How important is lume?

Tritium is king, even the best lume fades over time. 

I wear a watch to bed every night, and nothing beats the convenience of tritium for that role. Even just working in and out of dark spaces I find tritium is perfect. I never have to wonder whether or not my sleeve prevented the lume from charging while I was outside. 

I said it before, as a vintage guy by heart lume is nice but not that important.

When new it's great, but tritium fades too. Or at least all 3 of the tritium watch's I have owned and continue to own  2 of, have all gone south.

Lume can be cool, but also not really a necessity for me at all. I like lights, though, which Casio and Timex like to include in some of their watches.

I have tritium, lume, no lume, and can you really call that lume? watches. I think purpose and design dictate. 

Lume brings out the kid in me 🤗 I also prefer lume over a G-Shock where you need to use two hands to check the time. I only got one arm when the little one is sleeping on my other arm 😅

I hear that. Doesn't tritium fade too?

How old are the watches, and have you sent them in to have the tubes replaced? 

I don't like to use two hands to check the time. But G-Shocks are awesome in the dark beyond that 😊

I like the lume. But if giving it up for a nice vintage I pay the price without hesitation.

True

I guess it all depends on what I am doing or where I am going for the day/night. Lume or no lume. 😉

Tritium is constantly illuminated, but not bright enough that you can see it in lighted conditions.  So, on a day to day basis, it’s always perfectly bright, even if you have had it in a drawer for six months. 
 

As to the fade…it has a 12 year half-life, so in 12 years it will only be half as bright as it is today. Then in 12 more years, it will be half as bright again. Somewhere around 20-25 years  after manufacture it will be functionally done. This is roughly equivalent to when lume will also loose its function. 

I like lume on a modern watch, especially if it has some sports/outdoors/military vibes. I think its important on a go anywhere, do anything watch.  If its 100% dress watch, or its a worn out vintage watch, I'm fine with no lume.

For example, I have an old speedy reduced, and the lume is terrible. I also have a JLC reverso with no lume. Both are fine in my book. 

Unforgivable faux pas... Grand Seikos... Just imagine that textured snowflake dial if it reflected the soft glow from some super luminova. Criminal oversight. 

I wear a watch while sleeping, and I appreciate being able to easily tell the time in the dark should I wake up in the middle if the night. All I really care about is having enough lume to allow the time to be read, which means at least one fixed reference point for orientation, and enough lume on the hands to distinguish between the hour and minute hands.  I'm more concerned with the lume lasting through the night than I am with how much is lumed, although I admit that the kid in me loves to see watches from brands like Zelos where the lume just looks cool.  

Sadly, I am one of those people.

The lecture theatre next to my office doubles up as a cinema, and one keeps it dark when making a slide presentation.  So, whenever I teach there I wear either a watch with loom, or one one of those dress watches with shiny hands that pick up the slightest light source.  Not because I need to check the general time during a lecture, but I do need to check every now and then how many minutes I have left: am I ok, do I need to speed up and/or possibly drop a topic, or am I about to finish early and should therefore reenforce a topic with another example?

The time-check in those scenario needs to be a quick glance in a fraction of a second. Backlight engagement would take too long. Loom is a bit risky, because you would need to make sure that it is sufficiently charged when you rely upon it.

Sleeping with the lights on?! My wife would have killed me 😅

I smile every time I see the lume (inc. fully lumed bezel) on my Christopher Ward Trident Pro 600.

This new fangled lume craze is just a passing fancy. I read the time as I always have, from the warm glow of gas light.

Good luck with that old school Radium glow☠️

Lume is definitely useful but i never find myself in many situations where i can't see my watch. 

It usually happens when I turn of the light, in my experience at least 🤭

Yes it does.

Takes a while but I have a couple of Tritium lumed watch's left and both are very dim compared to when I first got them. Quite disappointed , and won't bother with it again unless I love the actual watch's design so much.

E. Depends on the watch

How long have you had them?  Have you considered having the tubes replaced?

One is 7 years old the other is a couple of years younger both same brand.

I haven't been bothered to replace the tubes as I don't believe that will fix it . I mean it will to begin with but the same thing will happen with the new tubes .

Still wear them now and then, in fact I have one on right now. Just don't use them as often as I used to.

What brand is it?  If they are only 5-7 years old, then either they didn’t put near enough in there, or the tubes were broken. The half-life on Tritium is exact and after that amount of time, you should have 70% brightness remaining. 

Correct. They are both Nite Icons. One the quartz and the younger one an automatic version.