Tablets, phones, computers, speakers, televisions... In every moment of our lives, we are in a magnetic field in one way or another. So, how does this affect our watches?

Even if the magnetic field we are in does not harm human health, it can affect our mechanical watches and cause unwanted problems. Even though these devices, which create magnetic fields, that we use every day mostly do not affect our beloved watches, they can cause the watch to display inaccurate time or stop working completely.

So if your watch starts gaining or losing time suddenly (considering no drop or impact happened), your watch is pretty likely magnetized.

Although mechanical watch manufacturers have developed many techniques and materials to deal with this problem for many years, the war continues unceasingly. More and more anti-magnetic components are added to the movements to overcome the negative effects of magnetic fields on today’s mechanical watches. Over the years, leading brands such as Rolex, Omega and IWC have produced many models to combat this problem. In fact, some of these models were specific to people working in intense magnetic fields.

How does your watch gets affected?

Although magnetic fields affect watches in many different ways, the actual battle is about the hairspring. Today hairsprings are produced as anti-magnetic as possible, but still, they may contain iron-based metals. We can briefly explain how the hairspring is affected; the magnetic field causes the coils of the hairspring to stick together, thereby shortening the length of the spring. This causes inaccuracy. In the alternative scenario, the coils jam and the watch stops.

Traditionally, cylinder escapements were extremely affected by magnetism, losing amplitude when the escape wheel tooth left the cylinder to indicate that both pieces were magnetized. Thanks to the levered escapements used today, this is not a problem anymore as those escapements feature non-ferrous and/or synthetic rubies.

Demagnetizing Your Watch

Watches exposed to the magnetic field do not experience long-term problems, but it may be necessary to ‘demagnetize’ them to normalize. If your watch is exposed to a magnetic field, you do not need to panic; a skilled watchmaker can overcome this problem easily. Alternatively, you can purchase a watch demagnetizer.