Nothing’s got nothing on Samsung’s software update policy

For a new manufacturer, getting into the smartphone market and making it big is no easy feat. But new players continue to enter the market, and one of them is Nothing, a new phonemaker from the founder of OnePlus, Carl Pei.

Its first phone, called Nothing Phone (1), received a lot of attention for a transparent rear-facing design that includes a whopping 900 small LEDs that light up for things like notifications and for indicating charging status. As expected, however, the Nothing Phone didn’t really make a big dent in the market, and Samsung, as the largest phone maker in the world, certainly isn’t worried about the competition.

Of course, like many other smaller manufacturers, Nothing could offer better specs for the same price as a competing Samsung phone, but the London-based company won’t challenge the Korean giant any time soon when it comes to software updates.

Nothing is expected to launch its second smartphone, the Phone (2), later this year, and while the Phone (2) will have flagship internals unlike its predecessor, Nothing will not be changing its software update policy and will only provide three years of major OS updates to the new device. Samsung, meanwhile, continues to extend its policy of four years of Android OS ugrades to more and more devices every few months.

In Nothing’s defense, the company’s very first phone was guaranteed three major OS updates instead of starting at two major OS updates, and it also doesn’t have nearly the same resources at its disposal as Samsung. Still, it speaks to the long-term value proposition of Samsung smartphones, a proposition that you can’t find on devices from any other Android smartphone brand.

For those who haven’t been keeping up, Samsung now provides four years of OS upgrades and five years of security updates to phones as affordable as the Galaxy A24 (it costs less than $300 in most markets). Galaxy A3x and Galaxy A5x series phones, along with all flagship Galaxy devices, are guaranteed the same level of support, and Samsung also extended eligibility of its amazing software update policy to the Galaxy M and Galaxy F lineups recently.