The Nothing Phone 2 is mostly fine on Verizon — if you’ve got good 5G coverage

Typically you’ve simply gotta break the principles and go for it. I attended Nothing’s New York Metropolis product drop final week and bought my fingers on the Nothing Ear 2s and the Nothing Cellphone 2. Now, I’m a longtime Verizon buyer, which appeared like a serious hurdle for truly testing out this telephone and its flashing glyphs. At one level, Nothing had talked about “restricted” help for Verizon on its web site, however the firm has since eliminated the provider from its tech specs altogether — by no means a very good signal.

However as I’ve come to search out out, so long as you’ve bought an energetic SIM that was already in one other Verizon-certified telephone, you’ll be able to toss that into the Nothing Cellphone 2 and get going with none speedy complications. Once I tried doing so, the telephone’s cell information lit up, calls and texts labored high-quality (together with RCS messaging), and I’ve thus far averted any hangups. The automated SMS scolding me for utilizing an unauthorized gadget by no means got here.

Over every week or so of attempting out the Cellphone 2 as my full-time gadget, I’ve seen the community indicator displaying 4G, 4G Plus, 5G, and 5G Extremely Wideband. Even the VoLTE (voice over LTE) icon is current at practically all occasions. I’m slightly unclear what 4G Plus interprets to in Verizon parlance; perhaps that’s LTE Superior, or perhaps the telephone is simply getting confused about what community it’s on. However it’s rolling with the punches both manner. I’ve traveled throughout Manhattan and Brooklyn with no apparent service disruptions thus far. However that is NYC we’re speaking about; 5G, as underwhelming because it so usually is, might be discovered all over the place.

The expertise may very well be slightly extra unpredictable elsewhere. And within the case of the Nothing Cellphone 2, that’s as a result of it fully omits help for band 13. That frequency band is fairly very important to Verizon’s 4G LTE community. For lots of the nation, it’s important. So in the event you enterprise removed from a metropolis or crowded suburbs and begin drifting away from 5G protection, that’s the place you’ll probably begin hitting some ache factors and lose sign — and that is the explanation why Verizon is unlikely to ever absolutely certify Nothing’s newest telephone.

I’m a tech reviewer and normally have just a few completely different telephones at my disposal. So I’m not sweating my time placing Nothing’s $599 telephone by means of its paces across the metropolis. But when I had been driving seven hours upstate to go to my father in New York’s “North Nation,” there’s zero likelihood I’d gamble and preserve my SIM this factor.

Do I discover the glyph system gimmicky? For essentially the most half, sure. I’ve bought the higher proper LED assigned to Messages, and it’s admittedly good to know once I’ve acquired a textual content if my telephone is flipped over. Exterior of the lights and community limitations, I’m a fan of this telephone general. The Cellphone 2 manages what I’d contemplate glorious battery life, has a really good and vibrant show — I’m choosy about screens, folks — and I just like the software program tweaks that Nothing has made.

With the ability to place fast settings toggles immediately on the lock display screen is surprisingly helpful. I’m operating fairly fundamental proper now and I’m certain there’s extra I might do, however thus far so good. The Cellphone 2 hums alongside and I’ve barely seen a single hiccup throughout my time with it. And the photographs I’m getting from the digicam are passable most of the time.

All of that is to say that in the event you’ve bought Verizon and are interested by giving the Cellphone 2 a shot, it’s doable. You’ll get your texts and calls. Information works fairly nicely. However you shouldn’t rely on Nothing’s gadget on this state of affairs. Exterior of 5G protection areas, you’re unlikely to have as strong of a sign as you’ll on different telephones that help Verizon’s full vary of bands. So preserve one other, actually-certified telephone inside attain in the event you resolve to splurge on this new gadget.