Hands-On With the Transparent Nothing Phone 1

Every so often a new phone makes waves in the tech world because of an eye-catching design or innovative features, and this month, the Phone 1 from Nothing is starring in reviews and videos due to its transparent design and affordable price point. The Nothing Phone 1 was picked up by us to see how it compares to the Apple phones.

We're going to give a little back story first since Nothing is a new company. Carl Pei founded Nothing in 2020 and the company bought Andy Rubin's company, Essential Products, in 2021. The Nothing Phone 1 was introduced in March and is a partnership between Nothing and Teenage Engineering.

The Nothing Phone 1 is more affordable than most of Apple's phones, and it is close to the price of the iPhone 11. The Phone 1 comes in black or white and has a series of LEDs at the back that the company says is aglyph interface. The lights let you know who is talking or texting.

The Nothing Phone 1 has squared edges, camera placement, and antenna bands, but those are not what distinguishes it from the rest. There's no color, so you're limited to pattern recognition, and the LEDs are fun to play with, but there's no color, so you're limited to personalization. It's easier to learn each light pattern than it is to set the LEDs up to show a different pattern.

Features of the cameras include optical image stabilization, night mode, portrait mode, and macro shot support. There is an in-display fingerprint sensor at the front of the device.

The base model of the Nothing Phone 1 has 8 gigabytes of memory and 128 gigabytes of storage. The water resistance rating and battery are included. The performance of high-end phones won't match the specifications of the device.

The Nothing Phone 1 is powered by Nothing OS, a version ofAndroid that does not include bloatware. The Phone 1 is one of the best mid-tier phones on the market, and it's not going to be of interest to those who are deeply entrenched in the iPhoneecosystem. The Nothing Phone 1 is competitively priced for those who are looking for a change or for those who want a rich feature set.

If you want to see the LEDs in action, watch our full video up above. What do you think of the phone? We want to know in the comments.