I thought nothing could impress me nowadays. But Nothing did!

In about a month, it will be four years since Carl Pei’s London-based startup — Nothing — released its very first product. The Nothing Ear (1).

I’ll come out and say that I was extremely skeptical, judgmental, and tongue-and-cheeky about the startup. In my defense, all we had to go on until this point was Nothing’s mission statement, which was “To remove barriers between people and technology, to bring back artistry, passion and trust to the field of consumer technology”.

A pretty bold, long-winded statement that, through the lens of someone who has been jaded by a barrage of marketing materials in the past, doesn’t mean much of anything.

It didn’t help that after releasing that mission statement and spending months to tease us, Nothing’s first product looked like a copy of AirPods Pro. AirPods Pro: Electric Boogaloo, this time it’s transparent! The kicker — they didn’t sound very good, too.

But hey, OK, it was just a first product to get the name out there, gauge interest, get the websites talking. What’s next?

The Nothing Phone (1) annoyed me, but why did I keep using it?

It took another year and, in July of 2022, the Nothing Phone (1) was launched. And it immediately became apparent that the transparent elements of the Ear (1) were not just a one-off gimmick — it was something that the company actively wanted to bake into its aesthetics.

In all honesty, the Nothing Phone (1) was rough around the edges. One wouldn’t expect a perfect first launch, right? It had obscure bugs in the software (like the blue light filter not turning off, or some issues with the auto-brightness), and it wasn’t a performer.

Yet, there was something oddly alluring about it. I do remember spending a couple of months with the Nothing Phone (1) as my phone after the review period was done. I wasn’t on board with the Glyph interface just yet — it didn’t make much sense. And I wasn’t happy with the software bugs.

But yet, as a budget phone with modest hardware, it did have exactly the things that mattered — good display, snappy navigation, and a no-nonsense user experience that still had a distinct signature and style. Like the extra-large folders, which allowed you to fit more apps in a single homescreen, but still let you launch them with a single tap, with no need to open the folder first. I am a sucker for keeping my homescreen count down to a minimum.

OK… OK, Nothing.

Nothing Phone (2) sold me the concept

So, I wasn’t super into the whole Glyph interface thing of the Nothing Phone (1), right? It was there to do two things. One — look cool. Two — deliver notifications to you with unique light patterns, so you’d know who’s calling or what’s happening when your phone is face-down.

I found it pretty impossible that one may be able to memorize the light patterns and use that to figure out what type of call is coming through. To be fair — I still do, that’s a weird way to try and sell the Glyph interface.

Nah, what sold the concept of the Nothing Phone to me as a whole was the iteration on the entire package. First, the Nothing Icon Pack, which turns all of your icons monochrome, was introduced with this phone. The reasoning behind the move is to allow you to “remove branding” from different apps and services from your homescreen.

That kind of makes sense in a world where “nomophobia” is a word that we should be conscious of, right? Apparently, Apple agrees, as you can now have monochrome icons on iOS 18, too. Some use that feature to create abominations, other make nice, neat, tightly-packed homescreens.



Then, the Glyph was upgraded with a timing bar. One of the LED strips can work as a Pomodoro timer, or a tracker for your Uber or food delivery (3rd party API is available, but admittedly — not taken up by a lot of developers). Which was a small improvement, but instantly got me to thinking about placing the phone face-down more often.

And then it clicked for me. The Nothing Phone (2) was trying to be “the best phone that you don’t use”. With its many customizations and options, it’s trying to help you push it to the back of your mind as “that one device that I pick up when I need to communicate”, not the smartphone that is always vying for and clawing at your attention.

Again, I used the Nothing Phone (2) for a while. Want to know what got me to stop? It is so incredibly slippery! It will fall off my Anker rubber-covered wireless charging puck, it will slide off a desk, it just does not want to sit still. Thankfully, Nothing is aware of that design flaw.

The best budget phones?

And now we get to the budget era of Nothing — the reason why I felt compelled to write this up, actually. The Nothing Phone (3a) and currently-launching CMF Phone 2 Pro are… pretty excellent for their respective prices.

Granted, slapping the “Pro” moniker on everything is a pet peeve of mine and feels like sandpaper on my prefrontal cortex.



But OK, let’s look beyond that. The CMF Phone 2 Pro costs $280. It is by no means excellent in anything it does — at that price, it can’t be… right? But it’s pretty darn good where it matters!

One — the display. It’s an AMOLED panel with a 120 Hz refresh rate with 388 pixels per inch. Yes, these are specs from a sheet, but in reality — the screen looks good. Very good. And it’s HDR compatible with 3,000 nits peak brightness. Since the screen is basically the thing you look at 99% of the time when interacting with the device, it sure helps if it’s good. And it sells the premium illusion better when it’s 120 Hz, too! (on a $280 phone, looking at you, iPhone 16e).

Then, the software experience. A Mediatek Dimensity 7300 Pro may not inspire much confidence — it shouldn’t, if you want to play Warzone Mobile on your phone. But, if you just want the core smartphone experience, you will be hard-pressed to find a better performer in the $280 price bracket. No, it’s not as fast as a $1,000 Galaxy S25+ or iPhone 16 Pro. But it doesn’t lag, stutter, take ages to open your calendar like some other $300 phones I’ve tried. It works… just fine!

And finally — the camera. No, it’s not as good as on the $800, $1,000, $1,200 phones. In fact, its photos are only slightly better than those of other $300 phones, and that’s arguable.