[Music] the flashy nothing foam 2 is here and we're excited [Music]
the first nothing phone impressed us with its solid all-round performance It's relatively
affordable price tag and of course the flashing lights but it never officially made it to the
US so those of you watching this video were probably left out of the loop but the second
generation is here to change that when it goes on sale in the US and the wider World
on the 16th of July the nothing phone 2 will come with a range of upgrades from the design
to the components and only 599 it is still a relatively affordable option but the competition
is much more Fierce here then is what you need to know about the nothing phone 2. thank you
visually there hasn't been a huge departure from the first model the back is still transparent
letting you see a little inside the phone including these exposed screw heads and
various connecting components the glass is now gently curved at the edges though which
does just give it a slightly more premium feel when you're holding it but it's those flashing
lights or the glyph as nothing calls it that is the big family resemblance here
there's LEDs light up the back of the phone and can be used to alert you to all kinds of incoming
notifications or for alarms or as a battery meter or simply to use as a fill light when
you're filming videos the phone 2 has slightly more sections to those LED things so it allows
for slightly deeper customization to create your own light patterns for different apps or contacts
there's also a glyph timer and that can just be used as a literally countdown timer if you're
boiling an egg but it can also link with apps like uber and it will count down as you're waiting for
your car to arrive that's handy if you're in a bit of a ration you still need that time to do
your hair but want an easy visual cue of exactly when your car is going to arrive and nothing says
it will be working with other developers to bring that kind of timer functionality to other apps the
glyph Lite certainly helps the first generation stand out against the competition and sure they
are arguably something of a bit of a a gimmick but it is genuinely nice to see a little bit of
fun and Flair in phones especially in the more affordable mid-range sector where things like
fancy designs and cool new Aesthetics tend to take a bit of a back seat in order to keep those
prices down but those lights are not the only physical thing to care about the metal frame
is made from a hundred percent recycled aluminum it is ip54 rated to keep it safe if you're taking
calls in the rain and there is a fingerprint sensor invisibly hidden underneath the display
the 6.7 inch display is big and bright enough to do justice to those fancy games or colorful Duty
videos you might be watching on the move and its adaptive frame rate can let it go from only one
Hertz to help preserve battery life and then ramp up to 120 hertz for more smoother gaming
powering the nothing phone 2 is a Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 plus gen 1 processor backed up
by either 8 or 12 gigabytes of RAM now that is a slightly older generation processor now but it's
still a potent chip so you can fully expect the nothing phone too to handle pretty much anything
you'd want to throw at it from gaming to photo editing or video streaming nothing said it wanted
to use an older chip because it wanted something that's tried and tested that will offer a more
stable platform while still keeping those costs down and to be honest I think that is a fair trade
here and not to say that it's an underpowered older processor far from it bear in mind that
phones like the OnePlus 10t and the Samsung Galaxy Z fold 4 both have that same processor
and they are both absolute Powerhouse Flagship phones only launched last year so don't worry
at all about this phone being able to handle any of your daily needs the phone 2 runs Android 13
at its core but nothing has done quite a lot to customize the look of the interface it's a very
Stark monochrome experience with quite a heavy Reliance on dot matrix style texts and icons
there are a variety of widgets that use these Aesthetics but even some of the actual app icons
themselves can be made black and white to fit in with that whole look now that could make it
quite difficult to find your apps especially if like me you tend to rely on those color cues to
find exactly which one you need so thankfully you can turn that off if you want to a feature that I
can see being quite useful though is is creating a folder of apps on one of your home screens and
then hiding that folder behind an icon I'm imagining filling a folder up with some of
my main work apps things like Outlook or slack or zoom and then I can hide all those behind an icon
maybe a briefcase to indicate work and just keep those hidden out of way so I don't have to worry
about them on my weekends I often don't really like custom skins that really change the look of
Android but there is something quite Stark and stylish about what nothing has done here and
if you are into that kind of monochrome minimalism then you will enjoy the interface nothing promises
that the phone 2 will receive three years of OS updates and an additional fourth year of
security updates now that isn't bad but it is a little bit below the five years of security
updates that other companies including Samsung are starting to offer on their phones I would
want to see all phone manufacturers offering up to and Beyond five years of security updates
it'll keep those phones being safer to use for longer and therefore keeping them out of landfill
on the back of the phone you will find a 50 megapixel main camera and a 50 megapixel
Ultra wide camera Hardware wise that is pretty much the exact same setup we had on the nothing
phone one but the improved Snapdragon processor on the nothing phone 2 allows the much better
image processing and indeed nothing is promising improved colors improved exposure and improved
HDR skills all of which should hopefully help you take nicer looking shots I've spent some
time testing the camera and so far I am pleased to see generally vibrant images with plenty of
detail and a decent enough handling of exposure so while there's no major Improvement here in
terms of sensor size or zoom lenses those software updates should definitely help you
take better photos on this phone than you could on its predecessor but its bigger competition is
going to come from the Google pixel 7A which can take stunning photos and is quite a bit cheaper
than the nothing phone too so I'm really looking forward to see how those two Stack Up [Music]
the phone 2 will shoot 4K video at 60 frames a second and it's 32 megapixel front-facing
camera should be more than enough to capture some really embarrassing selfies powering the phone is
a 4 700 milliamp hour battery which should be capacious enough to help you get through a full
day of use but as with all phones your actual results will just come down to how much you
Hammer your phone if you spend all morning gaming and streaming videos then you can expect you need
to give it a top up sometime in the afternoon a little more General mixed use getting through
a full day should be fine and you can probably just expect to give it a full charge overnight
as we all do it supports 45 watt fast charging which nothing says will take it from empty to
full in about 55 minutes a fast charger does not come in the box so you will need to factor buying
one of those when you look at the prices it has 15 watt wireless charging as well and you can
reverse charge through it so you can give your your headphones a little boost or even charge up
another phone entirely so is the nothing phone 2 actually a good phone to buy well if you're
after a flashy phone that really stands out from the crowds and the nothing phone two's LEDs does
somewhat put it in a league of its own certainly do make a statement and while I can't honestly say
I would find myself using them every single day there could well be a useful addition beyond that
the phone does have plenty going for it from it big screen to its potent processor and that quite
cool looking software but it's more expensive than the first version and that extra price means it is
got a lot of competition and in fact at 599 it's quite a big step up above the 4-4-9 that Google
wants for the excellent pixel 7A and while I don't expect the pixel 7A to compete on processing power
Google's cheapest phone does take amazing photos for the price and its software is a dream to use
the mid-range phone market has become one of the most hotly contested areas in 2023 and the
nothing phone 2's higher price does mean it's now got an even bigger fight on its hands to convince
people to make room in their pockets what do you think of the new nothing phone 2 do those
flashing lights convince you or are you looking elsewhere do make sure to leave your thoughts
in the comments below and make sure to check out the video description for a lot more information