16 Good Reasons to Start Collecting Timex

This is an edition of the newsletter Box + Papers, Cam Wolf’s weekly deep dive into the world of watches. Sign up here.They’re laughing at us on the Timex forums. Given the collecting communities that have formed around other affordable watchmakers, deep fans of the brand can hardly believe they’re able to find rare, vintage pieces from a storied watch manufacturer without the absurd prices associated with, say, vintage Seiko. In a moment where watch fiends have turned over every single stone in search of well-kept secrets, Timex somehow remains underrated. Particularly for a brand that has sold millions and millions and millions of watches.Timex has history as both a pop-culture giant and a brand once made in America. Founded all the way back in 1854 as the Waterbury Clock Company, the company created inexpensive pocket watches, setting itself up as an affordable brand from the very start. In fact, after partnering with Ingersoll in 1892, the newly formed company released the Yankee “Dollar Watch.” The piece was so popular it became known as the "watch that made the dollar famous.”During World War II, the company rebranded as The United States Time Corporation and started making bomb timers for the US military. The war ended and people needed watches again more than they needed bomb timers, so the company was eventually renamed Timex, a portmanteau of two popular brands from the era: Time magazine and Kleenex. Even then, Timex’s goal was to make the most affordable watches in America. The company was so successful that in 1962 one out of every three watches sold in America was a Timex.The brand became a worldwide phenomenon. Its watches appeared in MacGyver and Pulp Fiction, and it was the first company to partner with Disney in 1933. You’ve heard the phrase "It takes a licking and keeps on ticking,” right? That’s from a 1950s Timex advertisement. Figures like Martin Luther King Jr., Louis Armstrong, Bill Clinton, Jack Nicholson, and Bill Murray all wore Timex.Naturally, there’s a but. Vintage Timex watches are tricky to collect because it oftentimes makes more sense to buy new than go through the process of fixing up an old one. “When a Timex watch broke, one simply bought a new one,” says Nick Ferrell of DC Vintage Watches. “Timex drew its bold marketing campaigns from the (in)famous American ‘dollar watch,’ which advertised its easy repair method: rather than pay for a costly repair, buy another.”Mark Rushworth, an avid Timex collector and the man behind a database for the brand’s vintage pieces, warns that it’s not as easy as scooping up cheap watches on eBay. “I would caution anyone considering Timex as an entry point to wider watch collecting,” Rushworth says. However, Rushworth contends that the watches are more long-lasting than they get credit for, pointing to the takes a licking campaign and the fact that Timex produced manuals showing how to repair and service the watches.Economies of scale made Timex successful. That also means Timex used cheap and unique movements—euphemisms now for “difficult to service and repair.” And because the brand often used gold-plated metals or chrome instead of stainless steel, the watches aged worse than other vintage pieces from similar eras. One of Rushworth’s pieces of advice for collecting Timex is getting comfortable finding “donor” parts to mix and match movements, hands, and bezels.Consider that your fair warning if you go digging around on eBay, because it’s hard not to fall in love with at least one vintage Timex. At such low prices, you won’t resist hitting the Buy Now button. I’m proof: in the course of writing this story, I bought one of the brand’s vintage dive models off of eBay. The watch shares the funky 1960s numerals seen on Oris’s original Sixty-Five dial and a variant of Universal Geneve’s Polerouter Sub. I’m obsessively tracking its shipping status.Rushworth points out there are infinite reasons to get into Timex: through a pop culture lens, because of celebrity endorsements, the connection to space, military ties, or quirky collaborations with everyone from the Muppets to Heinz. And there are still diamonds in the rough out there. “Look for dirty models that look good under the grime or are listed with blurry photos,” Rushworth says.Below are 16 historic, quirky, or just plain handsome Timex watches to kickstart your collection of affordable watches. (Note: I’m sticking to the brand’s analog watches today; Timex also made a massive number of digital pieces, like the Ironman, that are worth their own story.)Core CollectionsMarlinThe Marlin is the brand's timeless dress watch design from the ‘60s. It’s still a favorite in the catalog and among collaborators. Plus, the archives are overflowing with awesomely strange variants.This Marlin takes its looks from an old-school rotary phone with apertures for each numeral. I want to dial up whoever designed this and tell them I love them. The design was also repurposed for a collaboration with Ritz where a cracker stands in for the hour markers.A Timex for the Susan Miller devotee in your life. This is a rare and collectible take on the Marlin and is perfect for when you need to know it’s Aries o’clock.QTimex's 2022 reissue of the Q Unfortunately, this line is not named for James Bond’s gadget guy, and none of the pieces in the line can transform into a mini buzzsaw. The Q actually stands for quartz. This line represents the brand’s entrance into quartz watches in 1972. The debut piece is a stunner: gold-plated case and a red dial.Now there are all sorts of models in the Q family, including a handsome take on a GMT.The Mil-W / Camper / Mk1TimexIn the early ‘80s, Timex created a plastic watch—meant to be thrown out when it stopped working—called the Mil-W for the US military. This project was abandoned after only a few months, but Timex repurposed the design for the general public and called it the Camper. ‘80s Campers are now collectible in the Timex universe because MacGyver wore one in the original TV series. Josh Brolin also wore one in No Country for Old Men.In 2016, Timex brought the watch back as the Mk1 through a J.Crew collaboration. The recent version with a fish on the dial is already a fan favorite.Easy ReaderOriginally released in 1977, Timex’s Easy Reader resembles a shrunken elementary school clock slapped on your wrist. The big, clean dial and crisp numerals are as simple to make out as the top row of an eye exam. Back when Timex originally started making these, it created dials in heavily saturated, beautiful primary colors like blue and red. The big, simple dial really amplified the fresh coat of paint. And if you think you’re too good to collect Timex, remember this is the watch Jack Nicholson often wears.Timex Skin Diver 600 Ft and 200 Ft waterproofThese were Timex’s first serious diving watches and among the brand’s only pieces made entirely in stainless steel. The 600 Foot is clearly modeled after the Rolex Submariner, which was released the prior decade. However, it’s the aforementioned 200 Footer I couldn’t resist.Sprite Calendar and Dive WatchesThe Sprite isn’t the most important Timex, but the family features some of the most zany and fun designs in the catalog, like the “Bullseye” pictured above. The big colors and dials as busy as Times Square on New Year’s Eve have a lot of character.Special LinesTimex Dorado ElectricYou can track the entire arc of watch history through Timex, and this Dorado represents the golden age of battery-powered watches. A sort of proto-quartz watch, this thing ran on the combination of a battery and a balance wheel, and Timex was so in on the tech that it put it inside its first solid-gold watch and sold it as its premium model. “Never needs winding…on your wrist or off,” a line of copy from an ad at the time of the watch’s release brags. These are so in demand that Rushworth says Charlie Sheen attempted to buy his.SouthamptonThis is Timex’s very first—and last—mechanical chronograph watch. I’m less interested in the busy dial with its long, swirly line in the middle (earning its “snail dial” nickname) than in how the watch functions. Because this is not your regular chronograph (the name for a stopwatch function). Push the slider at 3 o’clock into different positions and the seconds hand jumps into action. Shifting the slider up freezes the seconds hand in place, and nudging it back to neutral lets the hand roam freely again, while pushing the slider down resets the second hand at 12 o’clock. Todd Snyder reimagined the Southampton in 2019, though that version failed to include the weirdo chronograph complication. Bummer.Fun TimerIt appears that Timex’s definition of fun is a checkerboard pattern. We have that in common. Some versions of this watch double up on the pattern with both the dial and strap rendered in black and white.Timex Viscount “Bandit”Timex brought back a version of the “Bandit” in 2023 The sharp black-and-white colorway on this cushion-case watch would be good enough for me, but the backstory really gives this watch some juice. It’s known as “The Bandit”—great start!—because it was the watch of choice for Burt Reynolds’s character in the 1977 movie “Smokey and the Bandit.”Timex Black MaxTimex's reissue of the watch with Huckberry TimexBecause of its shotgun approach, Timex doesn’t just reflect technological trends throughout the decades but also aesthetic ones. The race-ready Black Max, originally released in 1978, clearly gestures at the funky Porsche Design watches of the time, but at a much more affordable price. It also reflected the advertising of the time: the Black Max was featured in an (in)famous commercial showing a woman in a Maserati who declared this timepiece was “only for real men.” Pair this with a vintage bottle of Axe Snake Peel body wash and the puzzle of your manhood will finally be complete. Timex brought this model back with Huckberry in late 2025.CollaborationsBecause of its affordability, Timex has become a perfect platform for designers like Todd Snyder and Noah or watch-world figures like Worn & Wound and Dimepiece to infuse their vision.Snoopy WeekenderToday, Timex puts out approximately 6,357 Snoopy watches a year, but I think I managed to find the very best. This 2019 version with the Milky Way sparkling in the background as Snoopy stands smugly on the moon makes good use of the Weekender’s typically understated design. A more recent piece shows the whole Peanuts crew floating freely inside a space station. I also love my personal Timex that uses Woodstock as the seconds indicator.Nigel Cabourn “Referee Watch”I think I’ve mentioned this watch a half-dozen times now over the history of this newsletter, but it’s such a fun nod to the purposeful way watches were invented. This colorful design has a single purpose: to track the halves of a soccer match.Beams Mickey MouseTimex is the original Mickey Mouse collaborator in the watch space. The brand started working with Disney all the way back in 1933. That history inspired a Beams watch from 2021 that uses the magical rodent’s yellow gloves as the actual hands, a detail I love.Heinz KetchupThe beauty of a cheap Timex is that your wrist can be a showcase for just about any interest. One of my favorite novelty Timex watches is this Heinz collaboration that uses a ketchup bottle as the seconds hand.Kermit the Frog Mystery DialRushworth also points to super rare, one-off pieces like this Kermit watch with a hat that floats around the dial and indicates the seconds. “The sad thing about prototype models is that these were kept by Timex employees and have become lost to the collectorverse,” Rushworth says.See all of our newsletters, including Box + Papers, here