Hands-on: Nothing Phone (4b) is a better budget phone at an impossible price [Video]

Nothing released the Phone (4b) at £299/€329, a budget device with a 6.77-inch 120Hz AMOLED display, Snapdragon 6 Gen 4 chipset, and 5,200 mAh battery, but it is only £50 less than the superior Phone (4a), making it hard to recommend. The phone lacks lockscreen ads that plagued its predecessor, but its pricing is squeezed by component cost increases from AI demand, leaving it in an awkward market position.

The Nothing Phone 4b is here and, with it, what feels like a better attempt at building an even-cheaper budget phone than what came before, though it is a lot more expensive this time. Nothing’s journey in smartphones brought it to the release of Phone 3a Lite last year https://9to5google.com/2025/10/29/nothing-phone-3a-lite-price-specs-lock-screen-ads/ , which was a pretty confusing and, frankly, messy launch. The device was a rehash of the cheaper CMF Phone 2 Pro https://9to5google.com/2025/04/28/cmf-phone-2-pro-launch/ , with the notable downside of including lockscreen ads that were strange, to say the least. “Lock Glimpse,” as we reported, existed to send users to a truly bizarre and sketchy blog of what appeared to be AI-generated clickbait https://9to5google.com/2025/10/30/nothing-lock-screen-ads-sketchy/ found across a host of different websites, with a questionable privacy policy to top it all off. Nothing has largely walked back lockscreen ads https://9to5google.com/2026/01/09/nothing-removing-lock-glimpse/ and, on Phone 4b , they’re not in place at all at least on our review unit , and that’s just the start of what feels like a better attempt as a lower-market budget phone from Nothing. The Nothing Phone 4b is a pretty simple step down from Phone 4a . It has a 6.77-inch 120Hz AMOLED display 2344×1088 that looks good in person, a Snapdragon 6 Gen 4 chipset that feels fast enough in general use, 8GB of RAM, 128GB or 256GB of UFS 2.2 storage, and a 5,200 mAh battery except in India, where it’s 6,000 mAh , all with Android 16 out of the box with 3 years of OS updates and 6 years of security updates – not bad at all . Cameras include 50MP primary, 8MP ultrawide, and 16MP selfie shooters. All in all, it’s pretty good. In using the device, I’ve been perfectly satisfied with its performance and build. The blue color is gorgeous in person – this is easily my favorite blue since Google’s “Really Blue” on the original Pixel – and by no means does this feel like a “cheap” phone. That’s probably because it’s not. Nothing Phone 4b will sell for £299 / €329. That’s £50 / €80 more than the Phone 3a Lite, and merely £50 / €20 less than Phone 4a https://9to5google.com/2026/03/05/nothing-phone-4a-specs-price-release-date/ :~:text=8/128GB%3A%20%C2%A3349%20/%20%E2%82%B931%2C999%20/%20%E2%82%AC349 . With so little in between these phones in price, it becomes harder to accept the downgrades. Phone 4a has three rear cameras including a 50MP telephoto, a better selfie camera, a higher-resolution display, a faster processor, faster storage, and more water resistance. It’s impossible to recommend buying Phone 4b when Phone 4a is better for basically the same price But, that’s probably not what the goal was. “RAMageddon” has put tons of products like this in an impossible situation, all trying to find impossible prices. Nothing publicly acknowledged this just a few weeks ago regarding the cancellation of a new CMF device https://9to5google.com/2026/06/19/nothing-cmf-phone-ram-costs/ . Phone 4b was going to have a tough time finding a real spot in the lineup, no matter what Nothing tried to do about it. It leaves Nothing Phone 4b in such an impossible place. There’s virtually no reason for anyone to buy this device, at least in markets such as Europe. Promotions and sales – and an increasingly inevitable Phone 4a price hike – will surely make this device more attractive than it is today, but it’s in a tough spot right now. I like the device, just not the place it’s been forced into – thanks AI companies https://9to5google.com/2026/06/28/tech-price-hikes/ . Nothing Phone 4b won’t be sold in the US, with Phone 4a Pro https://9to5google.com/2026/04/03/nothing-phone-4a-pro-review/ remaining the brand’s most affordable device in the States. Nothing Phone 4b also comes in black and white, in addition to blue More on Nothing: Nothing Phone and audio products are now in Best Buy stores https://9to5google.com/2026/06/12/nothing-phone-and-audio-products-are-now-in-best-buy-stores/ Review: Nothing Headphone a might be the best deal in over-ear headphones at $199 https://9to5google.com/2026/04/17/nothing-headphone-a-review/ Nothing upgrades voice-to-text with AI-powered ‘Essential Voice’ https://9to5google.com/2026/04/23/nothing-upgrades-voice-to-text-with-ai-powered-essential-voice/ Follow Ben: Twitter/X https://twitter.com/NexusBen , Threads https://www.threads.net/@nexusben , Bluesky https://bsky.app/profile/nexusben.com , and Instagram https://www.instagram.com/nexusben FTC: We use income earning auto affiliate links. More. https://9to5mac.com/about/ affiliate our homepage http://9to5google.com/ for all the latest news, and follow 9to5Google on exclusive stories https://9to5google.com/feature/exclusive/ , reviews https://9to5google.com/guides/reviews/ , how-tos https://9to5google.com/guides/how-to/ , and subscribe to our YouTube channel https://www.youtube.com/9to5google