---
title: 'Nothing Phone 4a Pro: A Hidden Flaw in an Otherwise Great Phone'
source: 'https://youtube.com/watch?v=iuuLBjIT4vo'
video_id: 'iuuLBjIT4vo'
date: 2026-07-23
duration_sec: 621
channel: 'JerryRigEverything'
---

# Nothing Phone 4a Pro: A Hidden Flaw in an Otherwise Great Phone

> Source: [Nothing Phone 4a Pro: A Hidden Flaw in an Otherwise Great Phone](https://youtube.com/watch?v=iuuLBjIT4vo)

## Summary

The Nothing Phone 4a Pro is a sub-$500 smartphone that competes with flagship devices, featuring a unique transparent design with a Glyph LED interface, a metal unibody, and impressive durability. However, a design flaw in the SIM tray area compromises water resistance if the wrong hole is used.

### Key Points

- **Nothing Phone 4a Pro Introduction** [00:00] — The Nothing Phone 4a Pro is a $499 smartphone that competes with high-end devices. It features a unique industrial design with a Glyph LED interface and includes games like Space Invaders in widgets.
- **Scratch Test Results** [01:11] — The screen has a pre-installed plastic screen protector (scratches at level 2-3). The glass underneath scratches at level 6 with deeper grooves at level 7, similar to mainstream flagships.
- **Carbon Footprint Disclosure** [01:49] — Nothing discloses the carbon footprint: each 4a Pro produces 50 kg of CO2, equivalent to driving 150 miles or eating 25 hamburgers.
- **SIM Tray Design Flaw** [02:18] — The SIM tray hole is directly aligned with the waterproofing mesh, making it vulnerable to puncture if the wrong tool is used. This compromises IP65 water resistance. A secondary mesh provides backup.
- **Metal Unibody and Durability** [03:29] — The phone has a metal unibody, making it the strongest Nothing phone ever made. It survives bend tests on par with iPhones.
- **Display Specifications** [03:55] — The 6.8-inch display is 10-bit, billion-color, 5,000-nit, and 144Hz. It lasts about 20 seconds under extreme heat before turning white.
- **Teardown: Back Panel Removal** [04:34] — The plastic camera plateau is removed with heat. Underneath are CNC-milled aluminum camera lens bodies.
- **Screen Removal Process** [05:37] — The screen is glued and requires heat. It is removed from the side between the plastic edge and metal frame.
- **Battery and Internal Components** [07:27] — The battery has pull tabs and is 5,080 mAh (US version) or 5,400 mAh (India version). The loudspeaker is large and high-quality.
- **Waterproofing Mesh Vulnerability** [08:07] — The primary waterproofing mesh is directly behind the SIM hole, making it prone to puncture. A secondary mesh is present as backup.
- **Camera and Main Board Details** [09:16] — The main board has thermal paste and a large vapor chamber. The 8MP ultrawide and 50MP main cameras have OIS; the 50MP telephoto and 32MP selfie do not.
- **Final Verdict** [09:44] — The Nothing Phone 4a Pro is the best-built Nothing phone at an affordable price. Repairability is moderate due to the need to remove the camera plateau for screen access.

### Conclusion

The Nothing Phone 4a Pro offers flagship-level durability and a unique design at a competitive price, but users must be cautious with the SIM tray to avoid compromising water resistance.

## Transcript

Before something, there was nothing, and&nbsp; Nothing just came out swinging against&nbsp;&nbsp; the big boys with a $499 smartphone&nbsp; that competes with the best. However,&nbsp;&nbsp; I did discover a subtle design change—a flaw, if&nbsp; you will—that's present here on the Nothing 4a&nbsp;&nbsp;
Pro that is not present on other smartphones.&nbsp; It is just something you should be aware of,&nbsp;&nbsp; and we'll get to it more in depth here&nbsp; in a second, literally. And here she is.&nbsp;&nbsp; It looks kind of like an industrialized, cyberized&nbsp; iPhone 17 Pro, and I'm here for it, especially&nbsp;&nbsp;
because Nothing appears to just be having fun&nbsp; with the whole thing, like adding literal games&nbsp;&nbsp; into the widgets on the main screen. Blasting&nbsp; some Space Invaders is always a good time. But I'm sure you can imagine my&nbsp; disappointment when I saw a pedometer&nbsp;&nbsp;
widget and realized it only counts how&nbsp; many steps I take and is not, in fact,&nbsp;&nbsp; displaying how many of Epstein's buddies are&nbsp; in jail. The answer to that question is still,&nbsp;&nbsp; unfortunately, zero. The cool part&nbsp; about the back camera shelf, though,&nbsp;&nbsp;
is the circular LED dot matrix. This can display&nbsp; information like notifications, timers, and music&nbsp;&nbsp; visualizers. Nothing has a very unique aesthetic&nbsp; across all of their devices, and I'm a fan.
Jumping into the scratch test: on a sub-$500&nbsp; smartphone, it could really be made of anything.&nbsp;&nbsp; Plastic would scratch at a level two or three. And&nbsp; here, indeed, we do see scratches at a level two&nbsp;&nbsp; with deeper grooves at a level three. Thanks to a&nbsp; pre-installed screen protector, which I'll remove,&nbsp;&nbsp;
glass would be a five or six, and sapphire—like&nbsp; we've seen on the back panel of the Red Magic&nbsp;&nbsp; phones—would scratch at a level eight or nine.&nbsp; Here on the Nothing 4a Pro, we do see scratches&nbsp;&nbsp; at a level six with deeper grooves at a level&nbsp; seven, just like most of the mainstream flagships.
One really cool thing that Nothing has done&nbsp; this year is tell us exactly how much carbon&nbsp;&nbsp; was emitted during the manufacturing of each&nbsp; phone. Each 4a Pro produced 50 kg worth of CO2,&nbsp;&nbsp; which is the equivalent of driving about&nbsp; 150 miles or eating about 25 hamburgers.&nbsp;&nbsp;
but Americans will use anything but the metric&nbsp; system. The aluminum does feel fantastic, though,&nbsp;&nbsp; and I think this is the best-feeling&nbsp; phone that Nothing has ever made.
It's down here at the bottom where we&nbsp; start to have a problem. One question&nbsp;&nbsp; I get asked an unreasonable amount of times&nbsp; is: "Will my microphone be okay if I put my&nbsp;&nbsp; SIM card removal tool in the wrong hole?" And up&nbsp; until now, with every other phone in existence,&nbsp;&nbsp;
the answer has always been yes; it'll be&nbsp; just fine. But with the Nothing 4a Pro,&nbsp;&nbsp; it's very important that you do not put the SIM&nbsp; card removal tool in the wrong hole, or it will&nbsp;&nbsp; compromise some of your IP65 water resistance. And&nbsp; I'll show you exactly how here in just a second.&nbsp;&nbsp;
I'm also curious if this circle on the bottom-left&nbsp; corner has any uses or if it's just copying the&nbsp;&nbsp; design language from the CMF phones. And we'll&nbsp; only find out when we go to take it apart. Making our way up to the camera plateau, we&nbsp; find that the clear lens over the transparent&nbsp;&nbsp;
hardware and glyph interface is actually made&nbsp; from plastic, which I'm totally okay with. Yeah,&nbsp;&nbsp; it might scratch over time, but I would&nbsp; 100% prefer my phone to have scratches&nbsp;&nbsp; instead of shattering into a million pieces.&nbsp; So, thumbs up for that. And the camera lenses&nbsp;&nbsp;
themselves are still glass. The top is&nbsp; the 8-megapixel ultrawide. Then we have&nbsp;&nbsp; the 50-megapixel main camera. And to the right&nbsp; of that, we have the 50-megapixel telephoto.
And I'm not going to lie: having a completely&nbsp; metal phone again is super refreshing. Even&nbsp;&nbsp; if we lose wireless charging, just&nbsp; knowing I don't have to deal with&nbsp;&nbsp; shattered glass ever again would be so nice.&nbsp; Durability is paramount. And also, fun fact:&nbsp;&nbsp;
this drawing is actually the scientific symbol for&nbsp; nothing. It is literally called the null sign, and&nbsp;&nbsp; it signifies an empty set. Now I have a "nothing"&nbsp; on my Nothing. Double nothing. Where was I?
Ah, yes, the screen. For a sub-$500 smartphone,&nbsp; Nothing really threw in the whole kitchen sink.&nbsp;&nbsp; The 6.8-inch, 10-bit, billion-color,&nbsp; 5,000-nit, 144-hertz display lasts at&nbsp;&nbsp;
about 20 seconds before turning white and then&nbsp; semi-recovering. What really matters, though,&nbsp;&nbsp; is the structural integrity, which, with a metal&nbsp; unibody, Nothing might already have in the bag.&nbsp;&nbsp;
And indeed, they do. The Nothing 4a Pro is&nbsp; the strongest phone Nothing has ever made.&nbsp;&nbsp; On par with the rigidity of iPhones,&nbsp; both when bent from the front and when&nbsp;&nbsp; bent from the back, the 4a Pro survives&nbsp; the durability test with flying colors.
However, while it's nice that the outsides can&nbsp; handle the test of time, it's time to scope&nbsp;&nbsp; out the insides. Starting with the back plastic&nbsp; plateau, since it does need to come off before the&nbsp;&nbsp; screen can be removed. I'll just start a little&nbsp; timer with the glyph interface. This turns the&nbsp;&nbsp;
137 LEDs into an hourglass, which is kind of fun.&nbsp; The camera plateau is plastic, so it can melt if&nbsp;&nbsp; my heat gun gets too hot. But since the plateau&nbsp; is recessed down into the aluminum and glued,&nbsp;&nbsp; heat is our only way of softening that adhesive.&nbsp; Thankfully, we don't have to be ultra-gentle,&nbsp;&nbsp;
though. Since the plastic is not brittle like&nbsp; glass would be, with the plastic plateau gone,&nbsp;&nbsp; we can see the CNC-milled aluminum camera&nbsp; lens bodies that are holding the glass lenses. To release the screen on the other side&nbsp; of the device, we now have to remove four&nbsp;&nbsp;
silver decorative T3 screws, which then&nbsp; allow the layer of decorative plastics&nbsp;&nbsp; and the red-light recording indicator to be&nbsp; taken off. Then, six more black Phillips-head&nbsp;&nbsp; screws can be taken out before we can get to&nbsp; work on the screen. The screen also needs to&nbsp;&nbsp;
be warmed up since it's glued in tight just like&nbsp; the back. This time, we do enter in from the side&nbsp;&nbsp; between the plastic edge and the metal frame.&nbsp; This is both easier and harder than it looks. While I work on that, I do assume that&nbsp; if you're interested in inexpensive,&nbsp;&nbsp;
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get three months worth of unlimited for just 30&nbsp; bucks. So, if you're thinking about switching,&nbsp;&nbsp; And also, thank you to myself for getting the&nbsp; screen off in one piece. I always like when a&nbsp;&nbsp;
phone survives. With the back panel off, we&nbsp; can see the ribbon that goes to the rear LED&nbsp;&nbsp; matrix and NFC coil. There's no wireless&nbsp; charging, and there really isn't a reason&nbsp;&nbsp; for that circular design on the bottom corner&nbsp; either. I'll take out three more screws that&nbsp;&nbsp;
hold down the silver bracket over the battery&nbsp; and screen ribbon cables. With that gone,&nbsp;&nbsp; I'll unplug the battery just like a little Lego.&nbsp; There are seven Phillips-head screws holding down&nbsp;&nbsp; the loudspeaker over the charging port board.&nbsp; Before it can be released completely, though,&nbsp;&nbsp;
the battery needs to come out, which thankfully&nbsp; does have pull tabs that work surprisingly well. The 4a Pro phone that gets released here&nbsp; in the USA has 5,080 mAh worth of capacity,&nbsp;&nbsp;
but the version that gets released in India gets&nbsp; an extra 6% capacity boost and sits at 5,400&nbsp;&nbsp; because why not? Lucky them. Now we have room to&nbsp; remove the loudspeaker and its antenna wire. And&nbsp;&nbsp;
I guess I could have unclipped it from this end&nbsp; as well. But the good news is that, even at $500,&nbsp;&nbsp; this speaker has a whole lot of balls. So far,&nbsp; it looks like Nothing hasn't pulled any punches. I'll unplug the optical fingerprint scanner along&nbsp; with the extension ribbon. And remember how I said&nbsp;&nbsp;
earlier that it's important you use the right hole&nbsp; when inserting your SIM card removal tool? Well,&nbsp;&nbsp; here's why. The waterproofing mesh that&nbsp; keeps this phone IP65 water-resistant&nbsp;&nbsp; can be seen over the loudspeaker opening and&nbsp; the microphone opening. Except for this time,&nbsp;&nbsp;
for the first time, it is right behind the&nbsp; hole. Meaning that if your tool goes in,&nbsp;&nbsp; the first layer of mesh will be punctured. And&nbsp; as you can see, the tool is indeed the right&nbsp;&nbsp; size for the hole in the frame. However, it's&nbsp; not the end of the world if it does get sliced,&nbsp;&nbsp;
since Nothing does have two layers of mesh,&nbsp; as we'll see in a second. But making that&nbsp;&nbsp; first line of protection so vulnerable&nbsp; to punctures is an interesting move. For reference, every other phone we've ever seen&nbsp; has its main mesh off to the side of the shaft,&nbsp;&nbsp;
like on this Samsung S24 Ultra. If we take&nbsp; out the charging port board on the 4a Pro,&nbsp;&nbsp; we can see the 50-watt USB-C port that&nbsp; can reverse-wireless charge at 7.5 watts,&nbsp;&nbsp; along with the SIM card tray slot and the&nbsp; rectangular microphone. And thankfully,&nbsp;&nbsp;
we also see the other secondary moisture barrier&nbsp; on the side of the shaft. Backups are good,&nbsp;&nbsp; but two is always better than one. So,&nbsp; if you want to make sure your first&nbsp;&nbsp; layer of water protection remains intact, just&nbsp; make sure your tool goes in the right spot.
Moving up to the main board, we can get&nbsp; a closer look at the cameras. It has two&nbsp;&nbsp; silver screws holding it in place. With the&nbsp; board up and out, we can see copious amounts&nbsp;&nbsp; of thermal paste as well as an extremely&nbsp; large vapor chamber that helps disperse heat&nbsp;&nbsp;
out through the thin front screen. The top&nbsp; 8-megapixel ultrawide camera does have OIS.&nbsp;&nbsp; The main 50-megapixel camera also has optical&nbsp; image stabilization, but the 50-megapixel&nbsp;&nbsp; telephoto camera does not. Neither does the&nbsp; front-facing 32-megapixel selfie camera.
Overall, I'm genuinely impressed with the Nothing&nbsp; Phone 4a Pro. It is the best-built Nothing phone&nbsp;&nbsp; ever made at a price that doesn't break the bank.&nbsp; And yeah, the repairability isn't all that great&nbsp;&nbsp; since you need to remove the camera plateau to&nbsp; get access to the screen. But as long as you&nbsp;&nbsp;
have a case and a screen protector on, nothing&nbsp; should break on the Nothing in the first place. Let's see if it still works. Nothing. Hit that&nbsp; subscribe button if you haven't already. We are&nbsp;&nbsp;
almost to 10 million subscribers. Thank you so&nbsp; much. And of course, don't forget to save some&nbsp;&nbsp; money with the Tello link in the description. And&nbsp; thanks a ton for watching. I'll see you around.