Being the most widely used time device, inexpensive, medium-priced or expensive collectible watches are purchased and widely used today by all. Before wristwatches, people used to carry pocket watches, which had covers and were placed into a pocket and attached with a light chain from a belt or pin. Years after the first pocket watch was introduced, people continue to buy them in jewelry stores or search for them in flee markets because really old ones are considered to be collectible items.

The wristwatch was invented by Patek Philippe at the end of 19th century and it was considered at the time to be a woman’s accessory. Men begun wearing wristwatches when Louis Cartier created one especially for his Brazilian friend, Alberto Santos-Dumont, who had trouble checking the time while working on his aircraft invention. The leather-band wristwatch Cartier gave to Dumont never left the latter’s hand and soon, the Parisian male consumer became interested in Cartier’s idea of this new portable time device. The great popularization of the wristwatch became possible after the end of the World Wars, since military officers kept their wristwatches and introduced them to the Western culture as a very useful and quick device to check time. The idea of wearing this time accessory became popular because one could frequently and quickly glance the time while wearing a wristwatch in comparison to the older time-consuming version of pocket watch.

Today, wristwatches are using self-winding, kinetic, electronic, light-powered or thermal power watches to conveniently check time. The differences between these different types of watches have to do with the way each watch receives the necessary amount of energy in order to continue its operation. Moreover, wristwatches can display time either in an analog or digital way. The difference here has to do with how one prefers having time displayed; either with a numbered dial upon which a rotating hour and longer minute rotating hand operate, or through a digital display that shows time as a number. Although cheaper electronics permitted the popularization of digital watches, the newer analog form did not replace the widely used analog watches. Today, people use both, as well as more complicated watch types, since different types of time devices serve different types of people during their everyday tasks.