Nothing Phone (3a) Pro review: the zoom camera you don’t expect at ₹29,999
A real 3x periscope camera, the cleanest software on Android and a design that still turns heads. The battery is merely fine, and that’s the catch.
8.1out of 10
The Synap verdict
The most fun phone under ₹30,000, with a zoom camera that earns its place.
Buy it if
You want clean software and a real zoom camera
Skip it if
You need two full days of battery
Nothing has spent three years convincing people that a phone can be fun again. The blinking lights on the back got the headlines. The Phone (3a) Pro is the first one where the most interesting thing isn’t the design.
It’s the camera bump. Inside that oversized circle is a 50MP periscope telephoto with 3x optical zoom, a part that usually shows up on phones costing twice as much. At ₹29,999 for the 8GB and 256GB model, nothing else in India offers it.
I used the (3a) Pro as my main phone for two weeks in Bengaluru, which mostly meant photographing traffic from further away than before.
The zoom is the real deal
Zoom cameras on mid-range phones are usually a trick: a crop from the main sensor with a “2x” button on top. This one is a proper periscope lens, and you can tell straight away.
At 3x, photos are sharp, with a natural background blur that makes it the best portrait camera at this price. At 6x, they’re still good enough for Instagram. Past 10x, things get painterly, which is true of most phones that aren’t Galaxy Ultras.
At 3x, this phone takes the kind of portraits I’d expect from a ₹60,000 phone.
The 50MP main camera is solid, if a little conservative with colour. Nothing’s processing has improved a lot, and night shots are clean, if not quite Pixel-level. The 8MP ultrawide is the weak link: fine in daylight, mushy indoors.
How it compares
| Spec | Phone (3a) Pro | Pixel 9a | Galaxy A56 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Starting price | ₹29,999 | ₹49,999 | ₹41,999 |
| Optical zoom | 3x periscope | None | None |
| Battery | 5,000mAh | 5,100mAh | 5,000mAh |
| Wired charging | 50W | 23W | 45W |
| Android updates | 3 | 7 | 6 |
The cleanest Android around
Nothing OS 3.1 is close to stock Android, with a monochrome look you’ll either love or switch off within a minute. There are no preinstalled games, no “recommended apps” folder and no ads. After three phones this month that tried to sell me something in the file manager, it felt like a holiday.
The Glyph lights are still here, slimmed down to a strip around the camera. They’re genuinely useful for one thing: put the phone face down, and you can see who’s calling without picking it up.
The catch is support. Nothing promises three Android updates and six years of security patches. That’s fair for the price, but Samsung promises six Android updates on the Galaxy A56.
Battery: fine, not great
The 5,000mAh battery gets through a full day comfortably, with about 25 percent left on a typical day. Heavy camera days drained it faster. In a year when budget phones ship with 7,000mAh batteries, “a full day” feels a bit ordinary.
50W charging takes it from flat to full in about an hour. There’s no charger in the box, so budget around ₹1,500 for one if you don’t already own a fast USB-C brick.
The best camera is the one you enjoy using. This is the first mid-range phone in a while that made me want to go out and shoot.
From our testing notes
Performance and the rest
The Snapdragon 7s Gen 3 is the same chip you’ll find in the iQOO Z10, and it’s perfectly smooth for everyday use. Heavy games run happily at medium settings. The IP64 rating covers rain and splashes, but don’t take it swimming.
At 211 grams, it’s heavier than it looks, mostly because of that camera.
Should you buy it?
- The 3x periscope camera is a genuine first at this price
- Nothing OS is clean, quick and refreshingly ad-free
- The design is still the most distinctive in the mid-range
- Battery life is merely average for 2026
- The ultrawide camera is clearly weaker than the other two
If you care about photos, and portraits especially, the Phone (3a) Pro is the most interesting phone under ₹30,000 right now. If battery life matters more than anything else, the iQOO Z10 is the better buy, and you’ll save ₹8,000.
