Home > Smartphone comparison > Phone (4a) vs Phone (2a) – which one to choose?

Nothing Phone (4a) vs Phone (2a)

69 out of 100
Nothing Phone (4a)
VS
63 out of 100
Nothing Phone (2a)
Nothing Phone (4a)
Nothing Phone (2a)

Here we compared two mid-range smartphones: the 6.78-inch Nothing Phone (4a) (with Qualcomm Snapdragon 7s Gen 4) that was released on March 5, 2026, against the Nothing Phone (2a), which is powered by MediaTek Dimensity 7200 Pro and came out 2 years and 1 month before. On this page, you will find tests, full specs, strengths, and weaknesses of each of the devices.

Select the amount of RAM to evaluate performance and value for money more precisely
Memory
  1. Differences
  2. Review
  3. Specs
  4. Benchmarks
  5. Battery life
  6. Camera
  7. Comments

Key differences

An overview of the main advantages of each smartphone
Reasons to consider the Nothing Phone (4a)
  • The rear camera has a 3.5x optical zoom
  • Delivers 54% higher peak brightness (1509 against 977 nits)
  • Newer Bluetooth version (v5.4)
  • Water-resistant body (IP64 classification)
  • The phone is 2 years and 1 month newer
  • More recent OS version: Android 16 versus 15
  • Slow-motion recording at 240FPS
  • 12% higher pixel density (440 vs 394 PPI)
Reasons to consider the Nothing Phone (2a)
  • Shows 17% longer battery life (29:55 vs 25:36 hours)

Review

Evaluation of Nothing Phone (4a) and Phone (2a) crucial features
Display
Screen quality, color accuracy, brightness
Camera
Photo and video recording quality
Performance
CPU and memory performance (apps, system)
Gaming
Capabilities for playing modern games
Battery
Battery life, charging type and speed
Connectivity
Networks, ports, data transmission
Scores with a red asterisk (*) are approximate and may change in the future as we gather more data.
NanoReview Score
Final comparison evaluation
Select your primary usage scenario to get a more accurate NanoReview Score
πŸ“± Primary usage:

Value for money (Beta)

Should I update?
No 27% Yes
Mostly no. The difference is too small to matter in everyday use.
The overall difference between Nothing Phone (2a) and Nothing Phone (4a) is not big enough to justify updating.
Main improvements: camera, display, and performance.
Be aware: the newer phone is weaker in battery life.

Tests and specifications

Comparison table of technical specifications and tests
Phone:
Phone (4a)
vs
Phone (2a)

Display

Type AMOLED AMOLED
Size 6.78 inches 6.7 inches
Resolution 1224 x 2720 pixels 1080 x 2412 pixels
Aspect ratio 20:9 20:9
PPI 440 ppi 394 ppi
Refresh rate 120 Hz 120 Hz
Adaptive refresh rate Yes (30-120 Hz) Yes (30-120 Hz)
Max rated brightness 1600 nits 700 nits
Max rated brightness in HDR 4500 nits 1300 nits
HDR support Yes, HDR10+ Yes, HDR10+
Touch sampling rate - 240 Hz
Screen protection Corning Gorilla Glass 7i Corning Gorilla Glass 5
Screen-to-body ratio 87.4% 87.8%
Display features - DCI-P3
- Always-On Display
- DC Dimming		 - DCI-P3
- Always-On Display
- DC Dimming
Display tests
RGB color space - 99.3%
PWM - 90 Hz
Response time - 1 ms
Contrast - ∞ Infinity
Peak brightness test (auto)
Phone (4a) +54%
1509 nits
Phone (2a)
977 nits
Sources: NotebookCheck [3]

Design and build

Height 163.9 mm (6.45 inches) 161.7 mm (6.37 inches)
Width 77.5 mm (3.05 inches) 76.3 mm (3 inches)
Thickness 8.5 mm (0.33 inches) 8.6 mm (0.34 inches)
Weight 205 g (7.23 oz) 190 g (6.7 oz)
Waterproof IP64 IP54
Advanced cooling - Vapor chamber
Rear material Glass Plastic
Frame material Plastic Plastic
Colors White, Black, Blue, Pink White, Black
Fingerprint scanner Yes, in-display Yes, in-display
Repairability Good (3.14/5) -
Drop resistance Good (C) Β· 100 drops -
Screen-to-body ratio
Phone (4a)
87.4%
Phone (2a)
87.8%

Performance

Chipset specifications of Nothing Phone (4a) and Nothing Phone (2a)
SoC
Chipset Qualcomm Snapdragon 7s Gen 4 MediaTek Dimensity 7200 Pro
Max clock 2700 MHz 2800 MHz
CPU cores 8 (1 + 3 + 4) 8 (2 + 6)
Architecture - 4 cores at 1.8 GHz: Kryo Silver (Cortex-A520)
- 3 cores at 2.4 GHz: Kryo Gold (Cortex-A720)
- 1 core at 2.7 GHz: Kryo Prime (Cortex-A720)		 - 6 cores at 2 GHz: Cortex-A510
- 2 cores at 2.8 GHz: Cortex-A715
L3 cache - 4 MB
Manufacturing TSMC TSMC
Lithography process 4 nanometers 4 nanometers
Neural processor (NPU) Yes MediaTek APU 650
GPU
Graphics Adreno 810 Mali-G610 MC4
GPU shading units 256 256
GPU clock 895 MHz 1130 MHz
FLOPS ~458.2 GFLOPS ~578.6 GFLOPS

Benchmarks

Benchmark comparison of Nothing Phone (4a) and Nothing Phone (2a)
Geekbench 6 (Single-Core)
Phone (4a) +10%
1249
Phone (2a)
1133
Geekbench 6 (Multi-Core)
Phone (4a) +29%
3324
Phone (2a)
2581
Compute Score (GPU)
Phone (4a) +16%
4758
Phone (2a)
4085
Compute Score (GPU) 4758 4085
Single-core score 1249 1133
Multi-core score 3324 2581
Sources: Geekbench [3], [4]
AnTuTu Benchmark 11
Phone (4a) +5%
1039119
Phone (2a)
985261
CPU 436236 363418
GPU 83260 172332
Memory 228236 158940
UX 291387 290571
Total score 1039119 985261
Samples Less than 3 [16 tests]
3DMark Steel Nomad Light
Stability - 98%
Graphics test - 3 FPS
Graphics score - 449
Sources: 3DMark [5]
Submit your benchmark results

Recent User Tests

The latest benchmark tests that have been submitted by users
Nothing Phone (4a)
DateBenchmarkResult
πŸ“˜ 2026-08-14 (Angedonia)AnTuTu 111039119
Add View all (1)
Nothing Phone (2a)
DateBenchmarkResult
πŸ“˜ 2026-09-30 (Kaiser)AnTuTu 121001163
πŸ“˜ 2026-09-19 (Vedurijuht2425)AnTuTu 121045921
πŸ“˜ 2026-07-12 (note8techh)AnTuTu 11984744
πŸ“˜ 2026-05-06 (legusk)AnTuTu 111025139
πŸ“˜ 2026-04-13 (Divyanshu Raj)AnTuTu 111006410
Add View all (22)

Memory

RAM
RAM size 8 GB 8 GB
Memory type LPDDR4X LPDDR4X
Memory clock 2133 MHz 2133 MHz
Channels 2 2
Storage
Storage size 128 GB 128 GB
Storage type UFS 3.1 UFS 2.2
Memory card No No

Software

Operating system Android 16 Android 14 (Can be upgraded to Android 15)
ROM Nothing OS 4.1 Nothing OS 3.0
OS size - 21 GB
OS updates 3 years 3 years
Security updates 6 years 4 years

Battery

Capacity 5080 mAh 5000 mAh
Max charge power 50 W 45 W
Battery type Li-Po Li-Po
Replaceable No No
Wireless charging No No
Reverse charging Yes No
Fast charging Yes (64% in 30 min) Yes (59% in 30 min)
Full charging time 1:06 hr 1:03 hr
Battery cycles 1400 cycles -
Battery life tests
Web browsing 09:51 hr 11:32 hr
Watching video 19:02 hr 18:30 hr
Gaming 05:21 hr 06:26 hr
Standby 111 hr 148 hr
General battery life
Phone (4a)
25:36 hr
Phone (2a) +17%
29:55 hr
Add your battery life

Main camera

Matrix 50 megapixels 50 megapixels
Image resolution 8192 x 6144 8192 x 6144
Zoom Optical, 3.5x Digital
Flash LED LED
Stabilization Optical Optical
8K video recording No No
4K video recording Up to 30FPS Up to 30FPS
1080p video recording Up to 60FPS Up to 60FPS
Slow motion 240 FPS (720p) 120 FPS (1080p)
Angle of widest lens 120Β° 114Β°
Lenses 1) Standard: 50 MP
2) Telephoto: 50 MP
3) Ultrawide: 8 MP
1) Standard: 50 MP
2) Ultrawide: 50 MP
Camera features - Bokeh mode
- Pro mode		 - Bokeh mode
- Pro mode
- RAW support
Standard lens
Image resolution 50 MP 50 MP
Aperture f/1.9 f/1.9
Focal length 24 mm 24 mm
Sensor Samsung GN9 Samsung ISOCELL GN9
Sensor size 1/1.57" (β‰ˆ 0.64 inch) 1/1.56" (β‰ˆ 0.64 inch)
Pixel size 1 micron 1 micron
Autofocus Phase autofocus (Dual Pixel) Phase autofocus
Stabilization Optical Optical
Telephoto lens
Image resolution 50 MP -
Aperture f/2.9 -
Focal length 80 mm -
Sensor Samsung S5KJN5 -
Sensor size 1/2.76" (β‰ˆ 0.36 inch) -
Pixel size 0.64 micron -
Stabilization Optical -
Ultra-wide lens
Image resolution 8 MP 50 MP
Aperture f/2.2 f/2.2
Focal length 15 mm -
Sensor Sony IMX355 Samsung S5KJN1
Sensor size 1/4.0" (β‰ˆ 0.25 inch) 1/2.76" (β‰ˆ 0.36 inch)
Pixel size 1.12 micron 0.64 micron
Stabilization Digital Digital

Selfie camera

Megapixels 32 megapixels 32 megapixels
Image resolution - 6528 x 4896
Aperture f/2.2 f/2.2
Focal length 22 mm -
Sensor - Sony IMX615
Sensor size 1/3.42" (β‰ˆ 0.29 inch) 1/2.74" (β‰ˆ 0.36 inch)
Pixel size 0.64 micron 0.8 micron
Autofocus No No
Stabilization Digital Digital
Video resolution 1080p (Full HD) at 30 FPS 1080p (Full HD) at 60 FPS
Depth sensor (TOF 3D) No No

Connectivity

Wi-Fi standard Wi-Fi 6 (802.11 a/b/g/n/ac/ax) Wi-Fi 6 (802.11 a/b/g/n/ac/ax)
Wi-Fi features - Dual Band
- Wi-Fi MiMO
- Wi-Fi Direct
- Wi-Fi Hotspot
- Wi-Fi Display		 - Dual Band
- Wi-Fi Direct
- Wi-Fi Hotspot
- Wi-Fi Display
Bluetooth version 5.4 5.3
Bluetooth features LE LE
USB type USB Type-C USB Type-C
USB version 2 2
USB features - Charging
- USB-Storage mode
- OTG		 - Charging
- USB-Storage mode
- OTG
DisplayPort No No
GPS GPS, GLONASS, Beidou, Galileo, QZSS GPS, GLONASS, Beidou, Galileo, QZSS
NFC* Yes Yes
Infrared port No No
Network
Number of SIM* 2 2
Type of SIM card Nano Nano
Multi SIM mode Standby Standby
eSIM support* No No
Hybrid slot No No
5G support Yes Yes

Sound

Speakers Stereo Stereo
Headphone audio jack No No
FM radio No No
Dolby Atmos No No
Speakers test
Max loudness
Phone (4a)
n/a
Phone (2a)
88.9 dB

Other

Category Mid-range Mid-range
Announced March 2026 March 2024
Release date March 2026 March 2024
Launch price (MSRP) $349 $329
Successor - - Nothing Phone (4a)
Sensors - Proximity sensor
- Gyroscope
- Accelerometer
- Ambient light sensor
- Compass
- Fingerprint		 - Proximity sensor
- Gyroscope
- Accelerometer
- Ambient light sensor
- Compass
- Fingerprint
Bundled charger Not included Not included
*Disclaimer! NFC, GSM network support, and some other specs can be different depending on the country.

Conclusion

After analyzing all the data, we think that the Nothing Phone (4a) is definitely a better buy.

Cast your vote

So, which phone would you choose?
1 (20%)
4 (80%)
Total votes: 5

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