Owning a good quality watch as a boat owner is essential. Whether it’s for style or practicality, there are many reasons as to why it may be useful. However, finding one that meets all of your qualifications may be difficult. For 8 of the best boating watches, continue reading!
On the subject of watches, style guru and editor of Gentleman’s Quarterly magazine Dylan Jones once wrote in his book Mr. Jones Rules’ For The Modern Man ‘…you can be walking along a deserted Caribbean beach, wearing only a pair of shorts, but if you’re sporting a big expensive watch then you’re still well dressed’ – something that might equally well have been written about boating watches.
For a boat owner of a certain age, this would have traditionally meant a stainless steel sports Rolex, if for no other reason than James Bond always wore a Rolex (the real one of Fleming’s books, not the movie interloper).
These days Rolex is little out of reach, since new stainless steel sports Rolexes are unobtainable unless you have a ‘special relationship’ with your authorized dealer, and secondhand values have quintupled as a result.
So instead, here are eight of the most practical and most stylish boating watches that won’t break the bank. After all, rules are made to be broken, even those of Mr Jones.
8 of the best boating watches
Spinnaker Tesei Titanium
Best all-round boating watch
Somewhat of an interloper in the established and clubby world of the wristwatch, UK brand Spinnaker has been with us for less than a decade. Yet in that time it’s established itself firmly as a maker of a wide variety of mostly nautically inspired timepieces.
With a range of seven distinct models, each model available in a sub set of colours, material and straps, the choice this fledgling company offers is remarkable.
This Tesei Titanium, as the name suggests, has a case made from titanium for durability combined with light weight. At 43mm across, it’s not short of presence, and it’s available in Matte Black, Forest Green, Everlight White or the Shadow Grey that you see here, complete with blue uni-directional bezel.
A matching 22mm solid Titanium bracelet keeps it safe, as does a sapphire crystal, screw down crown and 200m water resistance rating. The movement is a Japan NH35 TMI Automatic, so no batteries and no winding, provided you stay active (it’s powered by a counterweight that winds the movement).
Reasons to buy:
- Wide range of choice in models, materials, colours and straps
- Durable
- Light-weight
Reasons to avoid:
- Lacking the extensive features found in others on this list
Apple Watch Series 7
Best smart boating watch
King of the smart watches, the most obvious feature of this latest model from Apple is a watch face/screen that sits proud and wraps around the edges in a surprisingly satisfying manner. It’s created by reducing the borders by 40%, which allows for nearly 20% more screen area than Series 6. And over 50% more screen area than Series 3.
Crack, dust and water resistant, it’s a Retina Display that is always on, rather than having to be activated, and as it’s a touch screen, that means that the displayed buttons are larger. Or you can just scribble on it to compose text messages or emails.
Five new aluminium case finishes include midnight, starlight, green, and a new blue and red, along with a range of new strap colours and styles. Stainless steel models are available in silver, graphite, and gold colours. What does it do? Simply put, everything.
Reasons to buy:
- Feature-packed, it does everything
- Crack, dust and water-resistant
- Multiple styles and finish options
Reasons to avoid:
- Modern tech so relies on charging
Garmin Quatix 6S Titanium
The ultimate boating watch
Arguably the ultimate boating watch, the Quatix 6S Titanium is a smart watch that connects to your phone and does the usual displaying of emails and text messages, monitoring fitness data such as heart rate and even Pulse Ox blood oxygen saturation.
A good looking device, it’s a chunky 47mm but the circular case makes it look a little less geeky than the ubiquitous Apple product.
And whilst it lacks the brightly coloured Retina display, it also lacks the battery burn – in smartwatch mode you can expect 14 days between charges, rather than 18 hours. But where it gets really interesting is when you connect it via NMEA(R) 2000 boat data streaming to your MFD.
Now you’ve got heading, speed, depth, water temperature, waypoint navigation information, wind data and more, right there on your wrist. You can even use Fusion-Link™ entertainment control to operate your Fusion boat hifi.
But best of all, connect to a compatible Garmin system and it will even give you autopilot control!
Reasons to buy:
- Can last up to an incredible 14 days in smartwatch mode
- Connects to MFD to provide extensive boat data to your wrist
- Can operate autopilot via Garmin
Reasons to avoid:
- Can be quite chunky on the wrist
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