![[Question] Is it normal for a watch to run 4 minutes slow? Seiko GMT](https://alien.top/pictrs/image/719e9ce0-71a3-45b0-ad4c-c5213a686048.webp){kind=link}
Thanks everyone for the helpful advice. So basically this is normal and I’ll need to check my watch against time.gov every few weeks to make sure it’s not wildly fast or slow (like it is now at 4 minutes slow) and reset the time as needed?
Why wait that long? I was as surprised as you to find out these watches aren’t actually “great” at keeping time. You’d expect set it and forget it, right? People also say things like “this is part of your relationship with your watch” which mean you know it mechanically and you build habits around keeping time. Every other day I lost about a minute so every other day I reset it. I simply coordinate it with the time on my iPhone but whatever you choose is great. They say this is just part of the hobby…
Mine runs fast so every week I’ll pull the crown out to hack the second hand and wait until it’s 15 sec slow and then resume
Actually, “set it and forget it” is pretty much only said about quartz watches.
I usually just keep an eye on my auto watches compared to my cell phone (which is automatically coordinated to atomic time, so it’s just as accurate as time.gov). If I notice it’s more than a minute or two off, I adjust it.
If being accurate to the second is necessary for you, a radio-corrected or High Accuracy Quartz would be a good choice. Even the most accurate automatic watches will be off by a minute or two per month.
4min per day? Lmao
No, 4 minutes over a months long period
I bought my first “real” watch a few months ago and I love it, however it has lost a lot of time over the past month and I’m concerned it could be defective. I’m pretty new to watched so I don’t know if this is common/normal/acceptable, but my GMT has lost 4 minutes of time since I set the time over 30 days ago using time.gov as a baseline. During those 30 days it has never stopped and I manually wind it just about every night around the same time. Is this acceptable or should I send it back to Seiko for a new one? Thanks!
That sounds normal. I was surprised and disappointed by this when I got my first automatic. Currently in a smartwatch phase, with occasional automatics in the mix. I’m perhaps over fixated on exact time. I also use time.gov.
I’m that people don’t go to find this stuff out in the course of learning about mechanical watches. In my experience I’ve almost never needed electronic-level accuracy. But if you are worried, regular quartz watches and those with radio control and/or Bluetooth are gonna be your best friends