London-based Nothing has officially forayed into India’s mass smartphone market with its most affordable smartphone to date, the Phone 2a. The Phone 2a packs the most sought-after features from the Phone 1 and Phone 2, putting them together inside a product that will likely appeal to more people with its relatively accessible Rs 23,999 base price, even as Nothing starts to dip its toes into the volumes game largely dominated by brands like OnePlus and Samsung.
The Phone 2a retains some of Nothing’s most signature moves including a see-through back panel that gives you a peek at some of its inner workings, though the design has been refreshed quite a bit to –also— enable affordability. The Phone 1 and Phone 2 looked almost similar. Not only does the 2a look different, it could be a case study of how to do things in a cost-effective manner.
The blueprint, Nothing says, comes from some of its earliest drawings from 2020 when it was making the Phone 1. The back is divided into two halves. The upper half is indicative of the “brain” with the cameras being treated as the eyes. A trio of light strips circles them. The lower half is asymmetrical on purpose so as to disrupt the flow of the top. The inspiration for the pipe-like interconnected network came from Massimo Vignelli’s New York subway map. Clearly, Nothing put a lot of thought and it will be interesting to see how the average customer responds to it.
The same way, it will be hoping the buyer will appreciate its sustainability push. Nothing is being fairly transparent about what it’s putting inside the Phone 2a and what it’s not. At 52kg, the 2a takes up a 12.5 percent lower carbon footprint than the Phone 1. It is also repurposing plastic waste from its Ear 2 production line to make the Phone 2a using a new recycling process. The packaging is “plastic free” and the phone itself contains “a number of’ recycled materials.” Obviously, there is no charger in the box, like it or not.
Software is another area where the Phone 2a stands out in a sea of sameness. Nothing hasn’t dialled down its interface and ambitions to take on the big Apple for its budget-centric phone. Rather, it has the same Nothing OS 2.5 as its flagship Phone 2 with all the richness of Android 14 intact interspersed with its own “distraction-cutting” pixy dust that imparts a sense of originality and warmth, hard to find unless you break your bank for a Pixel 8 or something. An equally amazing feat is that Nothing has chosen to keep the Phone 2a free of bloatware and spam (so far), a necessary evil that other brands succumb to in order to achieve lower pricing. The phone will get three major OS and four years of security updates.
The rest of the Phone 2a package isn’t short-changed either. The hardware is good, if not the best. The phone has a 6.7-inch 1080p flexible AMOLED with a 120Hz refresh rate and Corning Gorilla Glass 5 protection. Under the hood, it has a “pro” MediaTek Dimensity 7200 paired with up to 12GB of RAM and 256GB of storage. The dual 50MP camera setup on the rear and 32MP front camera seem mostly identical to the Phone 2’s with the exception that the ultrawide lacks autofocus (so no macro shooting). Powering the 2a is a 5,000mAh battery with 45W fast charging baked in. There’s NFC, Wi-Fi 6, and Bluetooth 5.3 along with an under-display fingerprint reader for biometrics and basic IP54 rating for splash resistance. You also get dual speakers.
The Nothing Phone 2a will come in a choice of 8GB/128GB, 8GB/256GB, and 12GB/256GB for Rs 23,999, Rs 25,999, and Rs 27,999, respectively with general sale to start from March 12.
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