I’ve had the amazing opportunity of testing the Phone (2a) alongside the other insiders for the past few months and it’s safe to say I’ve had a great experience! Since we were told in Carl’s video it’d be competitively priced, and undercutting the Phone (1)'s launch price, I was certainly not expecting the smooth experience I’ve had. Using the Phone (2a) day to day, it’s quick and snappy feels like a really high quality device.
The phone: I had the joy of using the stealthy black version, which is new for me as I’ve previously only used the white Nothing phone (1) and (2). The black both looks and feels premium. It’s light weight, the design and rounded corners on the back are beautiful and the frame around the edge feels very high quality, and importantly, grippy! It’s ever so slightly textured with a rough but soft finish. It’s a really nice feeling in the hand. Bezels are thin like the rest of the Nothing phone lineup and the glyphs, despite there being less of them, are still as useful as ever. I actually quite like the minimalist design of the glyphs on the 2a compared to the full body glyphs of Nothing’s other phones. They’re not as “flashy” (pun intended!)
The OS: Phone (2a) is of course running on the familiar Nothing OS 2.5, with some enhancements specific to 2a relating to the camera, battery life, and various optimisations. We’ve even seen some new Nothing OS widgets such as widgets to launch the camera with specific pre-set settings and a voice recorder. In fact, we’ve received a total of 15 OTA updates since we first started testing; which have always been packed with new features and fixes to our reported bugs quickly to ensure the best experience for people who pick up the 2a on day 1! I can confidently say I’ve not been noticing any bugs in the latest OS versions.
The battery: The battery life has also been amazing! I must admit that I’ve not been using 2a as my primary phone as I’m still using Phone (2) for that, so I’m not best placed to talk about daily usage - regardless, when I have picked up the phone to use it or taken it out for some testing, it’s easily lasted a whole day even when using the camera on and off all day.
The camera: Speaking of the camera, the photos I’ve taken, of which I’ve attached some below, speak for themselves! At the very beginning of our testing a couple of months ago, the camera had a lot of improvements to be made, with inaccurate colours and blurred edges. Through the updates we’ve received, the 2a’s camera now performs really well in both bright and low light environments - photos are crisp and high quality and post processing handles challenging scenes well. I’ll be posting some more camera samples on my socials.
Thank you to Rob and Natalie for giving us this great opportunity to be one of the first group of people to test Phone (2a) and thanks also to the software team for all of their hard work with the OS updates!
