'Apple has dug a hole for itself': why the iPhone 17e has been overshadowed by the Nothing Phone (4a)

Tech fans who keep a close eye on their Google News feeds will have seen that it's been an overwhelmingly busy week for new smartphones. We started with the annual smartphone conference MWC 2026 (here's my pick of the best smartphones of MWC 2026), and quickly moved onto the unveiling of the iPhone 17e. But they were all of them deceived, for another phone was made.

In any usual week, an iPhone release would be big news, but this wasn't that week. Shortly after the iPhone 17's budget cousin dropped, we saw one other phone which completely stole Apple's thunder: the Nothing Phone (4a).

Not everyone has heard of Nothing, and that's okay. It's a fairly new company, founded by the co-founder of another phone brand, OnePlus, and it's been slowly making a name for itself by releasing ...