special lighting and parrots (+video)

With much fanfare and great words, the Nothing Phone (1) was officially announced today. According to Nothing, the smartphone market is getting boring and their smartphone must put an end to that. The company does this, among other things, with the striking transparent design including 900 LED lights that can shine cheerfully. What is our first impression of this newcomer? You can read that here.

Nothing Phone (1)

The Nothing Phone (1) is the first smartphone from the English company Nothing. This company was founded in October of 2020 by Carl Pei, the former CEO of OnePlus. The main goal of Nothing is to make technology fun again. About a year ago, the company therefore introduced its first product: the Nothing Ear (1). Wireless earbuds with a particularly transparent design. The earphones were tested by us at the time and received quite positively. According to Nothing, no fewer than 530,000 sets of the Earphone (1) have been sold.

After these earbuds, Nothing now thinks it’s time to bring a phone to the market. Because, as mentioned above, Nothing thinks the smartphone market is becoming boring and even sleep-inducing at the moment. According to them, only minor updates of phones appear. However, they want to change that and they are going to try to do this with the Nothing Phone (1). We got the chance to get acquainted with the smartphone and after a short week of using the phone, you can read our first impression here.

Lighting

Before we go through the specifications of the Phone (1), let’s talk about the remarkable design of the smartphone. After all, the great asset of this device must be the design. And this striking thing is mainly in the back of the smartphone. The back of the device is transparent and contains 900 LED lights. According to Nothing, however, in addition to being striking, the lighting is also very functional. According to them, it is even a new way of communicating. And this has to do with the following three functions in combination with the lighting:

1. Notifications: You can choose from different notification sounds and the lighting will then ‘move’ with the corresponding sound. Very well done, although some sounds are quite nasty. More on that in the video below.
2. To call to action: you can do the same when you receive a call. You can associate certain ringtones with people and have the corresponding Glyph pattern applied. So you can see who is calling through the lighting on the phone.
3. Flip to Glyph: This is a kind of focus mode where you can lay your phone flat with the front on the table. The phone, if turned on, will notice this and put your phone on silent. You will then receive LED notifications. The LED lighting will therefore light up when you receive a notification.

I cannot, and may not, draw any conclusions about the lighting yet. Due to the short time with the device, I can’t give you a good opinion about this yet. You will read this later in the review of the Phone (1). However, I can show you the lighting and the associated ringtones and notification sounds. You can see this in the video below.

Specifications

-Text continues below the specs-

Functional design?

In addition to the eye-catching back of the device, the Phone (1) is beautiful and very solidly designed. Both the front and back of the smartphone are made of glass, surrounded by an aluminum frame. In the days that I have been using the device, I have always had the feeling that I am walking around with a high-end smartphone. So a big thumbs up to Nothing for this.

However, if you have seen the images of the Phone (1) before, it will not have escaped your attention that the phone seems to resemble the iPhone 12. According to Nothing, they have designed the Phone (1) in such a way that it as beautiful and functional as possible. They therefore find it only logical that another particular brand has also done this. I don’t quite agree with Nothing on this one. I certainly think the smartphone is beautiful, but saying that the device is functionally designed, no I don’t think that. I like the flat sides, I’m a fan of them, but they are not functional at all. This is because it does not have a function and rounded sides also feel a lot nicer.

Added to this is the fact that the device does not have a 3.5mm audio jack and ‘only’ has an IP rating of IP53 (splash-tight and protected against dust). So I wouldn’t call the design very functional at the moment. This does not alter the fact that the smartphone is luxuriously designed and really has its own face.

Nothing OS and neat update policy

The Nothing Phone (1) runs on Android 12 with Nothing OS on top. That is a very bare shell about Android that is very similar to the ‘normal’ Android as Google intended. The device therefore contains no bloatware and currently only one pre-installed app from Nothing itself. All this in combination with the Qualcomm Snapdragon 788G+ chipset ensures that the smartphone comes across as very smooth. We can tell you more about this in the review.

In addition to the fine software, Nothing promises three major Android upgrades and four years of security updates. The Nothing Phone (1) will therefore be supported until 2026 and can still enjoy Android 13, 14 and 15. This is very neat for a device of 450 to 500 euros and for a new company.

Why those birds?

You may have already noticed: the many birds that were used in the marketing photos of Nothing. For example, a cheerful Edelparrot was gnawing at the device and two parakeets were snuggling together on the telephone. But why those birds? We wondered and asked Nothing, and they said to us the following about it: “The theme of our campaign is about Pure Instinct. Parrots have instinctive behavior, they do what comes naturally. They are spontaneous and untamed. Also brave, daring and beautiful.”

When will the review be on Androidworld?

In this article you can read more about our first impression of the Nothing Phone (1). A first impression based on a short week of use of the device. You can expect the review of the Nothing Phone (1) when we have been using the device for a longer period of time and we can therefore give you a good assessment.

Buy Nothing Phone (1)

The Nothing Phone (1) can be ordered in three variants. The version with 8 GB of working memory and 128 GB of storage memory and the version 8 GB of working memory and 256 GB of storage can be ordered from the introduction. These two variants cost 469 and 499 euros respectively and will be in stores from 21 July. The version with 12 GB of RAM and 256 GB storage will be available in the summer for a price of 549 euros.

The Nothing Phone (1) is available in the colors Silver and Black. The device is for sale on the Nothing website itself and via Amazon.

• Buy Nothing Phone (1) (8 GB + 128 GB) – Nothing and Amazon – 469 euros
• Buy Noting Phone (1) (8 GB + 256 GB) – Nothing and Amazon – 499 euros
• Buy Nothing Phone (1) (12 GB + 256 GB) – Nothing and Amazon – 549 euros (from summer)