casio ae1500 might be the best big watch

About six-and-a-half years ago, I said I would never buy a big watch ever again. I just bought a big watch, the Casio AE1500. I'm glad I did, because this is big done right.

I want to make something very clear up front. This watch was not bought to "look tough", because I don't care about that at all. What I do care about is legibility, comfort and features, in that order.

I'll actually talk about legibility and features in a moment. First, comfort.

Comfort

As a man with wrists that are both skinny and flat, there are many watches I can't wear, but I can wear this one.

The on-paper dimensions of the AE1500, much like what I said about the W735H, make it appear that I absolutely cannot wear this thing. AE1500 dimensions are 54.4mm lug-to-lug, 51.2mm diameter, 15.7mm thick. Yeah, it's huge.

What makes the AE1500 work? A lot of it has to do with the lug design, as both sides take a very sharp downturn where the case ends and the lug begins:

Amazingly, it's a good fit and with no long strap tail.

For those of you out there who do have big wrists of 7" or greater, Casio covered that base with the long-strap version AE1500WHX. The X in the model name literally means it features an extra long strap. The regular AE1500WH has single strap holes and the AE1500WHX has a longer strap with double-holes. But even if you come across a listing that doesn't show a photo of the double-holes, if it states it's a WHX, it has the extra long strap.

Even as big as the AE1500 is, the weight is 57g, so it doesn't weigh down the wrist at all. And because the strap is wide, the case doesn't flop around on the wrist. The design of the AE1500 is just good and feels good.

Legibility

I do believe AE1500 is king of the hill for digital watch legibility.

A problem with other large-display digital watches with an LCD panel is that while the display is big, the digits are skinny. Skinny digits can "blur" when trying to look at them, even if your eyesight is good. The AE1500 does not have this problem. All characters on the AE1500 are both large and thick.

I'll follow up on this in a moment.

Features

I think for most people, the AE1500 has the just-right feature set to it. It certainly does for me.

The home screen shows weekday, day, date, and time all at once, and I appreciate NOT having to press a button to see all that. Just look at the display and there it is.

There is a countdown timer with auto-repeat. Very nice to have. Many other Casios have the timer but not the auto-repeat, but the AE1500 does.

Having a stopwatch is obviously good, such as for timing things while cooking in the kitchen. In fact, you can use the timer to count down something cooking and use the stopwatch to time something else cooking.

I do like that the watch has 5 separate alarms, each with the ability to set as daily, monthly or annual.

Middle age man legibility concerns

I do wear glasses, but in reality I can read any watch, even for the little AQ230 I have which is a very classy little timepiece.

But I have to admit that it's so nice having those big thick digits of the AE1500. It's even big enough to where most of the time using the night light (which is good) isn't even necessary to read the time and/or date in low light situations.

However, were it the situation that my eyesight was so bad that even the AE1500 didn't cut the mustard, that's when I'd switch over to analog, but only for a very specific type...

...which is Seiko Prospex, and I'll tell you exactly why. It's three reasons.

First, It's a no-number diver. Symbols only.

Second, the hour and minute hand are different shapes, depending on model. On several models, the hour is a wider stubby arrow and the minute a longer and slightly skinnier fence post style. This makes it very easy to differentiate one from the other, and that's important.

Third, the "turtle" case shape, which for a steel diver is as comfortable as it gets. This is a shape that works on all wrists, even for skinny flat ones like mine. You may have heard of watches that "wear smaller", and the turtle shape is one of them because it hugs the wrist correctly the first time, every time. This means even if the watch is listed as something huge like 45mm or 46mm, yes I could still wear it as long as that turtle case shape is there.

And of course I get the rotating bezel dive timer, which I would use in the kitchen for timing things while cooking. True, the Prospex doesn't beep because it's mechanical, but still, at least I get a timer out of it in additional to a clock.

The reason I mention all this stuff is that if the AE1500 doesn't work for something you can read normally, you have to go diver at that point. And it has to be the right diver. I give my nod to the Prospex because it's the steel diver most likely to agree with just about anybody, including myself.

Middle age man style concerns

The AE1500 is plastic and there's no getting around that. It will never look as cool as a steel Seiko Prospex diver. But it is a multi-function digital that has that just-right combo of all the features you wear one for in the first place, with a super-legible display.

Is the AE1500 an example of function over form? I'd argue no just from the fact Casio did keep a reserved style to it. Yeah, AE1500 is big but thankfully doesn't look goofy. It works.

Lastly, I should also note that if you like the AE1500 but prefer square, Casio covered that too with the AE1600. Exact same feature set in a more angular square-ish shape.

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Published 2025 Sep 16