What is the best budget watch brand?

Tissot.

Great quality/price ratio.

Not often discussed except for the PRX.

I would not consider Seiko a budget brand anymore, unless you mean low budget-to-quality ratio. I would possibly get a Seiko 5 sports or dress-style 5, but once you move out of the 5 series, the quality does not appear to justify the price hike.

I have 15-20 Casio watches and the budget-to-quality on nearly any Casio blows Seiko out of the water.

All of the above! It’s all about your preference…

For me, #microbrands.

If the metric is budget, not all but most have a great price:quality ratio. And if you're patient and not risk-averse, many crowdfunded projects have a higher value per acquisition price.

I have two active pledges on Kickstarter, one a fun summer watch with a Seiko in a modular case to which you can change 5 sets of case-shroud and straps, the other a supercompressor dive watch with a unique case and a beautiful textured dial that includes an innovative date display enclosed in the 3 o'clock index maintaining aesthetical balance.

Laco

There is no one brand that does everything "best" at any budget. If I was going to pick the best "all-round" brand for below $1000 my vote is Timex, they do everything from digital, to hand wound mechanical.

I second the Tissot.

It depends who's asking. From a watch collectors perspective I'd say Casio, if somebody just wanting a watch asked me I'd say Lorus. If the questioner wanted solar I'd say Citizen, etc

I think it depends a lot on the type of watches you’re interested in.

Citizen makes great watches, though most are eco-drive, which although great doesn’t catch my interest as much as a mechanical watch does. Their automatic Promasters are fantastic value for money, especially when you pick them up below retail.

Seiko makes good watches, but they’ve been steadily increasing in price, I’m not sure where the metrics fall anymore with them.

Tissot I’ve never been into, as there’s always a significant design element that ruins most of their watches for me. Though their price point is good.

If we’re taking about complications for the least money… some of the Chinese manufacturers are hard to beat. You can get a column wheel chronograph from seestern/sugess for ~€195. That’s pretty hard to beat. Of course the finishing isn’t great, but it’s a great start for someone interested in mechanical chronographs on a budget. Plus, it’s a great movement to practice servicing later on down the road.

There’s a bunch of micro brands as well offering a good product for the money, some with fairly original designs, some a little generic, (I’m not taking about “homage” brands here). Boldr and Rze have some neat stuff.

See a lot of it already but gonna havta Dbl down on Tissot 😉🤙🏼

Hard to fault Casio (+ their Edifice line) for a quartz piece to tell you the truth ... though Timex has come a long way in the past few years, particularly with the "Q" offerings.

Orient has some really nice mechanical/automatics that are pretty good value

Love Seiko, but their mechanical/automatic pieces are getting too expensive (even some of their meca-quartz!) for what you're getting (which arguably makes Orient the better bargain).

It all depends upon what, exactly, one's budget is. If your budget is $10-$60, then Casio. If your budget is $60-$200, personally, I'd say Pagani. If your budget is $200-$400, San Martin and some Bulova. Above that, you're getting into Tissot, bigger price Bulova and Hamilton.

Orient

Posted just a few hours ago & has over 200 votes. This is a hot topic for sure.

Orient!

I would say that out of those, Casio.

Citizen has some cool stuff, but it's pretty much limited to people with big wrists only and this limitation makes them not as great as a whole.

Seiko is somewhat poor in terms of specs for money and their QC isn't known to be the best.

Casio also suffers from the big wrist thing with some of their watches, but they have some more reasonably sized options in most of their ranges. Their watches also have good specs for the money and although they don't really do mechanical watches, the cost can be justified with the extra features provided by their modules and quartz watches are functionally better than mechanical ones anyway. Also they, as opposed to Seiko for example, use the materials that are standard at their price points, such as Sapphire in their more expensive watches. They even have sapphire on some of their low end watches and they have some of the cheapest titanium watches in the market.

But if you want something that takes a more standard route in the form of mechanical watches, forget all of these. You can't beat Chinese watches. The issue with those is that dealing with any warranty issue is probably a huge pain and you have to order from China or pay extra.

I’d actually pick Orient. I haven’t seen one of those that I didn’t think looked great and they are great value for money.

For Egyptian adults its usually orient, alba or a smart watch, as casio is looked down upon as a children/teens watch. You'd also find seiko, bulova and rado with elders.

Certina, Glycine or Alpina

We're talking budget brands here - I assume to appeal to those of us who don't have scads of money falling out of our home safes like Scrooge McDuck - and Casio dives into lower price points than any other major mainstream manufacturer. Casio is the budget brand king and yet still maintains a reputation for durability and quality.

Those of you talking other brands like Tissot & Laco & mentioning "sub-$1000," clearly have deeper pockets and a higher baseline of what "budget" is for the general population, and to be fair, the poster opened the door for truly UN-budget brands by allowing the "Other" choice in the poll and didn't specify whether the question applied to the general public or was directed at us watch enthusiasts.

So the answer is - for watch enthusiasts - how much money do you make? THAT determines your budget watch brand.

For the general population, Casio is king. Think of it as a Family Feud question: "We asked 100 people: How much would you spend on a budget watch?" The #1 answer would be probably something like "$20."

Yeah, watch enthusiasts really have a twisted idea of budget compared to the general population.

I have seen people call multi-thousand watches as "budget", which is pretty funny.

Sundial is the most underrated tool

Agreed!! There is a lot more variety than I thought too!!

In my little bubble budget friendly is anything 200 usd so to me it is all of the above plus Orient and some Tissots.

I am just happy no one mentioned Fossil .

My answer in the poll is Seiko, but I’m seriously biased😱😂 I think it is very personally, style aproach etc. Casio is seriously durable and on time 🤭but you can’t compare them to the others. Timex and citizen for example are doing better then Seiko on QC etc. What means “the best” for you? I go for style and horological heritage. Good luck 🤞🏾

Seiko has wide choice between many prices, sizes and styles. But if I need to choose between the GS and Chronomaster I will choice the second.