A digital watch shows the time, or other information, as changing numbers instead of with hands or pointers. Rather than reading where the hands sit on an analogue dial, the wearer reads a figure such as 12:08. Electronic versions use movements with few or no moving parts.
Where it comes from
The earliest digital watches were mechanical. They were jumping-hour models, known in French as heures sautantes, and they showed the time as numbers rather than with hands. The term seems to go back to L. Marillier of Bienne in 1899. Even so, watches and clocks that showed the time this way were not called “digital” in English until the 1960s. So the idea is older than the word.
What was the first electronic digital watch?
Guinness World Records names the Pulsar P-1, also called the Pulsar Time Computer, as the first electronic digital watch. The American firms Hamilton and Electro/Data Inc. developed it together. A prototype of the Pulsar LED watch existed in 1970. The Science Museum describes the Hamilton Pulsar as the first watch with no moving parts at all. Electronic, or quartz, movements have few or no moving parts.
What is the difference between LED and LCD watches?
On most LED digital watches, the wearer had to press a button to see the time. It then showed for only a few seconds. Liquid crystal displays, or LCDs, used less battery power than LEDs and showed the time all the time, so they were easier to use. Seiko says its 06LC of 1973 was the first digital quartz watch in the world with a six-digit LCD. Other digital watches of that time used either LEDs or dynamic scattering mode (DSM) LCDs. In 1976 Texas Instruments brought out a low-cost integrated circuit system for digital watches.
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