Do I Come Back to Nothing?

zeroNULLvoid2

Hey Gang, long time no see…

So, from Apple, to Nothing, to Pixel, and here we are…

Things are not so great over here in America. Everything is getting ridiculously expensive, and prices are going up for most services - including my carrier.

I was on iPhone, then got sick of all the bugs, smoke, and mirrors. At the time I WAS going to go to the Pixel phone line, but then I found Nothing. I went with the 3(a) - and I fell in love with my tech all over again. It was cool, clean, super zippy and fast, great battery, the works. Not to mention it struck up a conversation pretty much everywhere I went!

Fast forward to the fourth-quarter of last year…

The Nothing Community began getting brutally toxic, Nothing put Lock Glimpse into NOS 4.0, then my carrier (which I happen to work for) gave me a Pixel 10 Pro XL for free if I ported back to them. I took the offer…

My carrier then lays off approx 17000 employees, and dives into the deep end of the AI pool. Service is taking a turn for the worse. Meanwhile I am sitting on the sidelines watching Nothing get into controversy after controversy…

So I bought out of my promotion and preparing to move to a more reliable carrier (It’s hilarious here that when you buy out your device, you start getting offers that are RIDICULOUSLY crazy just so they don’t lose you!). I have tried custom ROMS, but none of them suited me - my carrier’s services are still not-so-great.

Hindsight 20/20, I wish I had stayed with my 3(a) and “weathered the storm”. I loved that phone. I loved OWNING my phone. I loved the cleanliness, simplicity, and not having bloatware. I don’t think there was a negative thing I could have said about the device itself until the bloatware. I loved the freedom of choice of what I could do, and not be restricted by American “big tech”.

Now, here I am - getting ready to leave my carrier, tired of big tech, looking for alternatives. The Nothing phone is still one of the best options. Heck, even with all the design controversy, the Nothing Phone 3 is starting look appealing to me - especially the white one!

What do you guys think? Is Nothing “righting the ship”? Have things settled down? Is it time to come home to the brand I fell in love with?

ParulPal

zeroNULLvoid2 coming completely from a different ecosystem and culture, my say would be - “Yes” .

Considering the increasing cost of these tech devices v/s what they offer, and if you want a clean UI experience with no unnecessary hiccups with balance of performance and battery ( few bloatware are still acceptable like the glance thing).

And mate thank you for posting this, I was searching to move on from Nothing , but trust me - Nothing is better than “Nothing”

Amudhan_Sundararajan

zeroNULLvoid2 Welcome back!
Just a heads-up: they did remove Lock Glimpse, but they’ve introduced something called “App Services” on the (a) series and CMF phones. It’s a well-hidden system app, and I’ve seen several reports from users that it automatically installs bloatwares. I’d highly advise searching for it in your settings and disabling it as soon as you update.
I see some comments here saying the majority of users are happy and only a few were vocal about the bloatware. But if that were the case, they wouldn’t have removed Lock Glimpse, would they?
I don’t really want to argue with them… as long as they stay quiet and act as “yes-men,” nothing will ever change. Thankfully, we have a very vocal community that pushes for better. Nothing is clearly listening and trying to fix things by removing the bloatware we don’t like, which is a good sign.
Hopefully, they won’t mess with their next premium / flagship device this year and try to offset losses on the mid-range lineup by adding more bloatware. Hope they’ll turn things around, make a solid profit, and get us back to that pure, bloatware-free “Nothing experience” we all want.

Coldpaw

zeroNULLvoid2 Hi! You asked if Nothing would be “righting the ship” or ghings on the community have settled down.

In Germany I would now answer “jein” - yes and no. Things have naturally settled down because the initial outrage has been a while back already. People vented, time passed, some people already left the community and or will switch brands. Just recently Nothing has removed Lock Glimpse with a new OS 4.0 update, however there hasn’t been an official word as far as I know whether this was due to technical issues (there were reports about unusual battery drain when Lock Glimpse was off) or if they actually removed it for good. There still is a bloatware installation service going on with CMF phones.

While some complains and criticism was toxic for sure, I have to say I fully understand the anger and frustration of fellow users venting here. I am rocking a Nothing Phone (3) and I am not affacted at all by any of this, however I still imagine if I would own a CMF Phone or a (2a) / (3a) I would just be as upset. In fact I kind of am, because back in 2024 my brother was looking for a simple new smartphone without any app bloatware and he purchased a CMF Phone 1 after I recommended it to him. Now with OS 4.0 he got that bloatware service. Good job Nothing. 🫤

I also can kind of understand the underwhelming release of OS 4.0, while I think it offered an overall improvement, it feels more like a smaller update than a major one. I was in particular disappointed with 4.0 on my Nothing Phone (2), my hopes they would improve the ever since inconsistent image processing to more current standards found on (3a) and (3) was futile - it would have been a nice farewell present as OS 4.0 is the last major update for NP2. But no, didn’t happen. This in my opinion is also telling quite a bit about future improvements for the current generation phones when they start to age in a year or two.

Personally I am still overall happily using my Nothing Phone (3) as a daily driver, it is a great phone and I always enjoy using or looking at it. However I also have to say I tend to feel it might well be my last Nothing product: Poor availability of spare parts, increasing number of reports regarding poor aftersales support, lack of decent accessories, even first party accessories for a flagship phone and last but not least the shift in tone when it comes to ads and “bloatware” - even though again flagship devices aren’t affected, it still simply feels disappointing.

Last but no least I can only say you should use the phone you enjoy the most, regardless of what other people are saying. Big brands like Samsung or Apple don’t really have a centered community like Nothing does at all and thus nobody really cares about community concerns. Even as Nothing user you shouldn’t let toxicity and anger take away the enjoyment you get from your Nothing Phone. If it gets too much, just don’t visit the community for a couple of weeks and things naturally start to calm down - as you can see at the moment. As a Phone (3) I got used to negative comments all around the net regarding what a disappointing and ugly smartphone this is, yet I think the design is great, I always enjoy picking it up and overall it is a great smartphone for me, regardless what random people keep repeating around the net.

Anonymous1157

EduardoFonseca_bEYVuOFpAE

Not worth it, the 3a battery is crap now with the updates - watch the latest MKBHD about oneplus - same is going to happend here

abstractethic

batter is an issue, otherwise it is fine

JustinPemberton

Yes, I am still happy with my NP3 and my son uses my old NP2 which is still smooth and fast! Some times weathering the toxic storm by bunkering down and waiting it out will help. Nothing seems to have a vision on its future and is young and will still make mistakes on the way, but I think they will do all the right things in the long run. Their cheap prices can not last forever, they need to eventually make money and that is at a higher cost phone. (Timely) Software updates, (extensive) R&d, (brilliant and different) Design and (sourcing and structuring) Manufacturing all cost money. But Nothing is delivering a solid experience. Weather the storm!

zeroNULLvoid2

JustinPemberton Thank you for that ACTUAL well thought and constructive response!

JustinPemberton

zeroNULLvoid2 Your welcome! The Nothing Fans remind me of WWE Fans. They criticize and have in their heads how things should go and be and unless the product is exactly what they speculated or thought it was going to be they become keyboard warriors. Sometimes missing the actual work that has to go into the product and all the behind the scenes curve balls a company has to deal with. I know it’s a weird analogy but if you have boys and we’re a WWE fan as a kid professional wrestling fans are exactly the same 🫣

ThungbenKithan

Camera is a big No for Nothing users and the design with the glyph matrix isn’t impressive at all.

Ant-e-so-shial

Community shouldn’t be the reason to buy or ditch a product I feel.

You have some needs, you buy a product to fullfill those needs. That’s it. You can ignore rest of the stuff for peace of mind.

Now about the decision of coming back too, you are buying it for yourself, you know what you’ll use that device for.

So does it satisfy those use cases well enough? In your budget? You like how it feels and looks? If the answers are clear to you, then I don’t think you need somebody else’s opinion.

JP

JustinPemberton correct…people judge whole brand and device if they encounter small problem or glitch ( yes..! Glitch…because people nowadays call every little thing BUG)

Most people come here to complain…they don’t read any posts…they don’t research… so it seems like every people have problems with their devices…but it’s a small amount of people who faced problems and got vocal about it…

People who doesn’t have any problem with their devices are enjoying without posting here ..

So community is not in the state to take review or suggestions from 👍🏻

Anonymous1208

Amudhan_Sundararajan App Services was also present on my Google Pixel 7….if even google puts it I think it is kinda of inevitable…

Danitschka

Amudhan_Sundararajan Ich musste den Befehl ADB ausführen 😭.

adb shell pm disable-user –user 0 com.aura.oobe.solutions

MadOne

No. Phone 2 owner here right from the beginning. Cameras are bad. Now even gaming on lowest settings overheats the device and drops frames.

TonyAgnew

And their update roll out is a farce. I have a 3a and still waiting for nos 4 update and nothing are posting that the update roll out is complete. Not for me it isn’t

abstractethic

TonyAgnew did nothing not release 4.0 in December? they posted it right?

TonyAgnew

abstractethic Yes they released it in December and now we will be into February in a few days and they still have people waiting on last year’s update

craig_berrington

I’ve had multiple brands of phone and have just taken the dive and got the Nothing Phone 3.

My Pros

Camera hits well above the mark and the addition of LUTs is a gamechanger

Screen handles direct sunlight very well

No issue with app multitasking

No connectivity issues im currently using samsung buds a pixel watch and it handles them flawlessly

My Cons

Battery life isnt the best out there but will happily last a day under heavy usage