Nothing Phone (3) review: Glyphs and good vibes

Carl Pei’s Nothing continues to do what OnePlus once did so well: stir things up. The Phone (3) isn’t just another Android slab. It’s weird. It’s confident. It’s also the company’s most ambitious smartphone yet, packed with serious hardware and playful design flourishes. And while there’s a lot to like, there’s also a growing question: has Nothing priced itself out of its own fanbase?

Looks that polarise

Let’s start with the obvious. The Phone (3) is... unique. The back panel is a mash-up of transparent materials and layered textures, with a circular Glyph Matrix in the top-right that doubles as a second screen for things like the time, battery status, and incoming call signals. It’s bolder than Phone (2) but less clean. The asymmetrical camera module placement has divided opinion online. Personally, it took me a day or two to warm up to it, and now, I quite like the strangeness.

Gone are the individual LED strips from earlier Nothing phones. The Matrix display replaces them with a circular grid of 489 LEDs. You can play games like Rock, Paper, Scissors or Spin the Bottle on it, which is fun.

Display, performance and software

The screen is brilliant, a 6.67-inch 1.5K flexible AMOLED panel with 120Hz refresh rate and a massive 4,500-nit peak brightness. It’s easily one of the best-looking displays you’ll get in this range, although Netflix still hasn’t whitelisted it for HDR.

Running the show is the Snapdragon 8s Gen 4, a step below the 8 Gen 3 flagships, but honestly, it doesn’t matter in daily use. Everything feels fast. Multitasking is smooth. The phone runs Nothing OS 3.5, which remains one of the few Android skins that doesn’t feel like a clone. The dot-based visual language, minimalist menus, and slick animations are a joy to use.

There’s a new Essential Key on the side, which can trigger Essential Space, a place to drop voice notes, screenshots, and reminders. You can’t save regular typed notes (why?), but transcription features are handy. Essential Search is a neat AI-enabled universal search bar. Type a question, hit AI, and you’ll get results via Google’s Gemini models. Apple is doing something similar with Siri, so Nothing isn’t far off the pace.

Cameras: Decent but not quite there

On paper, this phone sounds like a dream setup: three 50MP sensors (main, periscope, and ultra-wide), plus a 50MP selfie camera. In real life, results are a bit inconsistent. In good light, the Phone (3) captures crisp, detailed shots. But in mixed or low light, dynamic range starts to suffer. Shadows get crushed, and highlights can blow out. Video is smooth at 4K60, and the new Ultra XDR video mode is promising but it still lags behind the Pixel and iPhone in colour science.

Battery life and charging

The Indian version gets a 5,500mAh battery (global units are slightly smaller), and the endurance is excellent. I pushed through a full day of heavy use, around 7 hours of screen-on time and still had juice left. The phone supports 65W wired charging, 15W wireless charging, 7.5W reverse wired charging and 5W reverse wireless charging. A full charge takes under an hour.

So… worth it?

Here’s the thing. I love using the Nothing Phone (3). It’s fresh. It’s thoughtful. It has just enough weirdness to feel personal. The problem is the price.

At ₹79,999, this is going toe-to-toe with the iPhone 16, Samsung Galaxy S25, and Pixel 9 Pro. Those are big shoes to fill.

Nothing Phone (3) is a fun, fast, and futuristic take on what a flagship can be. It’s not perfect, and it’s not for everyone, but if you like your tech with personality and care less about brand legacy, it’s absolutely worth a look. Just wait for the price to drop or keep an eye on those launch offers.