You don’t have to like the Nothing Phone 3 – but it won me over, and might win you over too

Introduction

Distinctive. Divisive. discordant. Whatever you call it, there’s no denying that Nothing got people talking with its first flagship phone. The firm with a fondness for transparent tech has embraced asymmetry and ditched its signature glyph lighting for a more functional dot matrix display. Phone 3 is also a big leap into premium territory for Nothing, which until now had majored on affordability.

With prices starting from $799/£799/€799, Phone 3 is going directly up against heavyweights from Samsung, Google and Apple. In some respects it’s up to the task, with three high pixel count cameras and one of the slickest versions of Android around. But Nothing’s definition of ‘flagship’ internals might not tally with yours, and the radical design change most certainly won’t be to all tastes.

So, is Nothing boldly going where no phone brand has gone before? Or does Phone 3 deserve to be jettisoned out the airlock?

Design & build: the Marmite mobile

There’s no mistaking Phone 3 for anything but a Nothing creation. The glyph lights might’ve gone, but the semi-seethrough rear panel remains, in your choice of black or white colours. The lines are more angular and grid-like this time around, except only two of the three rear snappers are aligned to it. The asymmetric telephoto lens feels deliberately provocative, and almost certain to put some potential buyers off. They don’t stick out nearly as far as the Nothing Phone 3a Pro’s chunky camera island, at least.

It’s the circular glyph matrix panel that takes pride of place, with white LEDs that flash up app notifications when the phone is placed screen-down. Press the touch-sensitive dot built into the rear casing and it can cycle through countdown timers, remaining battery life and the current time, act as a pixellated selfie camera viewfinder (though there’s no way to capture photos in this style), and play a handful of micro-games. That these include spin the bottle should give a clue as to who Nothing is aiming Phone 3 at.

A software development kit arrived for community developers when the phone was first unveiled, so I’m betting it won’t be too long before there are a bunch of third-party tools and functions to download. The firm also has an update in the works that’ll let you assign glyph mirror portraits to your contacts for person-specific call notifications. A long-press will then show the contact name or number.

It’s a fun addition, and far more functional than the old glyph lights were, but I don’t think it has quite the same personality. Asus already puts a similar dot matrix screen on its ROG Phones, so it’s not like this is a truly unique feature – however well implemented it might be.

The rest of the phone is more in keeping with Nothing’s older models, with a flat mid-frame made from recycled aluminium and flat front and rear glass. It’s practically the smartphone norm at this point, but that dramatically styled back panel helps the Phone 3 avoid accusations it’s merely copying Apple’s design beats. The screen bezel is suitably skinny and at 9mm thick there’s plenty of purchase at the sides.

My biggest issue is the button placement; the left side volume keys are in line with the power and Essential key on the right, so I was constantly taking screenshots by mistake when unlocking the phone. The Essential key doesn’t feel different enough from the power button, either, which led to a few accidental activations.

Gorilla Glass 7i covers the screen and there’s Victus glass around the back, so it should survive small drops and scrapes without any battle scars. IP68 dust and water resistance is also reassuring, if not quite on the level of flagship rivals that have even hardier IP69 ratings. The phone has stayed pristine throughout my week of testing.

Screen & sound: clear vision

Nothing resisted the urge to go big with with the Phone 3’s screen, settling on a relatively palm-friendly 6.67in. Still substantially more than the vanilla Galaxy S25 or Pixel 9, sure, but more compact than the OnePlus 13. It’s an AMOLED, of course (because no self-respecting flagship uses LCD these days) and a flexible one at that – necessary to make the outer bezels so slim, not because it curves or folds in any way.

The 2800×1260 resolution looks plenty sharp form arms’ length, for lots of resolvable detail in images and crisp text. It also won’t work the graphics chip quite as hard as some flagship rivals with even more pixels. Colours are rich and vibrant, without straying too far into unnatural territory using the default Alive picture preset. A Standard settings dials things down if you prefer more subdued hues.

There’s HDR10+ support, so compatible content is able to really ramp up the brightness; Nothing says the Phone 3 can manage a peak 4500 nits. The High Brightness Mode HBM) tops out at a more realistic 1600 nits, which while less than the best smartphones can manage, is still just fine for outdoor visibility. I had no trouble seeing what was onscreen, even on the sunniest of days.

Because Nothing has steered clear of expensive LTPO tech, the screen’s dynamic refresh rate flits between 30 and 120Hz. Being able to drop to 1Hz for static content like the always-on display mode would’ve reduced battery drain, but because the glyph matrix encourages you to put the phone screen side down, I’ve had less reason to use it. The dynamic switching is fast enough to react to swipes and scrolls, so there wasn’t much need to force it to 120Hz full-time.

The stereo speakers are a fine match to the screen, with more than enough volume on tap from the earpiece tweeter and down-firing main driver. It’s treble-heavy, but not so much it gets peaky or shrill when you crank things up.

Cameras: a clearer picture

If the Phone 3a Pro set Nothing’s photography bar earlier in 2025, now the Phone 3’s trio of 50MP rear snappers has to raise it. The firm hasn’t gone crazy on sensor size, but the hardware compares favourably with Google, Samsung and Apple’s similarly-priced alternatives. You get an optically stabilised lead lens with an f/1.68 aperture, paired to an ultrawide with a generous 114-degree field of view.

The questionably positioned periscope telephoto also has OIS and is good for 3x optical zoom. Macro focusing lets it get as close as 10cm from your subject for sharp close-up shots, and it promises to deliver 60x super res shots using AI upscaling – though in my experience image quality falls a long way short of rivals here, and isn’t that much different from the cheaper 3a Pro. Better to stick to 6x snaps, which are far more competitive. All three cameras can manage 4K/60fps video. The red LED indicator lighting up on the rear of the phone when you hit the record button is a nice touch.

Nothing’s mature image processing has impressed me in the past, but now it has to hold its own against top-tier Galaxys and Pixels. An updated camera pipeline that crams in 13 more frames than Phone 2 to generate each HDR photo is a great start. It helps deliver colourful and contrast-heavy shots in a wide range of lighting, with lots of dynamic range. There’s great colour consistency across all three lenses, and enough natural depth of field for portraits and close-ups – if nowhere near the level of rival phones with 1in lead lenses.

During daylight hours the main camera captures loads of detail and keeps noise to a minimum, though shutter lag isn’t the best. Trying to capture cars at a motorsport event proved tricky, especially when using some of the camera app’s picture presets. A bit like film simulations on a Fujifilm digital camera, I’m a big fan of being able to download new looks with a QR code to mimic black and white film or light leak retro snaps with a button press. The Action mode speeds things up, but you’re restricted to the default preset and locked out of the ultrawide lens.

Ultrawide shots are a half-step behind on outright resolved detail, but there’s not a whole lot in it.

The telephoto holds up equally well, with great clarity and punchy colours. 6x uses sensor cropping and is a little more sensitive to light, and while things don’t fall apart at night, noise definitely creeps up the darker it gets. A Pixel 9 does a better job here – and Samsung isn’t far behind – but the Phone 3 still puts in a very respectable showing for the price.

Tele-macro snaps are easy to pull off and let you get satisfyingly close to your subject; shots stay colourful and noise-free, too. Do I think the zoom lens is a quantum leap forward from the Phone 3a Pro? Not in good light, no – but Phone 3 still compares favourably to rivals within its price bracket here.

Low light is where Nothing’s cameras struggle to match the best sub-$1000 phones. Static subjects are absolutely fine, with convincing colours, well-controlled noise and contrast that maintains plenty of shadow detail. As soon as you introduce motion, however, things get blurrier. Crisply capturing the crowd at an evening concert proved a challenge. Google’s Night Sight processing keeps its edge here. I’d take more noise if it meant sharper shots – maybe Nothing can tweak things with a software update later down the line.

As it stands, this is a perfectly capable high-end cameraphone – just one that doesn’t compete for class honors.

Software experience: where it all comes together

Nothing’s monochrome, widget-filled operating system continues to be one of my favourite takes on Android. There’s a design consistency and level of customisation here that you really don’t find anywhere else, and not a piece of preinstalled bloat in sight. The only additions to Google’s default app selection are a voice recorder and photo gallery, which match the black and white aesthetic to a T.

Essential Space is the headline attraction, using a mix of on-device and cloud-based AI to gather and organise all your screenshots, voice notes and web links together in one place, separate from your camera roll. Squeeze the dedicated button and it’ll capture whatever’s onscreen; hold it down and it’ll record a voice memo; double-press it and you’re taken to the hub.

I’ll admit to not finding much use for the feature when it first launched on the Phone 3a Pro, but the new flip-to-record mode is an absolute gem. Putting the phone face down and press-and-holding the Essential key will record a conversation, with a waveform appearing on the glyph matrix. Press the key when something interesting is said and it’ll mark it in the recording; another press-and-then completes the recording and files it to Essential space to be transcribed and summarised automatically.

The new AI-powered Essential Search could perhaps use a little more time in the oven. I like that it can replace the stock home screen’s Google search bar, and taps into your apps list, calendar, contacts book and gallery images, but it can’t pull straight from Essential space yet.

Nothing was quick to commit to Android 16, saying an update for Phone 3 would arrive before the end of the year. That’s part of the firm’s commitment to five years of new Android generations, on top of seven years of security patches. A small step behind Samsung and Google, perhaps, but still a great showing for anyone wanting long term support.

Performance & battery life: what more do you need?

Nothing is no stranger to chipset controversy, having rattled a few cages when picking MediaTek power for the Phone 2a. This time the online flame wars have been over whether Phone 3’s Snapdragon 8s Gen 4 silicon is deserving of flagship status – especially now the Poco F7 comes similarly equipped for less than half the price.

It’s true that raw performance places the Nothing behind rivals with Snapdragon 8 Elite power, whether you get the entry-grade model with 12GB of RAM or the pricier 16GB variant. Single-core benchmark tests show a narrower margin, but there’s a 15-25% gulf in the multi-core results. It’s a similar story on the GPU side, if you just focus on synthetic tests. That could be a sticking point for anyone wanting maximum grunt for minimal outlay, though keep in mind this still comfortably out-drags the Google Pixel 9 across the board.

Real-world performance is a different story. I can honestly say there was no point during testing where I felt like I was down on power. The Android interface feels instantly responsive, apps open rapidly, multi-tasking was never a chore, and my current rotation of mobile games all played at a smooth frame rate. Unless you’re using your phone to churn out 4K video edits on the regular, there’s zero reason to feel short-changed over the choice of processor.

The one area I thought the Phone 3 did underwhelm a bit was battery life. Nothing has adopted silicon carbide chemistry, but stated conservative on capacity, so you’re getting a 5150mAh cell. Or if you pick up the Indian variant, 5500mAh. No, I don’t know why either. The global model’s battery is a fair bit bigger than Phone 2’s was, sure – but it’s still a long way short of slightly more expensive rivals like the OnePlus 13, with its sizeable 6000mAh.

While I did manage to last all day from a full charge, it was touch-and-go by bedtime and needed the power saving mode enabled. That was with a mix of video streaming, photography, social scrolling and gaming, but largely sticking to Wi-Fi. On a travel day with more 5G connectivity and some GPS navigation thrown in for good measure, I had to plug in mid-afternoon to guarantee I’d make it through to the end of the night.

I saw similar with the Pixel 9 and Galaxy S25, but if longevity is a must-have the OnePlus 13 can manage two days per top-up for not a lot more cash. Things did improve after a couple of days of testing, but most days still ended in the high 20% range.

65W wired charging is quicker than anything Google or Samsung will sell you, and good for 0-50% in less than twenty minutes. And while the rear panel doesn’t incorporate a charging coil into its design any more, there definitely is one underneath; it’ll manage 15W top-ups from a compatible pad.

Nothing Phone 3 verdict

This is comfortably Nothing’s highest-end handset to date, but is that enough to make the Phone 3 a true flagship? It isn’t trying to challenge the Ultras and Pro Maxes on the hardware front: the chipset isn’t quite top-tier enough for that. Or rather it isn’t for anyone who puts a lot of stock in spec sheets. Personally, I don’t see that as a stumbling block.

There’s ample everyday performance here, with well-optimised and highly customisable software to match. The rear cameras take engaging photos and the battery can go all day. The alternatives might have more muscle, last even longer, or have superior snappers – but few have them all at once for this kind of cash. Without the buying power of megacorps like Samsung, Nothing has carefully picked components to make this a competent everyman underneath the flashy glyph features.

The divisive looks aren’t going to be for everyone, end of story. But if you like your tech to stand out, it’s a tempting left-field alternative to the major players.

Nothing Phone 3 technical specifications