Nothing Phone 3 Review: Enters the Big League With a Big Price-OxBig News Network

Nothing has finally joined the flagship smartphone club with the launch of its all-new Phone 3 in London. This high-end smartphone club primarily includes devices from Apple and Samsung, priced above Rs. 70,000, while others, such as Oppo, Vivo, OnePlus, and Xiaomi, are also represented with select devices.

According to Counterpoint’s April report, Nothing was the fastest-growing brand in India during the quarter. It recorded a whopping 156% year-over-year growth, primarily driven by the launch of the 3a series. The market research firm noted that this was the fifth consecutive quarter in which Nothing was the fastest-growing brand in the country. The launch in the premium end could have been a result of the brand’s positive outlook in the market. Now that Nothing has started a new chapter in its smartphone journey, it is most likely to be compared to the best-of-the-best smartphones in the premium range.

At a starting price tag of Rs. 79,999, the Phone 3 is priced very closely to some of the most popular premium smartphones. For example, Samsung’s entry-level Galaxy S25 is retailing at Rs. 74,999, and Apple’s iPhone 16, which launched at Rs. 79,900, is now available at a lower price point through both offline and online channels. Not to forget, Apple’s recently unveiled iPhone 16e is available at Rs. 59,900. To add to the list, Oppo’s Find X8 is available for under Rs. 70,000, while the X200 Pro is available for under Rs. 95,000. Xiaomi’s compact flagship, 15, is available for Rs. 65,000, while the OnePlus 13 is priced under Rs. 70,000. So, long thing short, Nothing’s race to the top club means that it has to beat all of these devices to be worth that price.

So, what does the Nothing Phone 3 bring to the table? Here’s my review, where I break down every small detail.

The Phone 3 design can be polarising for some users
Photo Credit: Mohit Dawar/ Gadgets 360

Nothing Phone 3 Design and Display: Mr. Dependable

The Phone 3 closely follows Nothing’s signature transparent design language, and you won’t mistake it for any other device available on the market. The boxy design, with a flat display, looks subtle, and the curved edges ensure that long hours with the phone aren’t uncomfortable. The 92.89% screen-to-body ratio means you get more screen real estate, and the bezels are sleeker than those of the Phone 2. At 218 grams, the Phone 3 is slightly heavier than the OnePlus 13 (210 grams), while it can be categorised as very heavy when compared to the iPhone 16 (170 grams).

The waterdrop notch at the front now feels dated, and I wish Nothing could have done something with it. The company has made a concerted effort to design the new device sustainably. The mid-frame is made from 100% recycled aluminium alongside the buttons and SIM tray. The smartphone packaging is now also plastic-free.

The display on the Phone 3 is bright and sports a refresh rate of 120fps
Photo Credit: Mohit Dawar/ Gadgets 360

Returning to the aluminium frame, it offers a solid hand feel – something that gives you confidence in durability during daily use. The buttons – power and Essential key on the right and volume rockers on the left feel nice and offer a good tactile feel.

The back panel is where things get interesting. The design team must have had field days while working on this one. The asymmetry with geometric flair is on full show at the rear of the Phone 3. The three-column grid with different design elements looks elegant, while the periscope lens at the top right corner does look rebellious.

The rear camera alignment on the Nothing Phone 3 is so off that it’s practically a design feature now—a very unintentional one.

Another interesting addition is the red recording light at the back that activates when capturing video or using the voice recorder. For content creators, this blinks when you’re uploading a video. The addition of the IP68 rating is reassuring for regular users.

The Phone 3’s weight is 218 grams, and it is convenient to use it with just one hand
Photo Credit: Mohit Dawar/ Gadgets 360

The lens setup at the back doesn’t sit flush with the rear, and in fact, the wide and ultra-wide lenses have a raised stance. However, the phone doesn’t wobble completely when placed on a flat surface while typing.

The Phone 3 features a 6.67-inch AMOLED display with a resolution of 1260×2800 pixels and offers a 460PPI pixel density. The biggest highlight of the display is that it can hit a peak brightness of 4500nits when playing HDR content, 1600nits outdoors, and up to 800nits manual brightness. It gets all the other standard bells and whistles of a premium smartphone. There’s HDR10+ support along with a 120Hz refresh rate and support for 2160Hz PWM dimming. In real-world usage, the display is bright and produces crisp colours. The text is sharp, and sunlight legibility is never a problem on the Phone 3. The Nothing Phone 3 comes with Widevine L1 support, which means you can stream HD content on the device from your favourite OTT apps. It emerges as a decent multimedia device suitable for both binge-watching and gaming. However, looking at this competition, the Galaxy S25 and OnePlus 13 sport a better display.

The display on the Phone 3 is bright, but we have seen better displays in the price bracket
Photo Credit: Mohit Dawar/ Gadgets 360

Nothing Phone 3 Glyph Interface

What started as a light strip at the back (Phone 1) that could be used for different functions has evolved into a full-blown feature. You can now use Glyph Interface for a number of things, including interactions from an app or seeing a battery status at a glance. The Glyph Matrix, placed in the top right corner, is an LED disc with 489 individually firing LEDs, offering a monochrome dot-based display. The Matrix is so useful that you no longer need to look at the screen every few minutes. Be it a notification for a caller ID or any system app. Nothing says that it will roll out more features to the Glyph Matrix soon.

The Glyph Interface on the Phone 3 is a fun element, but it needs to evolve, as right now, it has pretty limited functionality
Photo Credit: Mohit Dawar/ Gadgets 360

It is a fun way to interact with your phone, as you can assign custom icons to contacts with pixelated avatars that appear every time they call. There’s also a Glyph Button, which you can use to check all elements of the Glyph Matrix. Nothing has also introduced what it calls Glyph Toys, which include features such as a Spin the Bottle, Digital Clock, Battery Indicator, Stopwatch, Solar Clock, Magic 8 Ball, a community-developed game, and even playing rock, paper, and scissors.

The Phone 3 comes with Corning Gorilla Glass 7i at the front and Gorilla Glass Victus at the back
Photo Credit: Mohit Dawar/ Gadgets 360

Nothing Phone 3 Performance: Every day ninja

• SoC – Qualcomm Snapdragon 8s Gen 4
• RAM + Storage – 12GB + 256 GB and 16GB + 512 GB
• Biometric – In-display fingerprint sensor
• Glyph Interface and Nothing OS 3.5 based on Android 15

The Phone 3 can handle multitasking with ease, and the app launch speed was quick. It feels fluid even when playing titles like COD: Mobile, BGMI, and other heavily graphics-intensive games. By default, games like COD: Mobile and Genshin Impact launch at the highest supported settings. Even after 45 minutes of continuous gaming, the Phone 3 doesn’t get too warm, and it means the VC cooling system does its job well. The Phone 3 supports up to 16GB of RAM and 512GB of storage, but there’s no 1TB storage model.

It comes in 12GB + 256GB and 16GB + 512GB RAM and storage models
Photo Credit: Mohit Dawar/ Gadgets 360

It is powered by Qualcomm Snapdragon 8s Gen 4, a chipset we have seen powering the smartphones under Rs. 50,000 lately. And, by looking at the price tag of the Phone 3, one would have expected to get the most powerful processor currently available on Android, the Snapdragon 8 Elite. Nevertheless, Nothing’s plan might have been to adjust the cost of the device. When it comes to benchmarks, the Nothing Phone 3 performs well, as shown in the comparison table below.

Nothing’s first bet in the flagship range, the Phone 3, doesn’t feel like a slouch in everyday tasks and can handle some intense tasks, such as editing photos on the go with the Canva app and transferring large files. The dual-stereo speakers are loud and should be able to fill a medium-sized room. On the connectivity front, the smartphone gets all the bells and whistles like NFC, Bluetooth 6.0, 5G support and more.

It runs Android 15-based Nothing OS 3.5 out of the box
Photo Credit: Mohit Dawar/ Gadgets 360

Out-of-the-box, the Phone 3 runs on Nothing OS 3.5 based on Android 15. The UI is mostly the same as what we saw on the 3a Pro and phones before that. The animations are smooth, and the Dot Engine still keeps Nothing devices distinct from the crowd.

The good thing is that Nothing promises five years of OS updates and seven years of security patches. The company has even confirmed that the Phone 3 will receive Android 16-based Nothing OS 4.0 by Q3 2025.

The Phone 3 also gets Nothing’s next-big bet in personal space, Essential Space, where it believes it will serve the user in a very different way compared to the current set of devices. The company refers to it as a second memory, where users can keep their ideas flowing by recording them or keeping notes in one place. With Phone 3, Nothing introduced new features like Flip to record, which works as intended. You can also instantly capture your screen or send a photo from the camera app straight into Essential Space by pressing once. On long-press, it also records a voice note, which can now be converted from voice to text on-device. During my review, I used Essential Space a few times, and it felt like a unique approach to keeping your ideas locked in one place. It will be interesting to see how this pans out for Nothing in the long run.

It comes with an in-display fingerprint sensor, which is snappy
Photo Credit: Mohit Dawar/ Gadgets 360

Additionally, it introduced Essential Search, which is something you may have seen on other devices as well. When searching on the Nothing Phone 3, you can get results for contacts, photos, and documents or even do an instant search for weather or any other information without needing to open a browser or summon an AI assistant. The company has confirmed that it will roll out more personalisation updates later this year.

Calls on the Nothing Phone 3 are clear, and I didn’t face any issues with call quality either. The smartphone worked fine with 5G networks on Airtel and Reliance Jio, and it could latch onto networks at comparatively dark spots, such as basement parking, where I have seen sub-Rs. 25,000 smartphones are struggling.

The Phone 3 gets an IP68 rating, but unlike a lot of Android flagships this year, it misses out on an IP69 rating

In a nutshell, the Phone 3 is an excellent everyday smartphone and can handle light image and video editing without a sweat. It can also handle gaming, but it’s not a gaming-centric device, so don’t expect a lot.

Nothing Phone 3 Camera: Mixed bag

• Camera – Triple 50-megapixel setup (Wide, Periscope, and Ultra-wide)
• Selfie – 50-megapixel sensor
• Videos – 4K Ultra XDR at 30 or 60fps

Nothing has gone all out in the camera department, and the Phone 3 packs four 50-megapixel sensors overall. Camera alignment aside, the primary camera on the Phone 3 is a capable one, capturing images with good exposure and a wide dynamic range. The white balance in camera samples was neutral, and most of the samples clicked during the day had nice colours.

The primary sensor on the Phone 3 is an OmniVision OV50H, while the telephoto is a Samsung ISOCELL JN5 sensor
Photo Credit: Mohit Dawar/ Gadgets 360

Under bright light and indoor lighting, there was a high level of fine details, including in macro mode. The autofocusing was quick and smooth. I also noticed that the samples had relatively low noise levels—some daylight shots are included below for your reference.

Nothing Phone 3 daylight camera samples (tap images to expand)

The Phone 3 can also take some lovely portraits with good face exposure, decent colours, and natural skin tones. The smartphone also handles the background blur well.

Nothing Phone 3 portrait camera sample (tap image to expand)

Moving on to low-light samples, the Phone 3 performed well in most challenging light conditions but noticed some inconsistencies when switching lenses while clicking – something I also noticed while clicking during the day.

Nothing Phone 3 close-up sample (tap image to expand)

Once you switch between 24mm (1x), 50mm (2x), and 70mm (3x) lenses, the colours keep changing. For example, a red bus is captured perfectly by the primary sensor, but I want to try different angles and lenses. Then, it appears slightly less red on 2x, and on 3x, the same bus is almost light red. So, the colour inconsistency is there. Hopefully, a new software update could fix this. Nothing is one brand that’s known for fixing issues pretty quickly, and reviewers received an OTA update right out of the box with plenty of changes to the camera, which was pretty average before the update.

Nothing Phone 3 low-light camera samples (tap images to expand)

The 50-megapixel selfie shooter can capture some decent shots during the day, offering a good amount of detail and a wide dynamic range. The noise levels are also controlled, and colours are vivid. However, the quality suffers at night and isn’t as detailed as shots taken during the day.

Nothing Phone 3 telephoto daylight samples (tap images to expand)

The zoom performance of the Phone 3 is excellent. The target exposure is accurate, with lovely colours, especially in bright conditions, and it remains relatively consistent when shooting indoors. The good thing was that when zooming, the telephoto did well, though I noticed that there was a lack of detail. The dynamic range was acceptable.

Nothing Phone 3 ultra-wide samples (tap images to expand)

The ultra-wide camera is one of my lowest-ranked sensors on the Phone 3. The most inconsistent results I got were from the ultra-wide sensor, and this was constant across lighting conditions.

Nothing Phone 3 selfie camera sample (tap image to expand)

The video quality is decent on the Nothing Phone 3, and all four 50-megapixel cameras support 4K 60fps recording. Overall, the Phone 3’s cameras are a mixed bag, with the main camera excelling, while the telephoto and ultra-wide lenses aren’t among the best we have seen in this price bracket.

Nothing Phone 3 Battery: Well-rounded

• Battery capacity – 5500mAh
• Fast-charging – 65W support (no charging adapter in the box)
• Wireless charging support – 15W

In India, the Nothing Phone 3 comes with a 5500mAh battery, while global units feature a slightly smaller battery pack – 5150mAh. The smartphone also supports 65W fast charging, 15W wireless charging, 5W reverse wireless charging, and 7.5W reverse wired charging. In real-world use, the Nothing Phone 3 can easily last more than a day with heavy usage. My usage included approximately 7 hours of screen-on time, which consisted of streaming, browsing, gaming, messaging app usage, utility app usage open in the background at all times, and camera use. With medium or light use, the Phone 3 can even last up to 36 hours on a single charge.

Much like other Nothing phones, there’s no charging adapter in the box
Photo Credit: Mohit Dawar/ Gadgets 360

The Phone 3 performed well in our HD video loop test, which plays a locally stored video in a loop (until the battery dies); it managed a decent 21 hours approximately. The figure was impressive. I also tested it with PCMark’s Battery test, and the Phone 3 lasted for 13 hours and 20 minutes.

On the fast-charging front, the 65W wired charging is a bump from the 45W seen on the Phone 2. The smartphone can fully charge (from 0 to 100%) in under an hour, which is impressive. A mere 20 minutes of charge can bump the battery from 0 to 50%. Considering the handset’s pricing, the company should have planned to ship a charging adapter in the box or even bundle it as a special offer for a few sales.

Nothing Phone 3 Verdict

The Nothing Phone 3 is a great first-gen flagship from a company that has delivered many fantastic products. The design is a classic Nothing. The more you use it, the more it grows on you. Glyph Interface is an excellent way to play around with the product. There’s no unnecessary AI push across the device, and Essential Search is a step in the right direction (hopefully, it stays this way without becoming too intrusive). The performance is top-notch, and you will barely feel that you need a better chipset for everyday tasks. Nothing OS comes with a signature dot theme that is fresh and unlike what you see on other devices. The cameras are okay, and while I type this, I’m hoping that the Nothing team fixes the inconsistencies soon enough. The battery will also impress you.

Nothing promises 5 years of Android updates and 7 years of security patches
Photo Credit: Mohit Dawar/ Gadgets 360

The biggest question mark is on the pricing! At Rs. 79,999, the Nothing Phone 3 is a phone that’s difficult to recommend to premium users in India, as there are better alternatives available in the market. While Nothing has made the deal sweeter with bank offers and exchange offers as a launch offer, but that doesn’t stay forever. If the Nothing Phone 3 were priced under Rs. 60,000, it would have had a better market positioning.

As we always recommend in our reviews, you can consider the iPhone 16 or 16 Plus, which is a decent device for the price; the Oppo Find X8 came out as an excellent device in our review, and there’s, of course, the OnePlus 13 packs top-notch specs and delivers value at that price.