Nothing Phone 2a Starts A Just $349, Is It The Budget Android Phone To Beat?

Carl Pei's Nothing has put the much ballyhooed Phone (2a) up for preorder here in the U.S. for only $349. As we reported before however, the phone can currently only be purchased for developers as part of the Glyph Developer Program. Will Nothing sell the phone to the general public for the same price, no less? For the sake of low- to mid-tier budget options, we sincerely hope so.

During its Mobile World Congress (MWC) after-party, Nothing made the Phone (2a) official plus revealed the MSRP, which starts at just $349 for the 8GB RAM/128GB storage model. The phone will be for sale in the U.K. and India through regular channels, but once again, buying one in the U.S. is thwarted by Nothing's Glyph Developer Program, basically limiting sales to developers of third-party apps for the brand's trademark "Glyph" notification system.


Not as surprising is the confirmation of the custom 8-core 4nm MediaTek Dimensity 7200 Pro chipset powering the (2a). The switch to a Dimensity SoC away from a de rigueur mid-range Snapdragon 7-series was purposeful. According to a company brief, "Nothing and MediaTek have introduced optimizations such as Smart Clean (+200% UFS read/write speed over prolonged usage) and Adaptive NTFS (+100% file transfer speeds with Windows computers) and have been able to reduce power consumption of specific components by up to 10%."

The rear has received the most changes compared to previous Nothing Phones, especially in how the rear camera module is designed. While the dual 50MP camera package itself is carried over from the Phone (2), both are now oriented in the top-center like eyes. Nothing's fashionable transparent back cover is still here, although the Glyph LEDs is relegated to the top half of the device with three strips. 

For the money, it's also nice to see a good display, namely a 120Hz AMOLED punching out 1,300 peak nits. Rounding that off is a 5000mAh battery, the largest pack ever in a Nothing Phone. In short, it's a lot of phone for the money, which raises the question: Would you buy one if you had a chance?