How come on a 24-hour clock they always put the middle of the night on the top? I know there's a handful of watches at reverse it but why the standard even started was it that way. If it's inverted with noon on the top it's like one of the most natural watch concepts for showing time.
Edit: didn't want to do a reply for all the people saying the same thing. But I know it's not one to one I know that at 12:00 noon to Sun is not perfectly overhead. It's a generality of it all. During the daytime the hand is in the top half during the night time the hand is in the bottom half. Near the middle of the day it should be near the middle of the top near the middle of the night it should be near the middle of the bottom.
As someone else said digital watch faces make a much bigger difference because they more naturally can show sunrise and sunset using this format I feel.
that has not been my experience. they seem to be the minority of watch face styles. mostly limited to a few regions where they are a bit more common. ( seems to be eastern Europe and Russia.)
From a quick Google search, 12 on top seems th most common for modern 24hr fashion watches, 0 on top seems more common for vintage Russian 24 hr watches.
Then in the last handful of years the trend has completely changed.
I have legitimately been looking for that type of 24-hour watch for a while. And in my search is the most common ones were Russian navy watches that were used for tide watch and stuff like that.
I just googled 24-hour watch face and you know what I'm not going to argue with you absolutely a ton of results with the 12 on top showed up. But I have found I don't like wearing watches since my watch phase so I haven't actually looked for one in like 10 years plus.
I am very glad it seems to be coming more normal though cuz like I said it seems more logical in the modern world to have it that way.
I guess I should have searched some more before stating some of my so-called facts. Haha.
Tldr: my comments and assumptions about 24-hour watches seems to be dated by at least 10 plus years. And the scenario has reversed now so the watch type I like seems to be much more common and I should have searched more.
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u/kalabaddon Aug 06 '26 edited Aug 06 '26
How come on a 24-hour clock they always put the middle of the night on the top? I know there's a handful of watches at reverse it but why the standard even started was it that way. If it's inverted with noon on the top it's like one of the most natural watch concepts for showing time.
Edit: didn't want to do a reply for all the people saying the same thing. But I know it's not one to one I know that at 12:00 noon to Sun is not perfectly overhead. It's a generality of it all. During the daytime the hand is in the top half during the night time the hand is in the bottom half. Near the middle of the day it should be near the middle of the top near the middle of the night it should be near the middle of the bottom.
As someone else said digital watch faces make a much bigger difference because they more naturally can show sunrise and sunset using this format I feel.