The $139 Nokia 2.2 brings back the removable battery

How cheap do you like your smartphones? HMD is bringing the latest version of the Nokia 2, called the "Nokia 2.2," to the US. It's $139 and currently for sale at Best Buy and Amazon. You might expect a pretty stripped-down device for $139, but as usual, HMD is delivering a good package for the price, with a fairly modern design, the latest version of Android, and a killer update package with two years of major OS updates and three years of security updates.

On the front, you have a 5.71-inch, 1520×720 IPS LCD with a flagship-emulating notch design and rounded corners. There's a sizable bezel on the bottom with a big "Nokia" logo on it, but it's hard to complain about that for $140.

This is a cheap phone, so don't expect a ton in the specs department. Powering the Nokia 2.2 is a MediaTek Helio A22 SoC, which is just four Cortex A53 cores at 2GHz. The US version gets 3GB of RAM and 32GB of storage version with an option to add a MicroSD card. The back and sides are plastic, and on the side you'll find an extra physical button, which will summon the Google Assistant. The back actually comes off, and—get this—you can remove the 3000mAh battery! Speaking of unnecessarily removed smartphone features from the past, there's also a headphone jack.

As this is a low-end phone, there are some things you are missing out on. Along the bottom, you'll find an ancient microUSB port, so you can't jump to the newer USB-C standard that more expensive smartphones have been using for years. There's also no fingerprint reader anywhere on the device. The rear-firing speaker looks anemic, and we would not expect much from the 5MP front camera or 13MP rear camera.

While the specs and design are fine for the price, the software here is what makes the Nokia 2.2 (and any HMD Nokia phone, really) worth paying attention to. You get stock Android with the full update package of two years of major updates and three years of security updates, which is completely unheard of at this price point.

This is a GSM phone, so it should work on your local T-Mobile and AT&T bands, along with all their MVNOs. The phone is on the Internet today on Amazon and Best Buy and will come to select physical Best Buy stores August 4.