Nothing may be a newcomer to the smartphone scene, but it really made an impact with the Nothing Phone 1. Debuting last year, the Phone 1 brought a unique design, good specs, an affordable price, and of course, the Glyph lighting system. Now, the Nothing Phone 2 is here, complete with the Glyph lighting system and some extra new tricks to tempt you into Nothing’s bustling ecosystem.
But the Nothing Phone 2 has more going for it than just a fancy lighting system, and those looking for a strong specs sheet won’t be disappointed. Nothing’s new phone has an adaptive refresh rate that peaks at 120Hz, up to 512GB of storage, 12GB of RAM, and the powerful Snapdragon 8+ Gen 1 processor. But how durable is it? Water resistance has become a feature we really want in smartphones, as it means phones are better insulated against the damage caused by accidental slips into baths, pools, and even toilets. So, is the Nothing Phone 2 waterproof?
The Nothing Phone 2 has an IP54 water resistance rating
Yes, the Nothing Phone 2 has an IP54 rating for dust and water resistance, which means it’s protected against water ingress — to some degree. While an IP54 rating falls short of the more common (and effective) IP68 rating, the IP54 rating still means the Nothing Phone 2 has a degree of resistance to water.
But the important bit to note is the word “resistant” rather than “proof”. Unfortunately, there’s no such thing as a truly waterproof phone, as water will always find its way in eventually. However, the various IP ratings do offer varying degrees of resistance to that eventual ingress, and it’s important to know exactly what the limitations of your device are.
What the IP54 rating really means
An IP rating is less complicated than you might think. Taken down to basics, “IP” stands for “ingress protection”, and the first and second digits represent the level of protection against dust and water, respectively. The first digit, the 5, is rated on a scale from 0 to 6, so a 5 scores quite highly. As such, the Nothing Phone 2 is rated as “dust-protected” and offers complete protection against contact with dust and some protection against airborne dust.
The second digit, the 4, is the most important rating for the purposes of this article. Water resistance is rated on a scale up to 9, so at first glance, 4 seems rather low. And it is, but it’s still a respectable rating. According to the official IP-rating charts, a 4 is “protected against splashing water”, which means water being splashed at the phone from any direction will have no effect on the device’s ability to function.
That means your Nothing Phone 2 is fully rainproof and will resist splashes coming at it from bodies of water — but it certainly isn’t waterproof enough to be fully immersed in water and come out unscathed. A rating of 7 is the lowest you can expect for protection from full immersion, and the Nothing Phone 2’s IP54 rating simply isn’t protective enough for that.
So, while your Nothing Phone 2 is water-resistant, make sure you don’t purposefully immerse it in water, and make sure to keep it away from situations where it might accidentally drop in, or you might have to start shopping for a new phone.
