. There are 10 glyph for notifications and 10 glyph for ringtones in the two sets. You can enable one without the other, but you can't change which tone each glyph is assigned to. You can either set aglyph for all incoming notifications or leave it at that, or you can go into individual app settings.

The glyph lights are tied to specific tones, so you can use them for any app or feature that allows you to modify alert sounds. You can assign specific glyph to individual contacts, but you won't see it when they message you, which is a shame.

Different kinds of notifications from the same app can be assigned different glyph. To do this, you need to head to that app's notification settings, where you can reassign the notification sound to the glyph of your choice, but it also means you'll see the corresponding glyph even when the phone is silent. You can set a glyph for any app notification that allows you to assign a custom notification sound, for example, or separate glyph for personal and work emails.

It's a less obtrusive way to have your phone tell you if a notification is worth taking away from something else. With some time and a little fine-tuning, this is a feature that some people might find useful, especially if you want to look at the notifications in a different way. I didn't think it changed anything.

I put my phone down when I don't use it, so I didn't see theglyph flashing most of the time. It hasn't happened in the couple of weeks that I've been using the phone, but I'm sure that's a habit I'd be able to change without a lot of trouble. There is a screen on the phone that tells me what type of notification I am receiving.

The difference between light patterns is something glyphs need to be aware of. Was that a sign of weakness or strength? The big blinking "C" is an email. When I set specific glyph for one or two important apps, the system works best for me. There was a little chaos.

Outside of notifications, there are other uses for the lights. There is an exclamation mark on the back panel when the battery is charging. It is neat, but it is a little more67531 than just checking the charge level. The glyph lights can be used to illuminate the camera. It is a nice option and less intense than the flash. If you want a young child to look at the camera, they will do it.

At their default setting, the glyph lights are very bright. I turned them down to about 30 percent. If you are going to be outside in direct sunlight, you should keep the brightness up because they are hard to see. When the battery is low, they're disabled as well. When the battery is sufficiently charged, you need to turn them on manually.

The glyph are a little different than the others. It's smart. It makes a statement to anyone who sees it, and it doesn't affect the experience of using the phone if you're not into it. Nothing will sell accessories tailored to the Phone 1, but I didn't get to try them out for this review.

It doesn't feel like it drove up the cost of the phone If the Phone 1 was a $1,000 flagship phone, I would feel cheated. If the lights are only occasionally useful, it feels like a bonus feature, not a rip off.

In the mid-tier class where high refresh rates aren't too common, the Phone 1's 6.55-inchOLED with an adaptive refresh rate up to 120Hz is a great spec. The A53 5G has a 120Hz refresh rate, but the other two phones have 90 and 60Hz screens. Most of the time, the screen on the Phone 1 sticks to the top refresh rate. Even in direct sunlight, it has 1,200 nits of peak brightness. Even with wet hands or in the sun, the under-display fingerprint sensor can read my fingerprints.

The phone has a 5G modem. Sascha Segan at PC Mag tried it out on a couple of US networks, but didn't have much luck. The review unit I use handles daily tasks without a problem and the phone feels very responsive. Haptics are strong, but not crazy. It all feels like it should be more than $500 or $600.

Nothing is following in the footsteps of the flagship OEMs by not including the headphones. The Phone 1's splash and dust resistance rating is better than nothing, which is common among mid-range phones.

One area where the Phone 1 is behind other phones is in the battery life department. The OnePlus Nord 2 lasted more than a day with a lot of screen-on time in our testing, and the sub-$300Nord N20 easily gets through a full day of heavy use. The Phone 1 can get through a full day but not much. It seems to drain a lot when the phone is not in use, and I would pick it up in the morning to find the battery dead.

The glyph lights don't seem to be to blame. Keeping the lights on for 10 minutes only depletes the battery by a small amount. I don't think they're contributing to the problem much at all because they light up for such a short period of time.

Fast wired charging is supported by the phone's 4,500mAh cell. It's not something you find in most mid-range phones. If you don't already have a fast charging device, you need to spend another $30-40 for one if you don't already have one.

The phone's battery was taken from completely flat to 100 percent by a 65W charge. That is very good for a phone that has wireless charging. A 20-minute charge in the middle of the day will go a long way in improving the phone's battery performance.

The excess depth and macro sensors on so many Android phones are not worth anyone's time. I would like this to be a norm but we are.

optical image stabilization is included in the main rear-facing camera. OIS is not uncommon on a mid-range phone, but it is not guaranteed below the flagships. The rear camera has a 50-megapixel ultrawide with an f/ 2.2 lens, while the front camera has a 16-megapixel selfies camera. There isn't a telephoto camera in phones that cost less than 800 dollars. It is possible to record video at up to 30p.

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The photos with the two rear-facing cameras in bright light are detailed and vibrant, but not too heavy-handed. In a side-by-side comparison with another camera, there is a cool color cast that can make shadows look a little blue, but it is the kind of thing that you only notice. Portrait mode photos in good light look great, but in low light they are a mess.

The phone 1 camera has a little bit of hi-res. The sky in one photo of a high-contrast scene is blue, while the sky in another photo of the same scene is blown out. The Phone 1's photos are well detailed, if a little saturated, but a little color detail gets lost in shadows. When shutter speeds are below 1/30 of a second, optical stabilization helps the most. Out of seven photos I took of my husband in a well-lit bar, only three of them are sharp.

There is a steady combination of optical and electronic image stabilization. There is a bit of a crop jumping between 4K and1080p, but it is nothing serious. It is possible at 30p but not at 60p. A bonus feature for video is a red recording indicator light that blinks when you film. That is for nostalgia.

Nothing has a light touch take on the phone. No duplicate apps or pre-downloads are present. Nothing has a dot-matrix fonts on the menu page and an audio recording app that is similar to a vintage tape recorder. There are four Nothing-designed homescreenwidgets for time and weather as well as awidget to display your NFTs. It isn't enabled by default, but it tells you a lot about who is designing this phone.

The company has promised three years of OS platform upgrades and four years of security updates, which is among the best software support policies for Android phones. This is the first device from a new company with no history of success.

It doesn't want to allow third parties to bring controls for their products right into the phone's OS, and for a start, it's working withTesla. According to the company, you can start the AC in your car by opening the doors. It would be helpful if you lived in a hot climate and owned a tesla. I don't think a Honda Fit has the same draw for me as someone who lives in the Pacific Northwest.

When Nothing started up its hype machine and began revealing details about its first phone, one particular spec raised a few eyebrows. It was surprising that the phone wouldn't use the most powerful processor from the company.

The choice to include a less expensive chipset has helped shape the Phone 1 as something worthy of a different type of hype: a very good, reasonably priced phone backed up with a solid software support policy. It's a shame that it won't be available in the US.

glyph notifications are a novelty, but they are harmless. It is part of the phone's unique style and will appeal to some people. Others won't. The Phone 1 doesn't live up to the hype because it's not a consumer tech product. The phone is just a phone and it is a good one.

Allison Johnson is a photographer.

Every smart device has a set of terms and conditions that you have to agree to before you can use it. It is not possible for us to read and analyze all of them. We started counting the number of times you have to agree to use devices when we review them since these are agreements most people can't negotiate.

You need to agree to use the phone.

• Google Terms of Service
• Google Play Terms of Service
• Google Privacy Policy (included in ToS)
• Install apps and updates: “You agree this device may also automatically download and install updates and apps from Google, your carrier, and your device’s manufacturer, possibly using cellular data.”
• Nothing end user license agreement
• Nothing privacy policy

There are some agreements that are optional.

• Back up to Google Drive
• Provide anonymous location data for Google’s services
• “Allow apps and services to scan for Wi-Fi networks and nearby devices at any time, even when Wi-Fi or Bluetooth is off.”
• Send usage and diagnostic data to Google
• Access your Assistant with Hey Google
• Activate Voice Match for Hey Google
• Access your Assistant without unlocking your device

At least seven optional agreements were included in the final tally.