This past Christmas, I once again found myself shopping for a children’s watch. I went through this exercise with my son a few years ago and got him a Swatch Fick-Flak. Now that it was time to do the same for my daughter, I instead chose a Casio LRW200H and have decided that this is perhaps the best watch for kids. Period.
Since I bought my son’s first watch, I have learned a thing or two that informed my decision.
First, most watches marketed for kids are pure garbage. We’re talking crap cases, with crap straps, stuffed with the absolute crappiest movements money (but not much of it) can buy.
Second, my kids wanted watches that looked like “real” watches, by which they meant analog watches, and while they wanted their watches to look fun, they did not want them to look too much like toys. Colors were definitely in, but cartoon faces were right out. Like my son, my daughter specifically asked for a diver with a rotating bezel and lume, and who can blame them? Those features are fun for adults too.
Third, kids lead super active lives, like exponentially more active than mine, so their watched must be able to handle harsh environments, repeated impacts, and immersion in all manner of liquids, with the possible exception of soap. Remember that old Timex commercial where they strapped a watch to an outboard motor? Like that. My daughter merely wanted a watch she could swim with, but I wouldn’t put the boat propeller thing past her.
Finally, the watch had to be reasonably priced because you never know when it might vanish. My son’s watch appeared in many unlikely places and disappeared once at a community pool. Even if your kid is careful and doesn’t lose it in those first few weeks, they may very well change their minds about watches in general. My son wore the heck out of his Swatch for several months, and then, he just stopped. He said it made his wrist hot, which isn’t entirely crazy in the heat of a Virginia summer, but in truth, I think he was just over it and has shown exactly zero interest in wearing a watch ever since. And that’s okay. Really. It only hurts like an ice pick in my heart. That’s all.
Those parameters narrowed the search considerably. We needed a small, inexpensive, analog dive watch in a style likely to delight a second grader. Ultimately, I considered only four brands: Swatch, Parchie, Blok, and Casio.
Swatch Flik-Flak
I’ve already covered the pros and cons of the Flik-Flak in my earlier review. In short, the watch has a small (32mm) plastic case, Swiss quartz movement, and comes in two general styles with myriad color combinations. Their Solo Dark Blue has the requisite rotating bezel, a cool bracelet-looking rubber strap, and sells for $55 on the Swatch site.
Swatches tend to be well screwed together, and I know from personal experience that you can beat the heck out of them. Water resistance is an unimpressive 30m, but my son’s somehow managed to withstand visits to the beach without issue. Its worst feature is its non-removable strap. I honestly don’t understand the logic behind that except for the fact that if your kid breaks the plastic buckle or decides they want something different instead, Swatch gets to sell you a whole new watch. Also, the current crop of Flik-Flaks has no lume, which was a deal-killer for my daughter.
Parchie Pal
The Parchie Pal was mighty tempting. It has a 32mm aluminum case, a Seiko quartz movement, and a $65 price tag. Parchie’s founder and designer, Cara Barrett, has described the watch as a lighthearted version of an adult’s watch, which is exactly the aesthetic I was looking for. With its bright yet smart color palette, and classic bones, the Parchie Pal was an early favorite, but I had my reservations.
Aluminum is a soft metal, and I wondered how well its presumably anodized coating would hold up over time. The strap is a Velcro pass-through. While I appreciate the idea of making it easier to fasten and infinitely adjustable, the fabric of any stripe quickly gets gross around kids. Yes, you can wash it, but I really wasn’t looking for yet another item for the laundry. Moreover, from my own experience with Velcro NASA straps, I know it is not a terrifically comfortable material. Like the Swatch, the Parchie lacks lume and has only a middling 30m water resistance rating. Finally, the bezel is one with the case and does not rotate. The Parchie was out of contention.
Blok 33
Last up was Swiss newcomer Blok. This one really piqued my interest. Like the Flik-Flak and Parchie, the Blok 33 is a colorful diver, but unlike either of those, it actually backs up its looks with a screw-down crown and a useful 100m water resistance. It even boasts a sapphire crystal. Its key feature is the unique Blok layout that offsets the hours into visually distinct blocks of time to help kids learn, and a clever rotating bezel marked with blocks of 5, 10, 15, and 30 minutes. Inside its 33mm plastic (okay, “bio-polymer”) case is an ETA quartz.
So far, so good, but now we get to the drawbacks. Its strap is Velcro on woven polyester with an Alter-Nappa (plastic) lining. That would likely be more comfortable than the Parchie’s unlined Velcro, although it will get just as nasty (additional straps are $26). A screw-down crown sounds great, but it is unnecessary to ensure 100m water resistance, and on a kid’s watch, it is an invitation to cross-threading, particularly since it is on the left side of the watch. Blok went destro for the same reason many adult dive watches do, to prevent the crown from digging into the wearer’s hand — which is something that has never happened to me. Not once. Not even with my most gigantic dive watches. If you are not left-handed, I fail to see the point.
The case looks cool, but it is afflicted with fixed lugs. I own a couple of watches in this style, and while they have their place, fixed lugs definitely limit your strap choices. This is especially true here because Blok, in what I can only conclude was a cruel joke on watch-loving parents, fitted a 17mm strap. You can probably stuff a common-as-dirt 18mm in there, but it still irks me that they looked at the world of available watch straps and settled on the oddest of oddball sizes. Also, you should bear in mind that fixed lugs protect the watch by eliminating the possibility of it snapping off of its strap if it gets snagged with any force. Frankly, I’d much rather that energy be transmitted to a hapless spring bar than to my daughter’s tiny wrist.
And then there is the price. The Blok 33 is $179. That is the same as the list price of my similarly-equipped Vaer S5. But that one is stainless steel and was purchased for me, an adult. The chances of me outgrowing it, losing it at a playground, or destroying it while playing a game that involves smashing, are exceedingly low. I cannot say the same about my daughter. I can afford $179, but there is no way in hell I would ever spend that on a kid’s first watch.
Casio LRW200H
The Casio LRW200H is a 33mm diver with a quartz movement. In white-on-white with multi-color numbers, it looks fun and lighthearted but not gimmicky or childlike. Indeed, it is not marketed to children but to women. You can get it in a more traditional black and white if you prefer. Like the Swatch, it has a plastic strap, so when it comes home from school covered in tempera paint, pond scum, and Norovirus, you can easily wash it off. I have no idea what the black schmutz is on my daughter’s watch, nor do I care to find out. If the strap is ever beyond saving, you can replace it. True, a 14mm lug box is not the most common size, but it is far more so than the Blok’s 17mm, and you are not locked into pass-through straps.
Like the Blok, the Casio boasts 100m water resistance, even with a conventional push-pull crown. Its rotating bezel is marked in 15-minute increments. Perhaps it is not as inventive as the Blok’s, but still quite useful. You get a mineral crystal instead of sapphire and a plastic resin case instead of bio-polymer, but you also get lume. Maybe it’s not torch-bright Swiss BGW9 SuperLuminova, but it’s real lume that lasts past bedtime.
On my daughter’s 4.5″ wrist, the 33 x 38.7 x 11.5mm Casio looked sufficiently sporty, and not at all ungainly. I was a little worried that the strap would not cinch far enough, but it has adjustment holes for days. She is not even wearing it on its tightest adjustment.
The date window is an added bonus not shared by the other three contenders. It also has a 24 index, but I think I’ll wait a bit before I confuse her with that.
My daughter is delighted with her watch. Like my son, she previously could not be bothered to tell time. If you asked, you would get a dramatic huff, some eye-rolling, and after an eternity of blankly staring at the clock, she would say something like, “I don’t know … 60?” But the second she strapped on her new watch, she was magically transformed into a time-telling machine.
“My watch says it is 2:25.”
“Do you know it is 11:53?”
“Dad. Dad? Daddy. Daddieeeee! … It’s 4:12.”
Hmm. Funny how that worked. It’s almost as if she knew how to tell time all along. Just sayin’.
She loves the fact that her watch looks like some of mine. She straps it on first thing every morning, and at night, she takes it off and places it on her nightstand facing her so she can read its glowing hands. She has already taken it swimming, and she praises its fit and comfort. It was a big deal to get it off of her long enough to take these photos.
The downside? According to my daughter, “I wish the bezel would stay in place; it turns without me even touching it.” She’s right, the bezel does tend to travel. I can accept that flaw because the Casio ticks all my boxes and does so at the absurdly low price of $36 if ordered directly from the brand or as low as $20 at other retailers. I bought this particular watch for $26 on Amazon — about half the price of the Swatch and the Parchie and the same price as one of the Blok’s straps.
So, after all that, is the Casio LRW200H the best watch for kids? I’d say yes, at least for my kid, based on my criteria. Bear in mind that while I do have direct experience with the Flik-Flak, I did not review the Parchie or Blok hands-on. I’d still like to. Those watches have much to offer, even though they lost out in terms of key functions (Parchie) and price (Blok). For the Bum’s dollar, the Casio LRW200H is clear winner.
