Nothing Phone 1 drops and bends with the best of them, but repairs will be tough

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When JerryRig and PBK labor over Carl Pei's debut Nothing Phone 1 handset, you know that we are getting the granular teardown and durability treatment. Long story short, the unorthodox design makes it harder to repair, yet the Nothing Phone 1 proved a tough nut to crack.

Unlike some other phones (looking at you, OnePlus 10 Pro), the Nothing Phone 1 didn't fold in half under the bend test and its aluminum allow frame held out surprisingly well against Mr. Nelson's sausage fingers, only giving up at the antenna lines a bit.

The scratch and burn tests also revealed a Gorilla Glass-clad toughie, while a Nothing Phone 1 drop test by the disassembler from PBK Reviews found it faring as well as the next midranger, since it comes bundled with a plastic screen protector already applied.

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As for the Nothing Phone 1's reparability, PBK gives it a very low, 3/10 score for several reasons. Even if we don't count that replacement parts are hard to find at the moment, in order to reach the phone's display you'd have to remove a ton of tiny screws and cables as well as copious amounts of adhesive from the pretty transparent back of the Nothing Phone 1.

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Still one of the better looking phones in recent memory, though it would be wise to put a case on it (preferably a transparent one) despite the affordable pricing, as spare parts may be few and far between, at least in the beginning.

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