Pink phones are here and Nothing’s 4A Pro is a great affordable option

I loved last year’s Nothing Phone 3A Pro so much that I gave it the coveted CNET Editors’ Choice Award, so its follow-up, the Nothing Phone 4A Pro, has a lot to live up to. I’ve spent some time with the phone, and there’s certainly a lot to like, from its fresh pink design to its capable processor. But Nothing phones have always had another key advantage: price.

HAS $499 in the United States And £499 in the UKthe Phone 4A Pro is undoubtedly affordable, especially considering its solid set of specifications. Its main competitor is the Google Pixel 10A, which costs exactly the same and recently impressed in our full test thanks to its overall performance (with the price tag at $599). iPhone17E behind in value). It’s too early to say how the Phone 4A Pro compares to Google’s phone, but it certainly has enough going for it to warrant your consideration.

Here’s what you need to know about this affordable Android phone.

Nothing Phone 4A Pro: pink design with Glyph Matrix

My favorite thing about the phone is its pink color. Does this make me extremely superficial? Yes, but that suits me. I love pink gadgets. I managed to turn my cosmic orange iPhone 17 Pro into pink with chemicals, and I had a custom pink wrap put on my expensive Leica Q3 43. It’s a subtle pink, rather than a hot pink like the old Motorola Razr V3, but it’s a fun color that doesn’t take itself too seriously – and it’s refreshing.

Many of today’s phones come in dreary shades of black, silver, or gray, so I really appreciate it when a brand injects a little more personality into the mix. That said, Nothing has made some significant design changes here. The company is known for its transparent plastic-backed phones that show some of the components underneath, as well as its “Glyph” LED light patterns. I loved this look on the 3A Pro and the Nothing Phone 1 and 2 before it.

There’s still an element of that here, but it’s been corralled and squashed into the camera bar, with around 70% of the phone now being a simple expanse of aluminum. Cover the camera bar and you could look at virtually any other phone. The bar itself looks interesting, with some visible screw heads that retain that industrial feel. This is also where you’ll find the three camera lenses and the Glyph Matrix introduced on last year’s much more expensive Nothing Phone 3.

The Matrix is ​​essentially a circular dot-matrix display that can show information such as the time, battery level, or incoming notifications. But Nothing opened up Glyph to allow developers or users to create their own tools, like a countdown timer until your Uber arrives. The Phone 3’s Glyph Matrix was touch sensitive, allowing it to use what Nothing called “Glyph toys”, like spinning the bottle, while the 4A Pro’s is just a screen.

I found these features to be somewhat gimmicky, and the new Glyph Matrix – used as a display rather than an interactive toy – loses little in terms of functionality while providing a better overall experience. Whether this will prove more useful remains to be seen. I also think it’s a bit of a shame that the Phone 4A Pro doesn’t have any of the flashing LED lights the company is known for; even the more affordable Phone 4A has only a modest cluster of lights to alert you of incoming calls.

The phone is IP65 rated, which protects it from spills or calls in the rain. This probably makes it as dust-resistant as most other phones, although it may not survive prolonged submersion like devices with an IP68 rating. There’s no mention that it uses recycled plastics, steel, aluminum, and tin in its construction, giving it the lowest carbon footprint of all its phones.

Nothing Phone 4A Pro: Processor, software and camera

The phone is powered by a Qualcomm Snapdragon 7 Gen 4 chip with 8GB or 12GB of RAM. I tested the 12GB model and found it fast enough for everyday use. Navigating the Android interface was smooth, apps opened quickly, and the graphically demanding game Genshin Impact played smoothly even at high quality settings.

It runs Android 16 with Nothing’s custom skin on top, which turns much of the interface into a stark, monochrome experience. I’m not a fan, largely because the lack of color cues makes it harder to distinguish app icons – a problem I also encountered with the Xiaomi Leitzphone’s Leica UI. Still, you can change the theme for a more typical interface if you also need more colors, and I like the different Nothing widgets you can install and the private space that lets you hide sensitive apps and photos behind a password. That doesn’t make it the most privacy-intensive phone in the world, but it’s a great option for casual phone owners.

On board you’ll find Nothing’s Essential Space, a productivity app the company launched on its phones last year. It’s essentially a repository of screenshots and voice notes to help you make sense of your stream of consciousness throughout the day. It uses a physical hardware button on the side of the phone; tap and hold, and it will take a screenshot of whatever you’re looking at, and you can record a voice note to remind you what’s important or maybe to remind you to buy something later.

I love Essential Space. It’s actually a useful tool, especially if you’re the type of person who randomly thinks about things you need to do during the day but can never seem to remember them later when you have time to act on them. This is by no means a reason to choose a Nothing phone over another device, but it’s a handy extra to play with if you’re already considering the Phone 4A Pro.

There’s no promise of three years of Android updates and a total of six years of security updates for the Phone 4A Pro, meaning it should still be safe to use in 2032. I’d like to see more generous software updates (the Pixel 10A will receive software and security updates for seven years), but security support is the main thing here, as that directly relates to the lifespan of the phone.

On the back is a trio of cameras, including a 50-megapixel main camera, a 50-megapixel telephoto camera with 3.5x optical zoom, and an 8-megapixel ultra-wide camera.

I only briefly tested the camera and found it decent for the price, but I want to take many more test photos, including comparisons with the Pixel 10A, before giving a verdict. Typically, Nothing phone cameras don’t offer image quality that will satisfy photography professionals, but if you’re looking for well-balanced photos of your kids playing in the yard, this will probably be ideal.

The phone packs a 5,080mAh battery, which the company claims will give you 17 hours of mixed usage. This will really depend on how demanding you are of your phone; in our streaming test, it dropped almost 10% after its first hour and only fell to 73% after the third hour. This is well below average. Keep things more reasonable, though, and you shouldn’t struggle too much to make a day of it. It has 50 watts of wired charging to quickly restore power, but you’ll need to provide your own compatible fast charger.

Nothing Phone 4A Pro: should you buy it?

There are many things I like about the phone. It’s got enough power for all your daily needs, its cameras are good enough for on-the-go shots, and while its design could definitely be a little more experimental, the pink color and Glyph Matrix screen certainly help it stand out from the crowd.

But the Nothing Phone 4A’s affordable $499 price is the main reason to consider this phone, and from my testing so far, I certainly feel like you’re getting a lot of phone for your money. Of course, if you’re looking for the latest and greatest phone technology, you need to look at the Xiaomi Leitzphone or Galaxy S26 Ultra. But both of these will cost you at least three times as much, so you need to think: are a better camera and more processing power really worth it?

I’ll have to leave my final verdict for once I can give it the full review treatment, so stay tuned to see how this phone really stacks up, especially compared to the Pixel 10A.