Nothing has one of, if not the, most practical and thoughtfully designed Android skins around. And that means plenty of really cool features worth trying out.
So, if you’re willing to do a little digging through settings and menus, you’ll find some great tips, tricks, and hidden features that can really expand what you can do with the new mid-range smartphones.
That not only includes adding support for Apple’s AirPods but also enabling excellent features like the Music Visualiser and other incredible options you might not find on any other Android phone.
Whether you’ve just got your hands on the phone or you’re just curious, here are 16 ways to get the most out of your new Nothing Phone 3a or Nothing Phone 3a Pro.
Music visualiser
One of the Nothing Phone’s standout features has always been the Glyph LED lights found on the rear. One neat feature lets you set them to pulse and flicker in time with any audio or music playing out of your phone’s speakers. This can be a YouTube video, music from your streaming app of choice, or any other audio.
To enable it, go to the main Settings app and choose ‘Glyph Interface’ near the top of the menu.
If you scroll down this screen, you’ll eventually find an option that says ‘Music Visualisation’. Just toggle it on, and whenever your phone is playing audio, it’ll give you a little light show.
Glyph timer
There’s a Glyph feature that uses the lights on the back of the phone as a countdown timer progress bar. To use it, go to Settings, then Glyph Interface.
ON the next screen, tap the option that says ‘Glyph Timer’, and on the next screen, tap ‘Set Glyph Timer’. You’ll then see a graphic with scroll wheel control. You can set the timer by moving this virtual scroll wheel or tapping any of the preset timer options at the bottom of the screen.
Once you’ve chosen the time you want the timer to run, flip the phone over on its front. It should start the timer automatically, and a progress light bar on the back will slowly count down to zero.
When you then turn your phone over to look at the display, you’ll see a countdown graphic on the lock screen showing you how long is left. It’ll stay in your notification shade too, so you can unlock your phone and easily cancel or pause that timer if necessary.
Enable AirPods support
Like most Android phones, you can connect your AirPods to Nothing phones pretty easily. Just press and hold the button on the AirPods case to put them in pairing mode and connect using the usual Bluetooth menu in the Settings.
But, with Nothing phones, you can go one step further and actually get AirPods icons and battery life displayed on the phone, no third-party app required.
Just head to Settings, then Special Features. Now choose ‘Experimental Features’ and you’ll see an AirPods Support option to toggle on. If you do, it’ll show the AirPods icons and battery levels in your settings when they’re connected.
You can also see the stats if you swipe down to access your quick settings tiles – so long as you have the large Bluetooth tile enabled, anyway.
Smart app drawer
The Nothing OS launcher has a mode where it categorises and sorts apps for you, just using its own smarts. It works pretty much exactly like the App Library screen on iPhone, or similar alternatives from the likes of Xiaomi. By default, though, your app drawer works like it always has, listing apps alphabetically.
To try this new smart drawer mode, open your app drawer by swiping up from the bottom of the display. Now tap the three dots in the corner, and you should see two options at the top. Tap ‘Smart’, and it’ll rearrange your apps into big category folders.
Customise app icons
Customisation in Nothing’s OS is one of our favourite features on these new phones. It’s just so easy to do, and part of that is changing your app icons. You don’t need to install any third-party launchers – just go to the Play Store and search for icon packs, then install any that you like the look of.
To apply them, just long-press on your phone’s Home Screen and tap the ‘Customisation’ option. You’ll see an option that says ‘Icon Pack’ – tap that and swipe across to the icon pack you want to apply, then swipe away and it’ll apply that icon pack. Cool right?
Customise folders
Another of my favourite Nothing software features is the ability to customise the look and design of app folders on the Home Screen. Sure, you can drag-and-drop apps on top of each other and create folders as normal, but there’s more you can do.
The first step is to enlarge them, so press and hold on the app folder, then tap ‘Enlarge’ on the next screen. Once it is large, tap and hold it again and choose ‘Customise’. Now, you can change the folder style and choose a different app layout.
Alternatively, you can choose one of the dot-matrix-style folder covers instead. So, if it’s a games folder, you can choose the dot matrix game controller icon, for example.
You can customise small folders using the same method, but the large folders just help them pop a bit more on your Home Screen.
Nothing OS 3 has some great widgets, and unlike many competing Android skins, you can add them to your Lock Screen for even easier viewing.
To add them to your Lock Screen, open Settings, then Customisation. By default, it’ll open to your Home Screen, but if you swipe the preview card at the top, you can move to Lock Screen customisation.
Once here, tap the ‘Widgets’ icon, then choose the widgets you want to add. You can add two square 2×2 options next to each other. Or, if you want, toggle the ‘Expand widget area’ switch and double the space. But bear in mind that if you do this, it removes the default Lock Screen clock.
Always-on display
Both the Nothing Phone 3 and Phone 3a Pro offer always-on display functionality, and enabling it is pretty easy. Just head to Settings, then Lock Screen, and choose the option that says ‘Always show basic info of Lock Screen’.
On the next screen, toggle it on. You can choose to have it turn on and off at specific times each day on a schedule or set it to come on automatically when you tap the screen.
Quick Settings shortcuts on your Home Screen
A lot of what makes Nothing OS such a great platform is the useful widget additions for the Home Screen.
Even to the point where you can add toggles you’d usually find in your quick settings shade right there on the screen for easy access. So you could toggle on Do Not Disturb mode, or enable your torch, just by tapping a button on your main Home Screen.
To use these, just tap and hold on your Home Screen wallpaper and choose ‘Widgets’ as usual. Swipe across to the list of all available widgets, and search for Quick Settings in the search bar at the top. You should see the Quick Settings option right there.
Choose the style of widget you want, drag and drop it onto your Home Screen, and you’ll get a list of options to choose from. Choose the quick setting you want to toggle. So, for instance, you could have the Glyph Torch option to toggle all the Glyph lights on the back to use them as a boosted flashlight. Or choose Do Not Disturb to quickly block all notifications.
Use the dot matrix font everywhere
Nothing uses a classic-looking font in most menus throughout its OS, which is actually very nice. But you can use the NDot retro font that Nothing uses in most of its widgets instead.
This one’s hidden in the Special Features menu, though. Head to Settings and scroll all the way down the main screen until you find the Special Features option. From there, choose ‘Experimental Features’ and toggle on the ‘Dot Matrix title’ option.
This should transform your menus and settings to all feature that retro Dot Matrix-looking text style, though it doesn’t work in third-party apps.
One-handed notification swipe
By default, Android has a one-handed mode that lets you swipe down near the navigation bar to bring stuff down from the top of the screen. But with Nothing’s software, you can use this same gesture to bring down notifications instead, making the phone much easier to use one-handed.
To enable the functionality, just open Settings, then Special Features, and choose ‘Gestures’.
In the next screen, you’ll see an option to toggle on one-handed mode. Switch it on, and then instead of the default screen pulling option, choose ‘Show Notifications’ instead. Now, when you swipe down near the bottom of your screen, your notifications will appear.
Floating windows
One useful gesture in Nothing’s software lets you turn an app into a floating window. It’s easy to activate; with the app open that you want to minimise, swipe up from the bottom of the screen and hold your thumb or finger when you see the message to release it to view the pop-up view.
Now the app is a miniature card in the top corner of your screen. You can drag from the bottom corner to increase the size, or drag near the top of the preview to move the window around. Or just tap to enlarge it. Tap the minimise icon to move it to the side of your display, or tap the ‘x’ icon to close the view.
Screenshot gesture
Nothing has a screenshot gesture that lets you swipe down with three fingers to take either a full-screen grab or a grab of a specific part of the screen.
To enable it, just head to Settings > Special Features and then choose ‘Gestures’. Now choose ‘Screenshot gesture’ and toggle on the three-finger swipe option.
With it enabled, you can swipe with three fingers to take a screenshot of the entire screen. Or, if you tap and hold with three fingers at the point you want the cropped area to start, then swipe down to the point you want it to end, it’ll take a cropped screenshot instead. It can take some getting used to, but it’s very handy if you manage to retrain your muscle memory.
Remove the Search Bar from your Home Screen
In its default setting, your Home Screen will have a Google Search bar at the bottom, below the bottom row of apps in your dock. But just because it’s there as standard doesn’t mean you have to have it there.
Open your Home Screen settings by long-pressing on your wallpaper and tapping ‘Customisation’. Tap the ‘Layout’ option, and on the next screen, you’ll see a switch next to ‘Search Bar’. Toggle it off, and the search bar will disappear accordingly.
Set a custom charging limit
Like many other modern phones, you can set a charging limit so that it does not constantly trickle charge while you’re fast asleep or otherwise away from your phone. This, in theory, helps protect the long-term health of the battery.
If you open Settings, go to Battery, and tap on ‘Battery Health’, a toggle switch next to an option that says ‘Custom Charging Mode’ will appear.
Switch it on and then choose the limit you think you can live with, without suffering battery anxiety. You can set it to 70, 80 or 90 percent, whichever you prefer.
See your internet speed in the status bar
Like many Android phones, Nothing lets you choose which icons appear in the status bar at the top of the screen. These icons usually represent battery life, Wi-Fi, signal strength, notifications, and other features.
One option that’s not enabled by default is the ability to see your current internet speed – especially valuable when using a cellular connection.
Open Settings, then find Display. Now scroll down to ‘Status Bar’, and on the next screen you’ll see a toggle next to ‘Internet Speed’. Switch this on and you’ll see a little graphic in the status bar showing how fast your connection is.
