What Is Tritium and What Does it Do?
Tritium is also known as hydrogen-3 and is a radioactive variant of hydrogen. One of its by-products is a substance that glows in the dark when combined with phosphorous in a sealed space.
The result of this glow-in-the-dark combination is a light source that lasts as long as 25 years. You’ll find it in tactical and outdoor watches because you can check the time and other data without draining battery life. In fact, tritium tubes in watches never need to be recharged!
Isn’t Tritium Radioactive?
Many consumers are wary of tritium because of radioactivity. While the substance is potentially harmful in vast quantities, they don’t use a harmful amount. Take a moment to check out our top ten tritium watch picks below:
Nite Watches Alpha 209 T100 Blue
The Nite Watch brand comes from Roger Green, a British watch designer. He wanted to create a dive watch that did not need a power supply to keep running. The Alpha 209 T100 Blue is not only an attractive watch, but it comes with a brushed stainless steel case and a sapphire crystal glass cover to prevent scratches.
It also has a screw-down crown and unidirectional bezels. This model offers a blue and orange shaded design and uses tritium to stay illuminated and running smoothly. It is a popular choice for watch enthusiasts!
Ball Fireman NECC IAAI
Collectors all over the world love Ball watches, and the Fireman is no different. It is designed with the help of the International Associate of Arson Investigations and the Navy Expeditionary Combat Command. They bid to create a watch that is useful to the special forces operatives in combat.
The result is a watch has both anti-shock capacity and antimagnetic protection, as well as tritium tubes that will last for 25 years.
Luminox Navy Seal 3501 BO
Swiss maker Luminox created the 45mm Navy Seal with scratch-resistant glass, carbon compound, and a unidirectional bezel. The result is a watch that offers up to 200m of water resistance and lightweight and durable wear.
Tritium gas tubes provide markers so that the face is viewable no matter how deep the wearer goes.
- Read more about Luminox watches here.
Marathon Watch WW194007 TSAR
Marathon Watch supplied Allied Forces with high-quality watches for over 80 years with a Canadian design base and Swiss production. They have some of the best watches, offering durability and enviable precision.
The WW194007 Tritium Search and Rescue (TSAR) is designed for search and rescue missions. With tritium, it can stay illuminated for over two decades, making the precise time always easy to read.
- Find out about other watches designed for military personnel here.
Isobrite ISO3005 Law Enforcement
This is another Swiss-made watch that offers reliability in the dark and is a limited edition watch honoring America’s law enforcement heroes. It comes with a 200m water resistance and has the time and date displayed at all times.
With 3 straps to choose from, a unidirectional bezel, tritium markers, and stainless steel buckle, not only does this watch look the part, but it can be relied upon whenever it is needed.
Pathfinder P68 Automatic
When the Pathfinder P68 was released, users were impressed with its trigalight tech and SuperLuminova offering. You can find the trigalight on the index markers and the watch hands and the SuperLuminova on the seal, numbers on the watch dial, and the compass indicator.
It also offers 42 hours of power reserve, 100m of water resistance, and a 46mm case that houses an easy-to-read display.
Deep Blue DayNight (45 T-100)
If you want a waterproof watch that offers water resistance to 500m, then the Deep Blue DayNight 45 T-100 Pepsi-Style watch is a great choice. It makes use of tritium tubes to illuminate the screen so that no matter how deep you dive, you will always have access to the time;
It runs with an automatic Seiko NH 35 movement, and the tritium tubes come in different colors to help you see the time with ultimate ease. Plus, the case and screen are scratch-proof so that your watch can withstand whatever you throw at it.
- Learn more about dive watches here.
Isobrite ISO100 Ultra Bright T100
Another in the tactical genre, the Isobrite ISO100 T100, uses tritium tubes for illumination and hermetically seals them inside the screen area to provide the best results. The tritium used in this watch is so well designed that it lasts up to fifty years without fading!
The watch itself offers a scratch-resistant case and is ultra-lightweight. It is also seriously comfortable to wear with a silicone strap so that no matter what you are doing, your watch won’t stand in the way.
Traser T5 Aviator
Made by MB-Microtech, this watch offers an ivory dial housed in stainless steel and works hard to be different from other tritium watches. The tritium is functional and looks stylish on the wrist.
It is clean and clear and boasts a really easy-to-read screen no matter how light or dark it is in the world. There is a 46mm size case, and the watch is water-resistant up to 100m, making it a good all-rounder.
Luminox Atacama
Reasonably priced, the Atacama appeals to a mainstream audience who enjoy tritium but don’t need the extended features. The watch scratch-resistant, made from stainless steel and sapphire crystal.
You can take the watch to 200m without failing, and it has a 44mm diameter that fits well on most wrist sizes. It is Swiss-made and offers long-lasting quality that any tritium watch fan will love.
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Last Updated on October 1, 2021