Casio MQ24

Seven dollars of joy...

...that's what the Casio MQ24 is. Whether it's model 7B seen above or any other number of variants of the same watch (there's something like 10 different designs,) it's all good.

The price is usually $9 to $12 for one of these, but I scored one for $7 with shipping included, so yeah I couldn't pass that up.

Size: 35mm with crown.

Tick: Almost silent. You can only hear ticking when holding it almost against the ear.

Legibility: Matte black hands against stark white dial = superior legibility. This thing can be read even in a barely-lit room.

Weight: 19 grams, which is next to nothing.

Small but good

I can get away with wearing this watch because I have a 6.75" wrist. And while true the band could fit up to a 7.5" wrist, bigger-wristed folk would be much better off with the MW240, which is basically the exact same watch as the MQ24 except with a bigger 43mm case.

The only "happy medium" 38mm size watch Casio makes that's cheap and shows all the hour numbers on the dial with no date complication is the V001 model. Nice enough watch, but not as readable as the MQ24. The indices are a proper size but the silver hands are too reflective. If the hands were a dark color, that would increase the readability of the watch by 3x if not more.

For what the MQ24 is, it totally gets the job done. The thing cost me 7 bucks so I really can't complain. It fits my wrist, runs very quietly, keeps accurate time and it's easy to read. Can't really ask any more out of it than that.

Published 2017 Sep 29