The Nothing Telephone 2a was one of the crucial memorable smartphones of 2024. It supplied a quick show, large battery and character, all for simply $349. For a follow-up, Nothing may have merely refreshed the 2a and the consequence would have most likely been price recommending. However the firm didn't do this. As a substitute, it determined to replace the 2a and launch a wholly new handset alongside it.
That new machine, the Telephone 3a Professional, has one thing you don't discover on many midrange smartphones: a periscope telephoto digital camera. Should you can stay with some added weight and a barely foolish design, the 3a Professional gives an almost flagship digital camera expertise for $459. As for the 3a, it’s an incredible machine by itself, and a sensible various you probably have even much less to spend on a brand new telephone.
Provider compatibility
There are a few essential particulars I want to say earlier than I get too far into this evaluation. Within the US, Nothing is promoting the 3a and 3a Professional via a "beta" program the place the corporate solely gives 14 days of after-sale assist. If there's one thing incorrect together with your new telephone and it's outdoors the extraordinarily quick return interval, you can simply be out of luck. That is separate from Nothing's software program assist coverage, which guarantees three years of Android upgrades and 6 years of safety patches for the 3a and 3a Professional, along with "corrective and performance updates."
Moreover, the telephones don't assist all of AT&T, T-Cellular and Verizon's 5G bands. You’ll get primary connectivity, however mmWave speeds are off the desk. Lastly, Nothing notes AT&T and Verizon prospects might want to contact their service to enroll their new telephone’s IMEI for 5G entry. I point out these items upfront as a result of I feel the 3a and 3a Professional are nice telephones worthy of your consideration, nevertheless it’s additionally comprehensible if Nothing's restricted buyer and service assist put you off.
Design
The 3a and 3a Professional don't really feel like two sub-$500 handsets, and a giant a part of that may be a new glass backing. In comparison with my iPhone 12, the 3a and 3a Professional really feel very Apple-like of their development. I particularly just like the coating Nothing used for the outer casing of the 2 telephones, which makes the body really feel prefer it's constructed from ceramic. Each are large handsets, and the feel made for a safe grip anytime I took one in every of them out of my pocket. Nothing has additionally added higher waterproofing, with each the 3a and 3a Professional providing IP64-certified safety towards moisture and mud. That's up from the IP54 ranking on the 2a. Should you spend a whole lot of time round water, loads of different midrange telephones include higher safety, together with the brand new $499 Pixel 9a.
One other new function is a button referred to as the Important Key. On each telephones, it's situated on the proper facet, proper under the facility button. I'll have extra to say on what it does later, however for now I'll point out it feels much less strong than all the opposite buttons on the 2 telephones. It's a disgrace as a result of every little thing else is so well-made.
The Telephone 3a is accessible in three colours (black, white and blue) and the 3a Professional in two (grey and black). Sadly, you’ll be able to't purchase the blue 3a in North America, in any other case I’d get one for myself. Practically three years after the discharge of the Telephone 1, Nothing's units proceed to have distinctive designs, although I think about some folks won’t be thrilled concerning the look of the 3a Professional.
I imply, have a look at it. The 3a Professional is a modern-day Lumia 1020, and is bound to draw confused seems to be. Not solely does the digital camera housing make an already thick telephone thicker, however the further {hardware} makes the 3a Professional an entire 10 grams heavier than the 3a. And at 201 grams, the 3a already feels substantial.
It's laborious to see in images however there's a spot between backside of the 3a Professional's digital camera module and the highest of the again casing. Within the quick time I've had the telephone, it has already began gathering mud and particles there. The outer ring of the module additionally has a end that doesn't match with any of the opposite supplies used on the telephone. In the end, it feels just like the 3a Professional sacrifices a few of the 3a's cool issue for digital camera efficiency. That tradeoff is finally price it and its design grew on me, however I wouldn't choose you in the event you discovered the 3a Professional an excessive amount of.
Show
The 3a and 3a Professional have the identical show. At 6.77 inches, it gives barely extra actual property than the 2a's 6.7-inch display screen. This time round, Nothing has additionally gone with Panda Glass to guard the AMOLED panel from scratches. On paper, that's a downgrade from the Gorilla Glass Nothing used for the 2a and what you'll discover on the Pixel 9a and Galaxy S24 FE, however in need of conducting a drop check, it’s laborious for me to say if there's any distinction in sturdiness.
What I can say is the show seems to be nice. It's nonetheless an FHD panel with a variable refresh fee that goes as much as 120Hz. Nevertheless, it gives improved visibility in direct daylight with the flexibility to hit a peak brightness of 1,300 nits routinely. I by no means struggled to see the display screen, even on a sunny day after I wore polarized glasses.
For the value, Nothing picked the proper display screen. It's quick, vibrant and, due to a brand new 480Hz sampling fee, extremely responsive. One side of the show which will annoy some is that Nothing went with an optical in-display fingerprint sensor as a substitute of ultrasonic. Ultrasonic sensors are typically quicker and extra correct, however additionally they price extra to make, so that they're usually solely discovered on flagship units just like the Galaxy S25. Don't let that scare you away from the 3a and 3a Professional although. Outdoors of a little bit of pokiness throughout setup, I haven't had any points with the fingerprint sensor.
Cameras
The cameras on the 3a and 3a Professional are the whole package deal. Beginning with the 3a, Nothing has made a couple of tweaks. For a essential digital camera, you continue to get a 50-megapixel Samsung GN9 sensor paired with an f/1.88 lens and optical picture stabilization (OIS). As a substitute of the 50MP ultrawide digital camera on the 2a, the 3a has an 8MP sensor from Sony and a barely wider 120-degree area of view. Most notably, the telephone now comes with a 50-megapixel telephoto digital camera with 2x optical zoom.
Whereas extra producers are starting to incorporate telephoto cameras with their midrange telephones, it's nonetheless not a function you discover on each machine. For $379, the 3a's telephoto has no proper being nearly as good as it’s, and I used to be always shocked by the element within the pictures I took. Throughout the whole package deal, Nothing has actually pleasing picture processing. The distinction that the software program provides to images may be an excessive amount of for some, nevertheless it in any other case does an incredible job of manufacturing heat and welcoming pure colours. Like a whole lot of telephones in its value vary, the 3a's cameras can wrestle in low mild or when it has to cope with harsh daylight.
One idiosyncrasy of Nothing's picture processing is that images will typically look unusable earlier than you press the shutter. For instance, brilliant scenes will incessantly have blown out highlights. Nevertheless, as soon as the telephone has had a second to use HDR, those self same photographs will typically end up nice. I didn’t know this after I first began utilizing the telephone, so generally I gave up on a shot earlier than taking it. That is true of the 3a Professional too, so preserve that in thoughts in the event you resolve to purchase one in every of them.
As for the 3a Professional, it gives a close to flagship expertise and the spotlight is the telephone's periscope digital camera. It has a 50MP Sony sensor with an f/2.55 lens and built-in OIS. The telephoto provides a 3x optical zoom, however you can even push it to 6x with a lossless crop. Both manner, the photographs produced by this lens can look sharp and detailed, so long as the topic you're attempting to shoot is comparatively nonetheless.
As you’ll be able to see from the pattern gallery, a few of the cats I attempted to {photograph} round my neighborhood got here out a bit blurry. That's as a result of the 3a Professional tried to get away with utilizing a comparatively gradual shutter velocity. Nevertheless, for much less difficult scenes, the periscope digital camera constantly felt like dishonest, and I needed to preserve reminding myself it is a telephone that prices lower than $500.
The telephoto additionally has a macro mode, permitting it to give attention to topics as shut as 5.9 inches away. It may be difficult to guage how shut you’ll want to be to the topic, however after I was in a position to nail focus, the 3a Professional produced detailed pictures.
The primary digital camera on the 3a Professional is equally nice. Like on the 3a, you get a 50MP sensor with an f/1.88 lens. Nevertheless, it comes with a special Samsung sensor that has dual-pixel autofocus, which helps the 3a Professional lock in quicker and extra precisely. Right here, Nothing’s picture processing goes an extended method to ship images that look nice. Colours are vibrant with out being overbaked and there's simply sufficient element to fulfill anybody who's on the lookout for it.
I didn't take too many selfies. The 3a Professional has a slight edge in that division due to the next decision 50MP sensor, however the 3a isn’t any slouch both with its 32MP sensor. Neither telephone has a front-facing digital camera with autofocus, however that’s typically the primary function producers lower to make a extra inexpensive machine.
Within the US, the 3a Professional has no counterpart. There are telephones just like the Motorola Edge 50 Professional that provide an incredible telephoto at a comparable value, nevertheless it's not offered in North America. If a digital camera with attain is essential to you, the 3a Professional's closest stateside competitor is the Galaxy S24 FE, nevertheless it usually prices $650. And for that purpose, I feel it's well-worth contemplating over twin rear digital camera telephones just like the Pixel 9a.
Efficiency
On high of up to date digital camera {hardware}, the 3a and 3a Professional function a brand new Qualcomm Snapdragon 7s Gen 3 chipset. Relative to the 2a's MediaTek Dimensity 7200 Professional, Nothing says the brand new Snapdragon SoC has a 33 p.c quicker CPU and 11 p.c quicker GPU. Once I ran the 3a Professional via Geekbench 6, the Snapdragon 7s Gen 3 earned a single-core rating of 1,115 and a multicore rating of three,082. For context, the Dimensity processor scored 1,123 and a pair of,603 when my colleague Sam Rutherford reviewed the 2a final 12 months. For one more level of comparability, the Exynos 2400e within the Galaxy S24 FE simply beats each the Qualcomm and MediaTek chips with scores of two,140 and 6,690, respectively.
I do know that’s a whole lot of numbers abruptly, however I put them upfront to set expectations: consider the Snapdragon 7s Gen 3 extra as a finances chip than a flagship one. For on a regular basis use, I discovered it was greater than sufficient for my wants. With 12GB of RAM, the 3a and 3a Professional provide loads of headroom for scrolling via social media, multi-tasking and AI purposes like Gemini.
Nevertheless, the telephones are much less ultimate for gaming. Once I tried to play video games like Diablo Immortal and League of Legends: Wild Rift, I discovered it was attainable to run them at 60 frames per second, however the 3a and 3a Professional would often drop frames and I couldn't play both sport with all their graphics settings maxed out.
Battery
Just like the 2a, the 3a and 3a Professional function a 5,000mAh battery. Looping a YouTube video till the battery died, the 3a went 19 and a half hours on a single cost. If you wish to spend a day gaming, the 3a Professional is sweet for about eight hours earlier than it wants charging. For extra common use involving a mixture of social media use and internet shopping, I used to be in a position to get near 14 hours of display screen time.
As soon as the battery is empty, the 3a and 3a Professional assist 50W quick charging, up from 45W on the 2a. Neither telephone comes with an influence adapter contained in the field, and Nothing didn't present me with one for testing, however the firm claims the 3a and 3a Professional can go from zero to 100% battery in lower than an hour utilizing its new charger. Most individuals most likely have a 20W energy adapter mendacity round, and primarily based on my observations, you’ll be able to anticipate to cost the telephones from 10 p.c to full in about an hour and a half.
In case your finances permits for it, it's undoubtedly price spending further to purchase Nothing's new charger since few telephones on this value vary provide charging as quick because the 3a and 3a Professional. The tradeoff is neither the 3a or 3a Professional assist wi-fi charging, however in the event you ask me, I’d take quicker wired charging over Qi compatibility each time.
Software program
The 3a and 3a Professional arrive with Android 15 and the most recent model of Nothing OS out of the field. As I discussed at first, Nothing has promised to assist these telephones with three years of Android updates, so in the event you purchase one now, you’ll be able to anticipate to get a minimum of Android 18 earlier than you may want to contemplate upgrading telephones. Google and Samsung provide longer assist, however relative to the remainder of the Android ecosystem, Nothing’s coverage is fairly good.
This was my first time utilizing Nothing OS and I’ve to say I'm a giant fan. Nothing hasn't gone overboard customizing inventory Android, and there's actually no bloatware to talk of. Each the system and fast settings menus largely observe the format established by Google, so navigating the interface is simple. One good contact is that Nothing consists of its personal monochromatic icon pack, with many fashionable third-party apps lined. There are 18 customized widgets that come normal with Nothing OS they usually all look nice.
The one main new software program function included with the 3a and 3a Professional is tied to the Important Key I discussed. A single faucet of the button permits you to take a screenshot, which you’ll instantly annotate. Should you lengthy press as a substitute, the 3a and 3a Professional will begin recording a voice memo. Lastly, a double faucet opens the Important Area, the brand new app the place all of these screenshots and notes are saved. An algorithm will routinely transcribe any voice memos and do its finest to categorize all of your clippings into classes, although you can even create your individual. Nothing plans to do extra with Important Area sooner or later, however for now it's restricted in its performance, and you may't rebind the Important Key to do one thing else in the event you don't discover the app useful.
Should you're the kind of one who makes use of Apple Notes religiously, I can see the Important Key and Important Area being a good way to maintain your digital life tidy. I discovered it much less helpful, largely as a result of I've by no means been a lot of a notetaker. I’ll say I do suppose it's a good suggestion, and, with a bit extra iteration, Nothing may create one thing that feels, properly, extra important.
Wrap-up
The Nothing Telephone 3a and 3a Professional provide large worth for $379 and $459. It's actually laborious to criticize Nothing for any of the element decisions, and in the event you're prepared to take a threat on the corporate's restricted US guarantee and need one thing distinctive, these are the telephones to purchase.
For everybody else, it's safer to purchase one thing just like the Pixel 9a or Galaxy S24 FE instantly out of your service. You gained't have to fret about calling your service about your telephone, and also you'll get an extended one-year guarantee. Moreover, each Google and Samsung provide as much as seven years of software program assist with their newest units.
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