Cheap Ticks: Our Favorite Timex Watches on the Market

If you’re anything like us, you often find yourself lusting after high-end watches full well knowing that you’ll likely never allow yourself to pay over $1,000 for one. Yes, they’re beautiful. Yes, you could maybe rationalize it as an investment. But there is rent due and there are car payments to be made.

There is a way to get a classically styled watch without all the cash and snooty prestige that goes along with it, though. Timex. The brand has been around since the 1940s, and they’ve been making time-telling instruments for even longer than that (think pocket watches and clocks). Before just about any other watch company, Timex found a sweet spot in the marketplace by making affordable, attractive, and accurate watches. This trifecta of qualities endeared the brand to an upwardly mobile post-war America and cemented the name in the nation’s consciousness. Now, as watches have started to come back in vogue, Timex is being rediscovered by both consumers and designers. To help give you a lay of the land, we organized a list of the best Timex watches for you to consider.

A Brief History Of Timex

Only a choice set of brands enjoy the same strong association with their product as Timex does. This, of course, isn’t by accident. It is in large part the result of a hard-earned legacy that started way back in 1854.

Originally named the Waterbury Clock Co. (named for its hometown in Connecticut), this small outfit first made its way by producing clocks (you can actually still find a lot of their old wares from the 1800s on vintage watch shops or on eBay). This more or less was all the Waterbury Clock company did for 90 years. During WWII – like most American industry – Waterbury pitched in to help out the war effort by making bomb fuses for the British. It was around this time that a refugee by the name of Thomas Olsen, fleeing the Nazi advance on Norway (and trying to find a safe place to put his money) bought a majority stake in the company. A few years later, Olsen renamed the company Timex – apparently a portmanteau of his favorite magazine and tissue, Time and Kleenex.

After the war, Timex expanded rapidly. By keeping prices low and changing distribution methods, wristwatches made by the newly named company became more ubiquitous than nearly any other. It was at this point that Timex as we know it today really came into its own. Since then, the company has had its fair share of ups and downs. Not only have watches come in and out of style over the years, but technologies and material preferences have changed, too. Recently, however, Timex has begun to reemerge as a solid choice for guys looking to strap on something classic but affordable.

Why People Love Timex

Style: More than most other brands out there, Timex puts a lot of its eggs into the basket of heritage and retro style. While there is a fair share of decidedly modern pieces, the vintage-inspired models are arguably the brand’s finest.

Versatility: As you’ll see below, Timex is good at just about any type of watch, from divers to chronographs to field watches to dress watches.

Affordability: It’s the low price tags that make Timex watches so appealing. You’d have to spend over a grand to get similar timepieces elsewhere. The watchmaker favors quartz movements over automatic (although it has plenty of those too) and cost-effective designs. For most of its watches, you’d never guess they were considered “cheap.”

Timex Expedition Scout

Best Cheap Timex: Looking for some Timex quality with an affordable price tag? This Expedition Scout is one of the best sub-$100 watches around. Designed to go wherever you need it to go, the field watch features a dial adorned with full Arabic numerals telling both civilian and military time as well as the Indiglo night light for low light visibility. But unlike some of the other low-end Timexes, the Expedition Scout boasts angular hands, a date window, and a more robust waterproofing down to 50m. Not to mention, it’s available in a handful of color and band variations, but our favorites are the ones with rugged NATO fabric straps.

Huckberry x TIMEX IRONMAN Flix Reissue

Best Digital Watch: Earlier this year, Timex had help from online retailer Huckberry with reissuing a faithful replica of the Ironman Flix watch from 1999. A cult favorite of endurance athletes, outdoorsmen, and first responders, the digital timepiece sports a 44mm resin case, 100m of water resistance, a highly legible display, and INDIGLO Night-Light illuminator. Not to mention, the watch has a nice hands-free illumination feature when you raise your arm. Also returning are the 5 alarms, the countdown timer, and the 10-item memo pad. However, the Lap Memory feature has increased from 30 to 100.

Timex Expedition North Traprock

Best Field Watch: If you like the Expedition Scout above but want something a little more elevated, check out the Expedition North Traprock series. Made with a 43mm eco-ceramic case adorned with a fabric strap constructed from 100% post-consumer recycled plastic and vegan apple leather, the timepiece is lightweight, durable, and comes in three different colorways. This watch ditches the 24-hour dial, which gives it more wearability once you’re done on the trail, and the wide lumed hands give you even more visibility in low light.

Timex Marlin Chronograph Tachymeter

Best Chronograph: Timex’s Marlin line is known for its beautiful dress watches and retro-inspired designs. Recently, the brand added a chronograph to the series for the first time, managing to keep the price low as well, thanks to the quartz movement — also a first in the collection. The result is redolent of the heyday of racing in the 1960s and ‘70s, and is a perfect choice for any auto enthusiast. Doubling down on the aesthetic, the watch features a beautiful perforated brown leather strap, a subtle tachymeter chapter ring to preserve the gentleman’s styling, and vintage-style rectangular hour markers at the 3, 9, and 12.

Q Timex Reissue

Best Vintage-Inspired: Reissuing one of the brand’s earliest quartz models from 1979, the Q Timex almost looks like it’s actually from the past upon first glance. Released in 2019, these new versions are highly popular amongst watch fans for their retro-style woven steel bracelets, rotating Pepsi bezels, and understated dimensions, at just 38mm across. These watches double as a three-hand GMT thanks to the 12-hour bidirectional bezel so you can keep track of a second time zone with ease. Other features are the hooded lugs, domed acrylic crystal, and reliable quartz movement.

Timex Waterbury Traditional GMT

Best GMT: If you’re looking for the ultimate travel companion for under $200, this one is well worth a second look. Adding a GMT function to its Waterbury Traditional line — named for the town where Timex was founded and the brand’s original name — Timex allows you to track a second time zone, which is great whether you’re jet-setting or tracking other parts of the world from your office. Adorned with a rubber tropic strap, the timepiece sports a black dial surrounded by a black and blue 24-hour bezel. It’s a great adventure watch as well, with a 39mm stainless steel case and 100m of water resistance. While that functionality is nice, what really sticks out is this watch’s simplicity.

Timex Legacy Tonneau Chronograph

Best Dress Watch: You’d be hard-pressed to find a more sensible dress watch chronograph at any price point, but the Legacy Tonneau Chrono from Timex is a beauty at just around $250. Barely noticeable as a stopwatch at first glance, this ‘70s tonneau-shaped homage cuts costs when it comes to the quartz movement and the gold-plated stainless steel case. The three chronograph registers blend in amidst the contrasting black dial, but still serve their purpose thanks to the double pushers on the outside. Just like the Marlin Chronograph above, this one features an in-dial tachymeter.

Timex x Peanuts Marlin Automatic Snoopy Easy Rider

Best Graphic Watch: While Omega has become known for its Snoopy-edition Speedmasters, Timex has a few Peanuts collaborations of its own — and ones that are significantly easier to obtain. We love this Easy Rider variant of the Marlin Automatic for its handsome appeal as a dress watch and the way its namesake beagle blends in with the dial’s colors. A lesser watch would have become too busy on the face, but Timex wisely chooses stick hour markers rather than numerals. As the first automatic piece on our list, the Marlin lets you view the movement via the exposition caseback.

Timex x Todd Snyder Utility Ranger Watch

Best Timex Collaboration: Given that his label has a real penchant for classic American style, it shouldn’t come as a surprise that Todd Snyder has taken a liking to doing special collaborations with Timex. However, this Utility Ranger is one of our favorites from Timex, collaboration or otherwise. Paying homage to the brand’s original Navi timepieces, this model blends both field watch and dive watch ethos, and has some serious wrist presence, in part thanks to the contrasting olive dial and burnt orange 60-minute bezel, as well as a 24-hour dial with an hour hand that features a ring to better read the military time. Boasting 100m of water resistance, the 41mm gunmetal-colored steel case is given a matching black fabric strap.

Timex Tiburon Automatic

Best Dive Watch: Although most Timex watches favor durability, the Tiburon Automatic diver is on another level. Made to actually accompany you on aqueous adventures, the timepiece boasts 200m of water resistance within its large, but not bulky, 44mm stainless steel case that’s both corrosion- and shock-resistant. The sapphire crystal on the front and the exposition caseback is scratch-resistant, while the synthetic rubber strap is particularly hard-wearing. We also love the contrasting red on the strap with the black and gunmetal on the dial and case, respectively — the former sporting the Diver Down Flag in red.

The Best Automatic Watches Under $500

If you’re looking to save some money on timepieces that punch way above their price tag, check out our guide to the best automatic watches under $500.