Review: Phosphor Watches E Ink curved world time watch

It isn’t often that we review watches here on Gadling – and we figure most watch owners fit in two categories; settle for cheap or pricey is good. Since we’d feel a tad out of place reviewing $3000 watches on the site, we tend to decline most of the watch pitches we receive. One recent email that got our attention introduced us to the Phosphor watch lineup. Their assortment of watches stands out in the busy watch market thanks to their use of E Ink display technology. If you have ever used an e-reader like the Amazon Kindle, you’ll know how clear and crisp E Ink is.

The newest watch from the Phosphor brand is the World Time Curved. This watch comes in four versions – white plastic band, black plastic band, black leather band and stainless steel band. In all four versions, the watch portion is the same.

Features on the watch are controlled with a single button, which means you may need to carry the compact user guide with you for the first couple of weeks. As can be expected, the screen really is very crisp and clear, but the lack of a backlight means it is relatively useless in the dark.

If you are the kind of watch owner that finds $20 for a plastic Timex to be your absolute spending limit, then the $150 for a Phosphor E Ink watch will probably seem like a preposterous concept. However, if you like your watch to show off your style, and wear something innovative, then you won’t be disappointed with this E Ink powered timepiece. Sure – there may be many other options out there in this price range, but none have the same “wow” factor as an E Ink watch.

The watch covers 24 different time zones and is water resistant to 5 ATM (50 meters). Its basic features include local time, world time, date and options for five layouts (dual time, calendar, big time, small time and world time). One feature lacking is an alarm, but since most people have switched to their mobile phone for wake-up calls, I doubt this is something that could be considered a dealbreaker.

As previously mentioned, prices for the World Time watches start at $150 for the white or black plastic bands, $165 for the leather band and $195 for the stainless steel version. The entire assortment of Phosphor E Ink watches can be found at Phosphorwatches.com.