Nothing Phone 4a Pro Durability Test and Teardown Reveals the Good as well as One Design Quirk

The Nothing Phone 4a Pro costs $499 and grabs the show right away with its sleek industrial design, which essentially redefines the class that the company has set with previous models. The aluminum frame surrounds it, and is the most durable yet from Nothing. Circular LED patterns on the back light up for notifications timers and music visuals while small widgets on the home screen run simple games or step counters that add a bit of personality without complicating daily use.

Zack Nelson of JerryRigEverything’s Mohs hardness picks are out to see how the rear panel holds up, and it takes a level two mark before the lines begin to deepen at level three, although the material acts more like reinforced plastic than high-end glass. Flip off the factory-installed screen protector to reveal the display underneath, and guess what? It resists scratches until level six, when it begins to be carved up at level seven. Even the most expensive flagships deliver such impressive performance.

This one design quirk may surprise you, but there is a tiny gap at the bottom of the phone that allows the SIM card removal tool to simply poke a hole in the waterproof mesh that keeps the microphone and speaker area dry. The majority of phones keep this mesh out of reach, however in the case of the Nothing Phone 4a, the first layer sits directly behind the hole, making it easy to slip up and compromise the IP65 classification. To make matters worse, there is a second backup layer, but the risk remains, so proceed with caution.

Following that, it’s time to burn test the 6.8-inch screen, which has ten bit color depth, five thousand nits brightness, and a quick 144hz refresh rate. It can withstand the heat for around twenty seconds before turning mostly white and recovering slightly once the heat source has passed. After that, it’s structural testing time, as he puts the phone through its paces, and the aluminum unibody comes out with flying colors, better than any Nothing model before it, with nary a crack or permanent deformation in sight.

It’s time to crack it open, starting with a heat gun to release the adhesive that holds the plastic camera plate in place inside the recessed aluminum frame. Once it’s done, we can see the precision-cut metal casings for the glass lenses, which include an eight-megapixel wide-angle, a fifty-megapixel primary sensor with optical stabilization, and a fifty-megapixel telephoto that, unfortunately, lacks stabilisation. The thirty-two megapixel front-facing camera also lacks stabilization. Before long, we’ve removed the four silver T-3 screws and six black Phillips screws, and the screen has a gradual warmth along one side.

The rear LED matrix and the NFC coil are connected by ribbon wires, and there is no wireless charging coil inside. Three more screws secure a bracket that protects the battery and screen connectors. Unplugging those leads reveals a massive 5080 milliamp hour battery in the US version or 5400 in the India version, as well as pull tabs to make removal easier. A loudspeaker module is perched on top of the charging port board and may be removed by unscrewing seven more screws and cutting the antenna wire.

Taking the main board out shows a thick coating of thermal paste and a large vapor chamber designed to distribute heat around the back of the display. The main and ultrawide cameras perform exactly as expected, with optical stabilisation in place. If you want to get to the main board, you must first remove the camera shield, which reduces the repairability score slightly, but each step is still rather simple to do with basic tools. The reviewer says that the lack of wireless charging was a deliberate trade-off to make this phone more robust, as well as the solid metal build, rather than compromising on either.