Almost On Time

Outside of the world of high end luxury, ETA movements are as good as it gets. The Swiss movement manufacturer is capable of making anything from a basic quartz, to a high end COSC certified movement. A fully owned subsidiary of Swatch, ETA is the backbone of the Swiss watch industry and supplies millions of movements each year to a variety of different brands. Their movements can be found everything from a cheap Swatch fashion watch, to a high end Omega.

Even though ETA supplies and manufactures so many different movements, there are still distinct differences between each brand. Whilst quartz movements are rarely modified, the same cannot be said for mechanical calibres. For example, the Tissot Powermatic uses a base calibre of the 2824-2 movement, which has a regular power reserve of 38 hours. However, Tissot upgrade this to a power reserve of 80 hours, making the movement superior to a regular movement.

The price of an ETA movement is not static since you’re not able to buy directly from ETA. Instead, ETA movements can be bought from a variety of 3rd party suppliers who have contracts with ETA. Therefore you may find that the same movement costs a different price from a different supplier. This is much like buying something from a store, some prices will be higher than others.

Cost Of New ETA Mechanical Movements

Below are prices you should expect to pay if you are buying a new ETA movement. As observed, the price will vary from each supplier, so a range of prices has been given.

Branded ETA Movement Replacement Cost

Branded ETA movements differ in price to regular ETA movements since they have been modified by each company. An Omega movement using a base ETA calibre will have a lot more effort put in to it when put alongside an entry level Tissot.

These movements are not typically “off the shelf” and cannot be bought online, or through any 3rd party dealer. If you have a brand-specific movement which needs replacing, the only way is to go back to the manufacturer. This will cost you a lot more money, but this is to be expected since it can only be purchased from a single source.

Some movements from older watches may even be discontinued. In this case it will be near impossible to get a direct replacement. Higher end luxury brands will make replacement parts on demand for discontinued movements.

Cost – Benefit Of Replacing An ETA Movement

From the table above, you should be able to see how much it costs to replace an ETA movement. This is especially helpful if you’ve been quoted a price which is extremely high for servicing. Whilst servicing a mechanical watch is time consuming and skilled work – ETA movements are some of the easiest to maintain.

If the price of servicing is simply too steep, it may well be worth removing the movement from your watch and replacing it with a brand new model. This cannot really be done for branded movements, but for standard ETA it is not difficult at all.

In all likelihood, servicing an ETA movement should be considerably cheaper than replacing the entire movement.