Our Heritage

Kintaro Hattori established “Hattori Tokeiten” in Ginza to sell and repair timepieces.

In 1892, Kintaro Hattori established his own factory in what is now the Sumida ward of Tokyo, and began producing wall clocks. Kintaro named the factory Seikosha to express his strong commitment to “produce precise, exquisite clocks” and, hence, the name “Seiko-sha” (House of Exquisite and Precision Manufacturing).

Throughout the 1890's, the success of Seikosha's wall clock business thrived, and Kintaro sought to broaden the range of his business. In 1895, he created a pocket watch, the Timekeeper. It was a vital step forward, without which the future of Seiko would have been very different, as it paved the way for Japan's first ever wrist watch.

Kintaro Hattori was quick to recognize that the era of wristwatches was coming, which led to his shop producing Japan’s first wristwatch, the Laurel, in 1913. About one-fifth the size of a standard pocket watch, the Laurel was very difficult to manufacture, and only about 50 pieces could be made in a day.

Tokyo was struck with tragedy: the Great Kanto Earthquake of September 1st 1923. The earthquake led to extensive fires throughout the city. Kintaro’s factory, as well as the watch store and his own personal residence, were all completely destroyed by fire. Although discouraged, Kintaro renewed his commitment to the business, which had now become his mission, and began restoring his facilities. On November 20th, less than three months after the earthquake, Kintaro resumes his business.

In 1924, one year after the great catastrophe, K. Hattori & Co. prepared to release a new wristwatch. At first, it was to be named “Glory.” However, after surviving the earthquake and fire, Kintaro wanted a special name to mark a fresh start after the hardship. His factory was called Seikosha, based on the word seiko, meaning precision and exquisite manufacturing, and also another word, pronounced just the same, that means success. The word seiko embodies Seikosha’s commitment when it was established: successfully producing precise timepieces. Thus, the watch released in 1924 was named Seiko—the very first product to carry the brand name. Today, Seiko is recognized around the world as a symbol of refined design and exceptional manufacturing. And it all began with this watch.

For obvious reasons, railroad watches must keep exceptionally accurate time. For many years, the Japan National Railways used foreign pocket watches as a time reference. However, in 1929, the Ministry of Railways designated Seiko’s pocket watch, the Seikosha, as its official railroad watch. This became the first watch of its kind to be made in Japan.

The K. Hattori & Co. building (now the Seiko House Ginza) in central Tokyo opens with the now familiar clock tower on its roof. Built in the neo-classical style, it remains one of Tokyo’s most famous buildings.

Seiko has always made active use of new media, so it was logical for the company to sponsor the first Japanese TV commercial. Appearing in 1953, this commercial featured Seiko’s first plastic-framed alarm clock, the Comet Flower. After an explanation about how to wind the spring, the ad showed a full-screen image of the clock tower atop the K. Hattori & Co. building (now the Seiko House Ginza) while it announced the time.

In the 1940s, several manufacturers overseas began to commercialize automatic winding wristwatches, ushering in the era of automatic winding watches.
Seiko was the first to commercialize an automatic wristwatch in Japan, with the release of the Automatic in 1956.

The first watch with an original Seiko design, it focused on the fundamental principles of wristwatches: it must be accurate, unbreakable, and beautiful. Larger components helped to stabilize functionality and improve accuracy, and soon the Marvel was dominating domestic watch competitions.

Diashock is a structure developed to enhance the movement’s resistance to shocks. It is used as a bearing, such as for the balance wheel pivot, a section of the movement that is especially sensitive to shocks and jolts. With Diashock, the structure maintains high stability even when subjected to sudden shocks.

This is the first self-winding watch equipped with Seiko's proprietary Magic Lever system. The Magic Lever is an innovative self-winding mechanism that uses a lever system to wind the mainspring during both clockwise and counterclockwise movements of the oscillating weight.

The Magic Lever is still used in many Seiko automatic watches. Thanks to the simplicity of its design and its efficiency in energy generation, it remains one of Seiko’s most durable and important contributions to the progress of the automatic watch.

The ancestor of Seiko sports watches is the Laurel Alpinist, launched in 1959. This model was developed in anticipation of a growing trekking and mountaineering boom in Japan. It featured an airtight, screw-on case back to keep out dust and sand, along with a robust construction for its time. The indexes and hour and minute hands were equipped with luminous inserts, while mountain-shaped markers at 3, 6, 9, and 12 o’clock enhanced legibility.

Seiko continued to make significant strides throughout the 1950s, developing wristwatches that blended precision with refined aesthetics. This progress fueled an ambition to create the very best watch the company was capable of. That vision culminated in the launch of Grand Seiko in 1960—a timepiece that embodied Seiko’s original technologies and the highest levels of design and manufacturing expertise of the era.

The first Grand Seiko met the chronometer standards of its time, marking a major milestone for the company. This achievement became a source of immense pride and strengthened Seiko’s confidence, ultimately paving the way for numerous awards in international precision competitions in the years that followed.

For the history of Grand Seiko, visit here.

King Seiko debuted in 1961, offering a compelling blend of performance and refined design. It was an immediate success and remained popular for many years.

The inaugural model combined impressive accuracy and quality with a more accessible price point. "KSK", released in 1965, remains especially well-regarded among watch enthusiasts today.

Released in 1963, the Sportsmatic 5 was highly acclaimed for its innovative design, featuring an integrated day-date display and a hidden crown. The following year, it became the first watch to receive the Good Design Award.

Seiko overcame numerous challenges in the development of a quartz timepiece small enough to be worn on the wrist. In 1959, the company provided a large-scale quartz clock, approximately the size of a locker, for use in a broadcasting station. Seiko continued to refine its technology, and in 1963, it introduced the Crystal Chronometer, a compact model that was small enough to be portable.

Seiko developed a ground-breaking stopwatch that could measure time to 1/100th of a second.
In addition, Seiko launched a variety of stopwatches that were customized to individual competitions. Over the years, Seiko continued to refine its technology, ultimately achieving a state-of-the-art timing system with an astonishing precision of 1/1000th of a second.

In 1964, Seiko introduced a milestone to coincide with the major international sporting event held in Tokyo. It was the Crown Chronograph, Japan’s first wristwatch equipped with a stopwatch function. It had a simple design without a chronograph sub-dial, but with an easy-to-push stopwatch button and highly legible bezel.

This watch was the first wristwatch made in Japan to have a separate GMT hand and a world time display. The inner rotating ring with the names of 24 cities is turned by a drive wheel linked to the crown at the 4 o’clock position.

Japan’s first-ever diver’s watch featured an automatic movement and water resistance to 150 meters. This watch was worn by members of the Japanese Antarctic Research Expedition four times since 1966, as well as by adventurers crossing the Arctic and mountaineers summiting Mount Everest.

From 1963, Seiko participated in the Neuchâtel Chronometer Competition. In 1967, on the final year of the competition, Seiko was awarded second and third places.
Seiko then entered the Geneva Observatory Competition in 1968 where it won the top position for accuracy adjustment.
Seiko’s entries were awarded every place from fourth to tenth, achieving an all-time record for mechanical movements.

The first diver’s watch made in Japan with water resistance to 300 m (1967). This model adopted a one-piece case construction, integrating the case back with the case, and used a tough Hardlex crystal.

In 1963, Seiko launched the Seiko Sportsmatic 5 (also known as the Seiko 5), the first Japanese automatic winding day-date model. Over the years, the watch evolved by improving water resistance, adopting luminous inserts, and adding a stronger crystal. This enhanced version was released in 1968 as Seiko 5 Sports.
In addition to featuring 70 m water resistance and a Hardlex crystal, this watch came in a wide range of colors, which made it especially popular with younger consumers worldwide.

Combining a chronograph mechanism and an automatic movement is an enormously difficult technical challenge. Consequently, Seiko was extremely proud to release the world’s first automatic chronograph equipped with a vertical clutch system back in 1969.

Never satisfied with past achievements, Seiko set its sights on creating an ultra thin movement for dress watches. Seiko introduced the U.T.D., or Ultra Thin Dress, watch in 1969. The U.T.D. aimed for an even slimmer case, which would require an even thinner movement. The U.T.D. featured Caliber 6800, a two-hand movement with an astounding slimness of only 1.98 mm.

On December 25th 1969, Seiko released a watch that would revolutionize the watch industry overnight. It was the Quartz Astron, the world’s first quartz wristwatch. Seiko engineers were well aware that a quartz movement uses a battery instead of a mainspring, and that the electronic vibration of a quartz oscillator provided greater precision to those of a mechanical movement’s balance wheel. However, the quartz oscillator was difficult to downsize. The quartz clocks produced for broadcasting stations in 1959 were bigger than a large bookcase. Seiko engineers worked for years trying to downsize quartz movements, and finally, in 1967, they succeeded in creating a prototype small enough to fit inside a wristwatch. Another two years were spent refining and preparing to launch the Astron, a timepiece with 100 times the accuracy of a standard mechanical watch.
Seiko held key patent rights for this technology, such as the tuning fork quartz resonator, and chose to openly disclose its proprietary technologies, allowing watchmakers around the world access to this revolutionary new mechanism.

This fully-electronic watch used the world's first six-digit liquid-crystal display to indicate the time. Capable of continuously displaying the hour, minutes and seconds on a field-effect liquid crystal display, this groundbreaking digital watch gained wide attention when it was first marketed in October 1973.
The internally developed LCD had a lifespan of 50,000 hours. A lamp provided enough illumination to make the numbers on the display easy to read even in the dark.

In the late 1960s, when Seiko's wristwatches reached world-class levels in both quality and performance, the company began developing luxury wristwatches using precious metals and jewelry to meet the growing demand for luxury goods in Japan.
In 1974, Credor was born – its name based on the French crete d’or, or “crest of gold,” suggesting the highest echelon of artistry in watchmaking.

Click here for the history of Credor

Since commercializing the world's first quartz wristwatch in 1969, Seiko continued to make smaller and slimmer watches through technological innovations, such as miniaturizing the quartz oscillator and reducing the power consumption of electronic circuits.
In 1974, they developed the slim Caliber 4130, measuring just 3.8mm thick, and commercialized the first quartz dress watch.

In 1975, Seiko launched the world's first digital quartz watch with a chronograph. Caliber 0634 could measure time to 1/10th of a second and had a lap time function. It also incorporated an internal light, so that it could be seen clearly in the dark. The watch became a huge hit, creating the market for high-function digital watches.

It all began with a letter from a professional diver, who explained that no watch could withstand the stresses and strains he experienced when working at depths greater than 300m. Inspired by this challenge, Seiko engineers got down to work. Years of research and development culminated in 1975 with the introduction of the world's first titanium cased diver's watch: the Professional Diver's 600m.

In addition to displaying the time, this watch featured a calculator function operated by pushing buttons on the case. A special stylus was supplied with the watch to press the small buttons on the keypad.

In 1978, Seiko launched the Professional Diver’s 600M, the world’s first saturation diving watch featuring a quartz movement.
In 1983, to test its reliability, the watch was strapped to the research submarine "Shinkai 2000" and taken to a depth of 1,062 meters below sea level, nearly twice as deep as its specified maximum. It performed with perfect accuracy.

In the 1970s, as the market became increasingly polarized between luxury and low-price segments, in order to quickly respond to the diversifying demand for affordable, the ALBA brand was born in 1979 (ALBA means "dawn, daybreak, beginning" in Italian).

This state-of-the-art watch could not only show TV programs on a 1.2 inch LCD display, but could also receive FM radio signals. It was listed in the Guinness Book of Records in 1984 as the smallest television in the world.

The Hybrid Diver's Watch, released in 1982, is the world’s first watch with both an alarm and chronograph. The LCD display was tilted so that the 12 o'clock side is higher, making it easier to read the time.

Seiko had long been working on the development of instruments to display information other than time. In 1983, Seiko launched the world's first wristwatch with an audio recording and playback function. It could record a voice message of up to 8 seconds, and also had a voice alert at pre-set times.

Seiko's mastery of quartz technology and mechanical chronograph watchmaking came together in the creation of the world's first analog quartz chronograph. It measured elapsed time to 5/100th of a second and offered split time capability and a tachymeter. It was designed by the celebrated Italian car designer, Giorgetto Giugiaro.

This digital chronograph featured an innovative dome-shaped LCD digital display that tilted 20 degrees to the right. Its stopwatch, alarm, and timer modes could be selected by rotating the bezel, which had a built-in rotary switch.

This very unusual model comprised a watch and a controller attachment, including a novel keyboard for inputting data.
The advanced cordless design, which used electromagnetic induction to transfer character data from the external keyboard, was revolutionary. In addition to memo and calculator functions, this model even had a game function, and this multi-functionality presaged the advent of today’s smartphones and tablets. The design was sharp and clean, with the watch, controller, and keyboard all having a straight, box shape. This streamlined, futuristic appearance was also a key feature.

Baselworld, once the world’s largest international trade fair for watches and jewelry, was held every spring in Basel, Switzerland, and had a long and storied history. It originated in 1917 as part of the Swiss Trade Fair Basel, which showcased a wide range of Swiss industries, including watches and jewelry. A dedicated section for watches was later introduced, which evolved into the Swiss Watch Fair. Initially, only Swiss brands were allowed to exhibit, but over time the fair expanded to include European manufacturers. In 1986, it opened its doors to exhibitors from outside Europe — the same year Seiko participated for the first time.

This diver's watch was water resistant to a depth of 1000 m and was the first to use ceramic for the outer case. It was combined with a lightweight, corrosion-resistant titanium inner case constructed as a single piece, enabling the watch to withstand the extreme pressures at such depths.

In 1985, Seiko was appointed as the official timer of the IAAF, and the 1987 World Championships in Rome (Roma ’87) was the first event it officially timed.
Since then, Seiko has been appointed as the official timer.

3rd Tokyo 1991
4th Stuttgart 1993
5th Göteborg 1995
6th Athína 1997

7th Sevilla 1999
8th Edmonton 2001
9th Saint-Denis 2003
10th Helsinki 2005
11th Osaka 2007
12th Berlin 2009

13th Daegu 2011
14th Moskva 2013
15th Beijing 2015
16th London 2017
17th Doha 2019

18th Oregon 2022
19th Budapest 2023
20th Tokyo 2025

From the moment that the quartz watch was born, Seiko strove to create technologies that did not require a battery change. In 1977, Seiko introduced the solar powered watch and, in 1986, a quartz watch whose energy was generated by winding the crown.
In 1988 came the big breakthrough with the Seiko Kinetic, a watch with an oscillating weight that converted the wearer's motion into electricity and thus powered the quartz movement.

Seiko's mastery of electronic watchmaking and long experience in diver’s watches allowed the creation of the Scuba master. It was equipped with both a water sensor and a depth sensor, and displayed essential information for divers, including diving time and depth.

Before cellphones were available, wireless pocket pagers were very popular. Seiko launched the world's first wristwatch equipped with a pager. It could receive short text-message signals sent from regular telephones via radio stations.

Slit Video and Ultrasonic Anemometer were introduced.

Seiko serves as the Official Timer at the 4th IAAF World Athletic Championships in Stuttgart, Germany. Seiko continued to time every IAAF World Championships and served World Athletics again in Budapest 2023.

In 1995, Lukia, a ladies watch collection designed to be both practical and fashionable was launched in Japan.
The name "LUKIA" took inspiration from the initial letter of words that symbolize the target audience of independently minded women: Lucid, Unison, Keen, Intellectual, and Active.
Designed with ease of use for working women in mind, Lukia featured larger and more solidly built models than conventional women's watches. It quickly became popular after its release and continues to enjoy the support of many women to this day.

Released in 1995, the Pulse Graph was the world's first wrist-worn computer that measured the wearer’s pulse rate with a finger-mounted sensor, and displaying it graphically. It was used for pulse training, a method that monitors heart rate to help athletes maximize their performance effectively.

In 1992, Seiko resumed production of luxury mechanical watches with a focus on creativity.
In 1996, a wristwatch containing a movement with a thickness of just 1.98mm was introduced. The main plate and bridges had a skeleton design, allowing the viewer to see the intricate motion of the balance wheel and gears.
This model is themed around "traditional Japanese beauty," featuring delicate and intricate engravings of chrysanthemum flowers, bamboo leaves, and nanako (an ancient Japanese carving pattern resembling fish eggs) throughout the movement. It embodies an aesthetic unique to Japanese luxury watchmaking.

In 1996, Seiko introduced the radio wave control watch, that could receive the standarad radio waves and automatically correct the time. At that time, the radio wave output was weaker compared to today, and there was only one radio transmitter in Japan, which was located in Ibaraki Prefecture. Only 500 km radius of the transmitter was able to receive the signal.

Seiko’s Perpetual Calendar introduced in 1998 had an annual accuracy rate of ±20 seconds, a long battery life of 10 years (five years for the women's version) and did not require calendar correction until the end of February 2100.

In 1998, Seiko released the Thermic, a quartz watch that generated electricity by utilizing the temperature difference between the wearer's body temperature and the surrounding air.
The Thermic was able to run approximately for 10 months on a full charge. It was one of the timepieces that symbolized Seiko's high creativity and technological capabilities.

Spring Drive combines the high torque created by the unwinding of the mainspring with electronic watchmaking technology. The rotation of a glide wheel connected to the end of the gear train generates tiny electricity that activates the IC and the quartz oscillator. Based on the signal from the quartz oscillator, the IC adjusts the speed of the rotor by applying an electromagnetic brake that regulates the speed of the glide wheel and hands. Spring Drive delivers a precision of 15 seconds per month, or approxiamately one second a day, a rate that no other watch wound by a mainspring can match, and allows the seconds hand to glide smoothly around the dial without a ticking sound.

Seiko's successful Kinetic watch is equipped with stopwatch function in a very unique design. Powered by Caliber 9T82, the watch featured a zero resetting function using the heart shaped cam and a special movement construction.

Ten years after the release of the 1990 Scuba Master, the world's first diver's watch with dive table function and depth gauge, an updated watch, the "Diving Computer Watch" was introduced in 2000.
Building on the features of a 200 m diver’s watch, the Diving Computer Watch included the ability to record and display dive profiles based on the diver’s current depth. It was also one of the first watches that can be used for nitrox diving.

The Shizukuishi Watch Studio was established in Iwate prefecture, in the nothern part of Japan. It is one of Japan's leading watchmaking studios, capable of integrated production from parts manufacturing to the assembly of luxury mechanical watches.

Quartz Astron receives the IEEE Milestone Award, given to historic achievements that have contributed greatly to society.
It was recognized as a great invention, on par with other award-winning inventions such as the transistor and the internet.

Seiko was the first to commercialize a solar-powered, radio-controlled analog watch capable of receiving standard time signals from three countries—Japan, the United States, and Germany.

Like all Kinetic watches, this watch generated and saved its own electricity but Kinetic Perpetual offered the added advantages of a calendar correct to February 28, 2100 and a ‘sleep’ function that, when the watch was not worn, remembered the exact time for up to four years and re-set automatically when put on again.

Using electronic ink technology for the first time in a watch, this model displayed time and data on a wide screen with perfect legibility at any angle. Furthermore, the display allowed the wearer to choose from many multiple graphic layouts, including a “day and night” background that distinguished AM from PM. This was the first Seiko watch to receive an award at the Grand Prix d’Horlogerie de Genève.

A watch designed for use in space, the watch performed flawlessly both inside and outside the International Space Station, winning the Sports Watch Prize at the Grand Prix d'Horlogerie de Genève.

This new display system retains all the legibility benefits of Seiko's first E-Ink watch, but allows for a much richer range of imagery and data to be displayed on the watch dial with 80,000 pixels, each capable of four different shades, delivering 300 dpi of display.

The pursuit of atomic precision, everywhere on the planet, culminated in the introduction of the Seiko Astron GPS Solar. By developing a patented, low-energy-consumption GPS receiver, Seiko created a watch capable of receiving GPS signals and determing the time zone, time, and date using the global network of GPS satellites. It recognizes all the 39 time zones on Earth. Like its celebrated 1969 predecessor that first bore the Astron name, the new Seiko Astron marked a new era in timekeeping technology.

2013 marked the 100th anniversary since Seiko first introduced Japan’s first wristwatch.

A special edition timepiece was introduced for the Seiko Astron collection. Commemorating the 100th anniversary of Seiko watchmaking, the limited edition piece was the first to be named after the founder, Kintaro Hattori.

Since its first appearance in 2012, Astron has proven to be a stunning success worldwide. In 2014, the second-generation creation powered by Caliber 8X was introduced. It offered enhanced performance and a more compact design, which made possible a wide range of new designs and colors.

Grand Seiko has always been distinct in its design, character, and the quality of its movements. In 2017, Grand Seiko became an independent brand to further reinforce its uniqueness and to communicate its characteristics effectively to a global audience.

For the history of Grand Seiko, visit here.

2019 marked the 45th anniversary of Credor’s founding, and in this milestone year, Credor became independent from the Seiko brand, establishing itself as the second pillar of the company’s luxury watch offerings alongside Grand Seiko.

Click here for the history of Credor

The SNR029 from the LX Line collection of Prospex won the Diver's Watch Prize at the 2019 Grand Prix d'Horlogerie de Genève.
This marks the second consecutive year that a creation from the Prospex collection won an award, following the 2018 win in the "Sports" watch category for the Marinemaster Professional 1968 Automatic Diver's Re-creation.

Seiko Astron releases a limited edition model commemorating the 160th anniversary of the birth of Seiko's founder, Kintaro Hattori.
The model commemorating the founder is designed with a dignified and imposing appearance, featuring a predominantly black and gold color scheme. The bezel is made of zirconia ceramics, which is hard and highly scratch-resistant, and features a 16-facet cut in honor of the 160th anniversary.

“Always one step ahead of the rest.” This was Kintaro Hattori’s guiding philosophy for the company he founded in 1881. It has shaped the company for more than a century of innovation.
This principle, as well as the desire to appeal to customers’ emotions, is reflected in our Group slogan.
“Moving ahead. Touching hearts.”

In 2021, a new Speedtimer series was introduced into the Prospex collection in honor of Seiko's rich and continuing tradition of sports timing.

Originally born in 1961, King Seiko was revived in 2022. For the relaunch, the second-generation model known as the “KSK” served as the foundation for development. It was highly regarded for its practical advancements, including water resistance and use of a hacking seconds hand. With its sharply defined case with prominent edges, and box-shaped glass, this model played a key role in establishing the distinctive design language of King Seiko.

Since the beginning of the company’s foundation in 1881, Seiko has continued to innovate in line with the founder's philosophy to be "Always one step ahead of the rest."
In 1924, the company introduced the first wristwatch with “Seiko” on the dial, signifying the beginning of the Seiko brand. The year 2024 marked the 100th anniversary of this landmark event.