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Watch GlossaryWatch Winder

A watch winder keeps a watch wound up to maintain its power reserve, and date and time complications, when not worn on the wrist

Ornella D’Souza November 1, 2023

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What Is A Watch Winder?

A watch winder keeps a highly complicated watch wound up to maintain its power reserve, and other date and time complications, when not worn on the wrist.

Wolf Module 4.1 Watch Winder Single Vertical Module Uni-directional Bi-directional Rotating Black leather — Wolf Module 4.1 Watch Winder Single Vertical Module

The winder is not meant for the manual-wind and battery-operated quartz kind of timekeepers, and even simple time-only or day-date versions. It is considered a boon for watches with complex functions such as perpetual calendar, annual calendar, sub-dials with moon display, power reserve, etc. This utility device ensures these functions are not paused due to poor lubrication to avoid timekeeping inaccuracies and run the risk of damaging the watch having to regularly adjust it. Winders are either battery-operated or run on electricity. Modern automatic watches do not require a watch winder as these are wound by the motion of your wrist. Besides, there’s no need for a winder if you own just one watch as that’s hardly a hassle to manually set up the date and time.

Purpose Of A Watch Winder

A quality watch winder guarantees the good health of your watch collection. After taking the desired watch out from the winding chamber, the owner should be able to directly wear it without needing to wind it up. The device keeps the mainspring wound at regular intervals to mimic the sense of motion felt when the watch is worn on the wrist.

It is designed for intermittent/periodic rotation rather than continual, allows you to control the number of turns per day (TPD)—between ~650 and ~1,800 daily turns—and depending on the watch, provides unidirectional or bi-directional winding options. Note: winding a watch the wrong way can damage it. A watch should be ideally positioned vertically within the winder to optimise gravity with each rotation. Brands such as Wolf come with a user manual that details TPD and the direction of winding a particular branded watch. For instance, some watches have lengthy power reserves can be wound after extended time periods.