The situation with Apple Watch

[Al Rukh]

I am sipping on my 6th drink while I’m typing this. I shouldn’t let a thought slip away just because I’m not absolutely sober.

In my opinion, the Apple Watch is the best creation from Apple, second only to the iPhone. The amount of utility tasks you can do with the watch is limitless, while providing a respectable range of materials and colour choices to suit your design of choice and style (with the choices of bands included).

I’ve dabbled with the mechanical watch world recently and as much as I appreciate the history and the unique touch of a beating watch, I am not entirely sure how Apple hasn’t put the likes of Rolex, Omega out of business as of yet. I can understand why Omega will still be around because they’re managed by a bigger organisation (Swatch or LMVH is it?). But how does a company like Rolex and Patek stay relevant in the age of smartwatches, when the latter is accessible ( I’m looking at you ADs) and cost a fraction of their limited mechanical counterparts?

If we were to apply pure logic into this, the mechanical watch industry should be struggling. Not only that it’s not struggling but it’s thriving with the rise of micro brands.

So my question to everyone is, what would take the Apple Watch to ‘kill off’ the mechanical watch industry? Not that I want to see the death of mechanical watches but with the unattainable-ity of the Big Three, compounded by the true definition of utility watch in the Apple Watch, it’s perplexing to see how the mechanical watch world is still relevant and thriving. The latter was almost extinct when the Japanese created the quartz watches. I don’t think a Gerald Genta-esque intervention SHOULD save the mechanical watch industry to sink, given how much we can do with a smart watch.

Thoughts?

 

[BSG75]

I have an Apple Watch Ultra, along with a collection of mechanical (Omega, Heurer, Hamilton, Seiko) quartz and HAQ quartz (Grand Seiko, Seiko Astron, and Casio). The AW is the most powerful watch you an wear on your wrist. Some will say it's not a watch, but IMO, it is since its primary function is to tell time, with fitness and notifications playing a very close second.

Mechanical watches became obsolete with the introduction of the quartz Seiko Astron back in the late 1960's. A number of Swiss manufacturers went under during this time, also known as the Quartz Crisis. Other brands like Rolex, Patek, AP, etc., pivoted to become a luxury good. No one really "needed" a mechanical watch anymore when quartz watches, which were more accurate and less expensive were readily available. So, for Rolex and other manufacturers, the focus shifted to brand heritage and exclusivity, along with excellent marketing. If you think Apple is good at marketing, take a look at Rolex. They are selling every watch they make and are playing the "scarcity" card to drive demand.

As time went on, people seemed to be less inclined to wear watches, until the Apple Watch came along. Once again, we started focusing on wrist space and watches became "cool" again with a larger audience. So, in some way, the Apple Watch may have played a role in the resurgence of traditional watches as more people became interested in both function and fashion in something we wear on our wrists.

From a purely logical perspective, you have a point. No traditional watch can compete with a smartwatch in terms of timekeeping accuracy and features for the price. When you think about spending four to five figures on a piece of functional jewelry that (at best) is accurate to+/- 2-4 seconds per day, it doesn't make sense. Watch collecting is far from a logical hobby. I think you buy and Apple Watch with your head and a mechanical watch with your heart.

BTW, Omega is Swatch.

 

[Howard2k]

AW, one of the most accurate watches on the planet.

People: It's not a watch, this is a watch (shows off less functional less accurate watch)



I don't think many people, if anyone, buy a Rolex purely as a device for keeping time. It's the brand, the investment potential, the look etc. It's a luxury item. Then there's the cheap and dirty $20 Casio and its peers. Super good value for money and likely as accurate or even more accurate than the Rolex for 0.1% to 0.2% of the price. Then there are those who care about the fashion of the watch more than the time keeping. I've seen comments on here about how you could wear a non-working Apple Watch as a fashion statement. That's clearly not just an Apple thing, many people do have multiple watches and match them to their outfits.

Apple has one Watch product. Perhaps two if you think that there is enough differentiation between the Ultra form factor and S8 form factor. But ultimately the difference between S8 and Ultra is nothing like the difference between S8 and Rolex. Those are materially different. Apple doesn't have a Rolex competitor, or a $20 Casio competitor, but both the luxury market and the cheap market are huge.

And for many the AW just isn't practical. Charging every day can be a burden.

Lastly, the Apple Watch is pretty useless if you don't have an iPhone, outside of family sharing.

It simply cannot control the market in current form.

 

[BSG75]

I forgot to add value retention with Rolex. Right now, you can purchase certain Rolex models at retail and then sell it at market price, which in some cases is for several thousand over MSRP. I don't think Apple and Rolex, Patek, etc., are competing in the same space. I do agree that limiting the AW solely the Apple ecosystem is somewhat limiting, but I can't see them opening it up anytime soon.

I recall reading a report that the Apple Watch outsold the entire Swiss watch industry, so I think there is a market there. Some complain about charging the AW every day, but I've also seen people complain about having to wind their Omega Speedmasters every day. Speaking just for myself, I don't have any issues charging the AW or winding my Speedmaster!

For accuracy and convenience, I have a Seiko Astron GPS that is quartz, solar powered, perpetual calendar and as long as it receives GPS signals is accurate to 1 second every 100,000 years. For timekeeping , it could be a one and done type of watch.

 

[the future]

Apple Watch is a powerful computer on the wrist. Non-smart watches are jewellery. Apples and oranges, so to speak.

Some folks left their mechanicals behind (or in a drawer) when they started wearing AW, other folks got interested in watches in general for the first time when AW was released.

Apple has for quite some time now been the biggest watch company in the world, by far (units and revenue). But luxury watch manufacturers are doing fine as well.

 

[Bichon]

Quartz and smart watches have already pushed the mechanical watch with an escapement movement into the "niche" category. I liken it to the playback of recorded music. While the vast majority of people stream digital recordings to equipment built with modern electronics, there is a niche group that buys vinyl records, some even spending megabucks to play them back using equipment containing vacuum tubes. Whether we're talking watches or audio, there are clearly a small but sizeable number of people willing to pay more for well executed old technology than they would to buy modern (and measurably better) new tech.

 

[jz0309]

AW is a tool, a computer in the wrist that does much more than telling time…
A mechanical watch, or quartz for that matter, are mostly for telling time but beyond that they are jewelry and last a very long time, they are not disposable…

Now I know that some regard AW as jewelry but in my mind it’s not as it loses value rapidly and has a lifetime of 3 , 4 or maybe 5 years, then it hopefully gets recycled.

So why would AW or smart watches totally dispose of mechanical? Doesn’t make sense, different market

 

[BSG75]

Question for the group. What in your opinion defines a watch?

I always seem to struggle with that definition myself, because I see the perspective that the AW is a wrist computer that tells time and much more. However, I know that my Grand Seiko and Seiko Astron quartz, along with my Casios (some of which are connected watches) have circuit boards, where more engineering that artistry. Exception being the Grand Seiko, which is a marriage of artistry and engineering. The movement is made by hand, but also is thermo-compensated which helps regulate the quartz crystal and the integrated circuit to maintain accurate time. It checks the ambient temperature over 500 times per day to maintain regulation. While it looks like a watch from the outside, it has a lot of electronic technology running things on the inside.

Looking forward to your perspectives.

 

[The Cockney Rebel]

Ridiculous.

I’d rather a Santos De Cartier all day long.

 

[Howard2k]

Question for the group. What in your opinion defines a watch?

I always seem to struggle with that definition myself, because I see the perspective that the AW is a wrist computer that tells time and much more. However, I know that my Grand Seiko and Seiko Astron quartz, along with my Casios (some of which are connected watches) have circuit boards, where more engineering that artistry. Exception being the Grand Seiko, which is a marriage of artistry and engineering. The movement is made by hand, but also is thermo-compensated which helps regulate the quartz crystal and the integrated circuit to maintain accurate time. It checks the ambient temperature over 500 times per day to maintain regulation. While it looks like a watch from the outside, it has a lot of electronic technology running things on the inside.

Looking forward to your perspectives.

This works for me:

Watch - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

A watch is a portable timepiece intended to be carried or worn by a person. It is designed to keep a consistent movement despite the motions caused by the person's activities. A wristwatch is designed to be worn around the wrist, attached by a watch strap or other type of bracelet, including metal bands, leather straps, or any other kind of bracelet.

 

[BenGoren]

Some will say it's not a watch, but IMO, it is since its primary function is to tell time, with fitness and notifications playing a very close second.

I’m every bit as comfortable calling modern smartwatches “watches” as I am calling modern smartphones “phones.”

I still have Grandma’s rotary-dial phone mounted to the wall in my home. Until I cancelled my landline, it even worked perfectly fine — indeed, with better sound quality than most landlines, which is saying a lot (considering that it’s only recently that some mobile phones have started to approach typical landline quality).

The Apple Watch has the computing power of a supercomputer from the ’90s. Its smartphone functionality is actually superior to that of the original iPhone.

But the modern iPhone casually does computational things that we couldn’t even dream of on supercomputers in the ’90s, and it has a still camera that puts 35mm film to shame, and a video camera that movie studios would have killed for in the ’90s, and more …

… so, if the iPhone is still a phone, then the Apple Watch, dagnabbit, is still a watch.

b&

 

[Bichon]

Until I cancelled my landline, it even worked perfectly fine — indeed, with better sound quality than most landlines, which is saying a lot (considering that it’s only recently that some mobile phones have started to approach typical landline quality).

I beg to differ on this point. Ever since voice-over-LTE and wideband codecs became a (widely deployed) thing around 2015, mobile phones have sounded FAR superior to a typical landline phone.

 

[BenGoren]

I beg to differ on this point. Ever since voice-over-LTE and wideband codecs became a (widely deployed) thing around 2015, mobile phones have sounded FAR superior to a typical landline phone.

But 2015 is “only recently,” grasshopper!

Now get off my lawn …

(And don’t get me started on VoIP “landlines” and how miserable many of them sound!)

b&

 

[Salty Pirate]

To me, the value of the apple watch is fitness. Closing my rings, stand reminders when I have been at my desk too long.

Records my workout and streams music and has the ability to take calls on my beats fit bluetooth? Awesome.

My iphone stays at home. I used to strap that thing to my arm and the wire from the ear pods would always get bunched up on something.

Plus I have apple pay on it!

When I get old, if I fall, it will call for assistance.

Apple Watch is more a compute extension of the iphone.

I can see a day when you might not need an iphone at all, just the watch.

 

[Monkswhiskers]

Mechanical watches are jewellery. I never wore a watch regularly since my snoopy one when I was a kid, the AW changed that. Now Snoopy is back with watchos10!!

The AW is my favourite Apple product by far not least because it has such an exciting future, blood sugar, blood alcohol and blood pressure might be a few years away yet but the device has an important role for health.

p.s I was given a Breitling Navitimer pilot's watch from the 60s, it sits in the draw never worn by me.

 

[stanza.richi]

Well, I want to share again my experience with AW to try to reply to your questions. I used an AW2 for three years (from summer 2017 to autumn 2020), then ugraded to AW4 in November 2020. At Easter 2021 I received an old manual Longines from my grandfather: checking info about it, I met some watches forums that showed to me the beauty of mechanical watches. I felt in love with Rolex Submariner Date Hulk, a dream that was insane expansive at the time (and still it is). Started buying an Orient Kamasu green, ended up picking a Rolex Submariner 124060 for the birth of my first son in January 2022. Since the summer 2021 I wore only mechanical watches during my normal day, reserving my AW 4 for physical activities, sleeping monitoring or particular occasion where I can need notifications on my wrist.

A mechanical watch is one of the few jewels that a man can wore. An AW is a device that could be useful in some occasions, annoying in other. My 2 cents about the question

 

[rchornef]

Going on trips into the wilderness for multiple days, or when I really can’t afford the complication of recharging, I have a Timex Expedition watch. Replace the battery about every two years. Also use for situations where it might really get beaten up. It is more than what I need for accuracy, but if I need to I can synchronize with others or my Apple Watch. So I wear my Apple Watch in the car, but I have my Timex for the trails. . . I use Apple Watch mostly to tell time, great watch, love it. Also at home I set my iPhone down in one place but can take voice calls all over the house, similar function to landlines withe multiple extensions (which I also still have for back-up and to give out when I have to give a telephone number). I love Apple’s products but make sure I devote my attention to the real world.

 

[TechnoMonk]

I have couple of Swiss watches from late 90s and early 2000s. Their usage went down after iPhone. For fitness I used to wear those fugly Garmin Forerunners, polar watches with heart strap around chest. Apple Watch to me is a good middle ground between all. I use for fitness, notifications, always used my iPhone on silent/vibrate for past 15 years. I rarely wear Swiss watches on special occasions as accessories.
AW battery is pretty decent now, I use series 6, and may be in few years upgrade to Ultra.

 

[boss.king]

I don't really see Apple Watches really competing with the tradtional watch market. They're almost different categories of products for entirely different sets of needs.

If you just want a no-fuss watch that looks good and and will last a decade or more, an Apple Watch probably isn't going to fit the bill. If you want something that can play music, send messages, track your health, a traditional watch just won't work. I don't see the how Apple Watch could ever fully fill the gap for traditional watch wearers without some truly revolutionary battery tech advancements (and even then, there are still software issues to contend with).

To use an analogy, the iPad has replaced a paper notebook for a lot of people, but paper notebooks are still widely available and heavily used. They both serve important roles and can coexist.

 

[hirsthirst]

I own an AW6, a mechanical Tudor, a solar G Shock & a £10 Casio F91W.

They're all watches, and all do a different job on different days. FWIW I generally have the Tudor on my left-wrist & the AW on my right-wrist (with screen almost always off) ...

 

[klasma]

So my question to everyone is, what would take the Apple Watch to ‘kill off’ the mechanical watch industry?

Making recharging as fast as rewinding a mechanical watch, or increasing the battery life to the level of traditional digital watches (which means years).

But truly, even that wouldn’t kill of mechanical watches. People buy them exactly because they are mechanical.

 

[The Cockney Rebel]

This works for me:

Watch - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

A watch is a portable timepiece intended to be carried or worn by a person. It is designed to keep a consistent movement despite the motions caused by the person's activities. A wristwatch is designed to be worn around the wrist, attached by a watch strap or other type of bracelet, including metal bands, leather straps, or any other kind of bracelet.

In the case of straps, that’s a tough decision for @bricktop_at who has 79 of them!

Decisions, decisions .

 

[bricktop_at]

In the case of straps, that’s a tough decision for @bricktop_at who has 79 of them!

Decisions, decisions .

80 now and soon 84, a few are incoming😜

 

[The Cockney Rebel]

80 now and soon 84, a few are incoming😜

What you got coming?

 

[bricktop_at]

Marigold SB, Maize/White SL, Dark Cherry/Forest Green SL and Abyss Blue/Moss Green SL