A week with Nothing's cheapest phone: The Phone (4b) looks beautiful, but faces competition from within its own ranks

In July, the Nothing brand launched a double offensive on the wallets of everyone who likes transparent backs but doesn’t want to pay flagship prices for them. The Phone (4b) for 7,999 CZK opens a completely new (b) series below the (4a) models, and the Ear (3a) headphones for 99 euros, which is approximately 2,450 CZK, replace the popular Ear (a) model. I carried both new products in my pockets for a week – the phone in blue, the headphones in pink. Don’t expect a full review with benchmark tables; this is a field report after seven days of living with them.

Blue that turns heads

I’ll start with what the Phone (4b) does best: its looks. The blue variant is rich but not garish, and honestly – I haven’t seen a prettier blue on a phone since the first Pixels. The entire body is made of polycarbonate, but it doesn’t creak, twist, or feel like a yogurt cup in hand. Nothing adds bend resistance up to 600 Newtons and IP64 rating – so dust is not an issue, but I wouldn’t risk swimming with it.

The Glyph Bar light strip is present on the back, this time with 45 mini LED diodes with brightness up to 3,500 nits. It flashes with notifications, counts down timers, and indicates charging progress. It’s smaller than on its more expensive siblings, but it’s still the best excuse to leave your phone face down without panicking. In the box, you’ll find a cable and a transparent case; the charging adapter is traditionally missing.

2026 Panel in a 2021 Frame

The display itself is excellent for this price: a 6.77″ Super AMOLED with a resolution of 2,344 × 1,080 pixels, a 120 Hz refresh rate, and a brightness of 1,200 nits outdoors, peaking at up to 2,000 nits for HDR content. Colors are vibrant, smoothness is spot on, and I didn’t have to hide in the shade in the midday sun. LTPO is not present, so the frequency jumps in steps instead of smooth regulation, but I forgive that in this class without hesitation.

What surrounds the panel is harder to forgive. The bezels are unusually wide for 2026, making the Phone (4b) look like a phone costing four, maybe five thousand from the front. Most competitors – from Redmi to Motorola to OnePlus – can already slim down the edges even on cheaper models; here, it’s as if the front design was done by someone completely different from the person who designed the back. Moreover, the optical fingerprint reader sits very low near the bottom edge, so your thumb takes a few days to get used to it.

Performance without ambition, battery without excuses

Inside, a Snapdragon 6 Gen 4 processor, manufactured with a 4nm process, is complemented by 8 GB of RAM and 128 or 256 GB of storage. The phone is swift in the system and handles a typical day – networks, maps, photography, streaming – without a hitch. On paper, however, it’s nothing extraordinary: UFS 2.2 storage is a relic you’ll notice when installing larger games, and the manufacturer promises only 3 major Android updates alongside 6 years of security patches. For a phone meant to sell on timeless design, this is a cut in the wrong place.

Software-wise, the new device runs on Android 16 with the Nothing OS 4.1 overlay – it’s still among the cleanest on the market, and the Essential Key side button brings up a suite of Essential AI features, including ChatGPT, Gemini, and Circle to Search integration. The battery is a chapter unto itself: 5,200 mAh is the most Nothing has ever put into a phone (the Indian version even has 6,000 mAh), and in my usage, it meant a day and a half without a charger. It charges via wire at 33 W; wireless charging is absent, but reverse wired charging at 7.5 W came in handy, especially for the headphones.

Two cameras are enough if you know what to expect from them

The camera setup is straightforward: a 50Mpx main sensor with f/1.8 aperture and optical stabilization, an 8Mpx ultrawide lens, and a 16Mpx selfie camera. The main camera does a solid job in daylight – Ultra XDR mode stacks 13 RAW images and maintains dynamic range even against the sun. The ultrawide lens is more for show; in the evening, it falls apart into mush and lives its own colorful life. Don’t expect a telephoto lens; that remains reserved for the Phone (4a) model, and video caps at 4K at 30 fps.

Pink pill for your ears

The Ear (3a) headphones adopt the brand’s transparent aesthetic, but the case has become rounded – Nothing reportedly took inspiration from a medicine blister pack. The pink variant is just striking enough to elicit a second glance on the tram; conservatives will opt for black or white, while the adventurous will choose yellow. New features include an LED battery status indicator on the case and IP54 rating for both the headphones and the case. The package includes four sizes of ear tips, including a new XS size, but don’t look for a cable.

Sonically, it’s a surprise. The new 12mm driver added up to 5 dB in bass compared to its predecessor, yet surprisingly plays cleanly and balanced – after fine-tuning in the Nothing X app’s eight-band equalizer, I sometimes had trouble distinguishing them blindly from the flagship Ear (3), which cost a third more. It features LDAC with up to 24-bit / 96 kHz transmission, Bluetooth 6.0, and simultaneous connection to two devices. Active noise cancellation up to 45 dB performs a solid service in public transport, but it doesn’t threaten Sony’s throne. Battery life is reported as 10 hours on a single charge and 42 hours with the case without ANC (6 and 25 hours with it), and a five-minute charge provides an hour of playback.

Headphones that remember what you’ve heard

However, the main trump card is hidden inside: 32 MB of internal flash memory. The Audio Snapshot feature works like a screenshot for your ears – you press both stems simultaneously, and the headphones save up to a minute of audio, including 15 to 30 seconds retroactively, because they continuously buffer what you’re listening to. The recording then automatically plays into the Nothing X app, where it can be edited, shared, and transcribed into text; three months of Pro cloud transcription (120 minutes per month) are included in the price. It’s an unexpectedly addictive feature for capturing the point of a podcast or a voice message from a friend.

On paper, the Ear (3a) can even record an entire two-hour phone call, but the availability of this feature varies from market to market – it doesn’t work here yet.

Who this makes sense for

For the headphones, the answer is simple. At 99 euros, the Ear (3a) are an exceptionally balanced piece of technology with their own memory on top, and I would easily call them the most sensible audio product Nothing currently sells.

The phone has a significantly tougher time, paradoxically mainly due to its own family. Last year’s Phone (3a) is currently sold by Nothing for 7,381 CZK and can be found for under 7,500 in promotions – yet it offers a faster Snapdragon 7s Gen 3, a full-fledged telephoto lens, and faster 50W charging. The Phone (4a) then costs 9,199 CZK, which for an extra 1,200 CZK adds a telephoto lens, a better selfie camera, and faster memory. And if you look outside the ecosystem, the Xiaomi Redmi Note 15 Pro 5G in the 8/256 GB configuration sells for around seven thousand and counters with a 200Mpx camera with OIS, a 6,580 mAh battery, IP68/IP69K rating, and Gorilla Glass Victus 2. So, you buy the Phone (4b) with your eyes and heart; your head will find a better price/performance ratio in several other places.

Would you go for the cheapest Nothing, or would you rather pay extra for the Phone (4a)?