Best Watches Under $500

A Seiko 5 Sports with a second time-zone hand and a 24-hour bezel, on an automatic movement.

A GMT hand shows a second time zone at a glance, and this is by a wide margin the cheapest mechanical way to own one. For someone with family abroad, clients in another country, or a job that involves calls at odd hours, it is the rare complication that gets used every day rather than admired occasionally. It keeps the 100-meter water resistance of the rest of the Seiko 5 line. The case is thick — noticeably tall on the wrist — so it suits someone who likes a substantial watch.

A 200m automatic dive watch with a sapphire crystal and a steel bracelet, from Seiko-owned Orient.

Sapphire at this price used to be unusual and it is the reason this watch ages better than its rivals: after two years of desk knocks it still looks new, where a mineral crystal would be scratched across the middle. Add 200 meters of water resistance and a steel bracelet in the box, and there is nothing else to buy. It wears large, so this is a pick for someone with a wrist to carry it — if you are unsure, the Seiko 5 Sports is the more forgiving shape.

Seiko's modern 5 Sports: a 100m water-resistant automatic in a diver-style case, with a day-date display and a movement that both hand-winds and hacks.

It sits well under this ceiling, which means you can pair it with something else rather than spending the whole budget on the watch. It is the least risky automatic anyone sells: it can be swum in, it hand-winds so you can set it going before wrapping it, and the dial choice is wide enough to match a taste you already know. If the plan is watch plus strap plus a roll to keep it in, this is the watch to build that around.

A dress watch with a domed crystal, applied numerals and an in-house automatic movement, on a leather strap.

For an occasion that wants marking, a dress watch does something no other gift does: it works in the setting the recipient is heading into, and it carries the date with it for decades. The Bambino's domed crystal is what makes it look expensive, and the in-house automatic movement means there is no battery to deal with ever. Water resistance is low, so it is genuinely a dress watch — worth saying out loud so it does not go in a pool in its first month.

Seiko's quartz dress line: slim steel cases, clean dials, sapphire crystals on many references and 100 meters of water resistance.

If the recipient will only ever own one watch, this is the most sensible thing on the page. It looks formal enough for a jacket, survives swimming, and keeps quartz-accurate time without any of the mechanical caveats. That combination is rarer than it sounds — most dress watches cannot get wet and most water-resistant watches cannot be dressed up. Choose by the dial rather than trying to decode the reference number.

A slim steel dress watch powered by Citizen's Eco-Drive technology, which runs on any light and never needs a battery change.

At this budget you could buy something mechanical, and for some recipients you should not. If the person you are buying for would find a stopped watch a nuisance rather than a ritual, a light-powered Eco-Drive is the more thoughtful gift: slim, dressy, and with no battery change for its entire life. It needs to see daylight occasionally, which is the only thing to mention when you hand it over.

A reissue of Timex's 1979 quartz diver, with a battery hatch in the caseback and a woven steel bracelet.

Well under the ceiling, and a genuinely distinctive choice for someone whose taste runs vintage but who should not be given a forty-year-old watch. The period details are right, the movement is modern quartz, and the battery hatch opens with a coin. Buying it here rather than at the top of your budget leaves room to add a leather strap, which suits this watch particularly well.

An entry-level GPS running watch with pace, distance, heart rate and suggested workouts, in a light plastic case.

If the recipient runs seriously, this is more useful than any mechanical watch at any price, and that is worth saying plainly. It gives accurate pace and distance, tracks heart rate, and lasts days rather than needing a nightly charge like a smartwatch. It is unambiguously a plastic sports watch, so it is a second watch rather than a only watch — which is fine, because that is how runners use them.

Apple's entry smartwatch: notifications, workouts, heart rate, fall detection and Apple Pay, paired to an iPhone.

Worth including honestly: for a lot of recipients this is the most useful watch on the page, because it is the only one that does anything beyond telling the time. Notifications, workouts, Apple Pay and fall detection all get used. Two hard conditions: it requires an iPhone and is useless without one, and it needs charging every night, which some people never adapt to. If either is a problem, buy one of the automatics instead.

A 37mm automatic field watch with a black dial, canvas strap and a window in the caseback showing the movement running.

Cheap enough at this budget to be the second watch rather than the only one, which is a genuinely good strategy: one dressy watch and one casual field watch covers everything a person does, and together they still come in under the ceiling. The window in the caseback also makes this the best teaching object on the page — it is what makes a non-enthusiast suddenly interested in how a watch works.