Ah, Seiko 5 — that paragon of horological affordability and timelessness. Plentiful, mechanical, colorful, and, best of all, cheap. Like, real cheap. Not in a fall-apart-in-your-hands kind of way, but in a not-spend-a-ton-of-money kind of way.
But what if cheap isn’t good enough? What if you want cheaper? We have you covered, there. Right now, you can nab a Seiko 5 SRP48X “Baby Monster” for just $140, which is over half-off an MSRP of $320. The Baby Monster, which is available in both white and orange dials, features now-iconic thick lumed indices and hands, a stainless steel 43mm case with 100m of water resistance, a mineral crystal, a notched unidirectional dive bezel and Seiko’s 4R36 automatic movement with day-date complication, which is viewable via an exhibition case back.
Though the lack of a screw-down crown on this model means by default that the watch’s water resistance doesn’t come near that of, say, a Seiko Prospex dive watch, for $140 you’re getting a 100m-diver on a steel bracelet with an automatic movement. What more could you want at that price?