Nothing Phone (3) review

Display

The Nothing Phone (3) has a 6.67-inch, 120Hz ALED display. It features a 1260 x 2800-pixel resolution, which at this diagonal translates to approximately 460 ppi of density - extremely sharp. The display is protected by Gorilla Glass 7i.

Nothing says the Phone (3) can achieve 4,500 nits of peak brightness. That is probably true in a very small window and is definitely beneficial to support the HDR10+ display certification.

In our standardized testing, we achieved a maximum brightness of 756 nits by setting the slider to its maximum and then a very respectable maximum auto figure of 1,507 nits. That's definitely good enough to be comfortable outdoors even in bright sunlight.

Refresh rate

Sadly, the Nothing Phone (3) does not support LTPO technology. It sticks with LTPS and the phone reports support for 60Hz, 90Hz and 120Hz. It can't drop lower than 60Hz, which is a bit disappointing.

In terms of modes, the phone offers Dynamic, High and Standard. Standard is the simplest, it just locks the phone to 60Hz. Dynamic and High both offer some dynamic and automatic switching behavior. The UI runs at 120Hz while you are interacting with it and quickly drops to 60Hz. Most apps tend to run at a maximum of 90Hz and occasionally drop down to 60Hz. High mode favors higher refresh rates a bit more consistently, but aside from that, there is no noticeable difference in behavior.

Regardless of which mode you choose, you probably won't be able to get a high refresh rate going with any sort of consistency. That's a real shame. High-framerate gaming was a no-go either.

HDR and streaming

As mentioned, the Nothing Phone (3) is certified for HDR10+ compatibility. The phone reports decoder support for HDR10, HDR10+, and HLG (excluding Dolby Vision).

We are happy to report that the phone supports the highest possible Widevine L1 DRM rectification.

Battery life

The Nothing Phone (3) has a 5,150 mAh battery in the international model that we have. The India mode has a bit higher capacity at 5,500 mAh.

We conducted our standard battery testing and obtained fairly solid, but not overly impressive, results. The Phone (3) managed an Active Use Score of 12:56 hours.

The Snapdragon 8s Gen 4 is seemingly just a pretty, power-hungry chip. We do have one other device with it in our test database - the Xiaomi Poco F7, and that phone has a pretty huge 6,500 mAh battery, but still doesn't manage amazing battery life. The numbers we are seeing here are pretty consistent, given the smaller battery pack.

Charging speed

The Nothing Phone (3) officially supports 65W Power Delivery charging with PPS, as well as Quick Charge 4. Since there is no charger in the box, we paired the Phone (3) with a known good PD charger capable of more than 65W just to be sure.

The Nothing Phone (3) offers a solid charging rate, but nothing to phone home about. We have to say that the 65W rating is a bit misleading since the phone never actually reached anywhere near 65W during our testing (more like 40W).

Speakers - loudness and quality

The Nothing Phone (3) has a stereo speaker setup. It is of the hybrid variety with the amplified earpiece pulling double duty as the second speaker. There is a secondary speaker grill on the phone's top frame, which is great for a more balanced audio output.

The Nothing Phone (3) is pretty much exactly as loud as its predecessor. It earned a Very Good mark in our standardized testing. We can confirm they do sound quite loud in real life.

The audio quality is good - there is some bass, the vocals are alright, and the high notes are well-presented. The sound could have been a bit richer, but we've heard far worse, so let's not go nitpicking.

Use the Playback controls to listen to the phone sample recordings (best use headphones). We measure the average loudness of the speakers in LUFS. A lower absolute value means a louder sound. A look at the frequency response chart will tell you how far off the ideal "0db" flat line is the reproduction of the bass, treble, and mid frequencies. You can add more phones to compare how they differ. The scores and ratings are not comparable with our older loudspeaker test. Learn more about how we test here.

Connectivity

The Nothing Phone (3) is a dual-SIM 5G device with SA/NSA Sub-6 simultaneous support on both Nano-SIM slots. The device also supports eSIM for up to two eSIM cards simultaneously.

Positioning is covered by dual-band GPS (L1+L5), GLONASS, BDS, GALILEO, QZSS, NavIC and SBAS support.

Local connectivity is supported by tri-band Wi-Fi 7, which includes the unsaturated 6GHz band, as well as Bluetooth 6.0 with LE support. There is also NFC on board. No FM radio, 3.5mm audio jack of IR blaster, though.

The Type-C port is backed up by a simple USB 2.0 data connection, which means a theoretical maximum data transfer rate of 480 Mbps. There is USB Host/OTG support, but no more advanced features, such as video output.

The Nothing Phone (3) has a good set of onboard sensors. There is an STMicro LSM6DSV accelerometer and compass, a Memsic MMC56 magnetometer and compass, and last but not least, a Goodix GLS6851C ambient light and hardware proximity sensor. There is no onboard barometer.