UNDERSTANDING THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN
QUARTZ and MECHANICAL
MOVEMENTS

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  A quartz movement is essentially another way of saying a timepiece is battery-powered. In simple terms, a quartz caliber operates via an electrical current from a battery that gives power to the quartz crystal within the movement. This causes it to vibrate, and these vibrations cause the movement to oscillate, which drives the motor. Finally, we see this in the moving hands on the face of a watch.

  

  While a quartz movement gets its power from a battery, an automatic mechanical movement uses energy from the motion of a wearer’s wrist. Every time the watch moves, a rotor within the caliber spins and automatically winds the mainspring. This is why you may hear someone refer to an automatic movement as a self-winding movement. Next, the gathered energy releases from the mainspring through a barrel to the gear trains, powering the timepiece. As long as someone wears the watch regularly or keeps it in a watch winder, it’ll continue to have power.