Two years on, I have no idea how I went a year without a G-Shock

Borna Bošnjak

There is one watch that gets as much cred from laics and the WIS alike, and that’s a Casio G-Shock. Whether you pick a CasiOak, a 6900,or a GA-110, they’re a rare item that has pierced both the iron curtain of being considered as “in the know” by watch enthusiasts, as well as become a major part of pop culture ever since its 1983 release. I’ve also not been shy about my love for mine: it featured on my most-worn list two years in a row for 2024 and 2025, and it’s showing no signs of slowing down in 2026. My choice has always been some form of square G, starting with the ubiquitous DW-5600 – one of which I lost, and another that eventually flew back to Egypt with mum after one of her visits to Australia.

In the year that I spent without a G-Shock in the collection, I tried to replace it with a whole heap of watches while inexplicably delaying the purchase. This included broadening my SKX’s scope to include more than just swimming and diving (it proved to be too heavy), and putting the ultra-lithe HZ.01 with its titanium case and more shock-resistant quartz movement on a T+T Club strap (shoutout and RIP), but the lack of a timing function made it hard to use in the gym. You really never know how much you love something until it’s gone, and the first day my new GW-M5610 arrived made that painfully obvious.

As good as the day it was made, if not better

The formula for the square G-Shock has remained pretty much the same throughout its 40 years of existence: a robust, resin case housing an inner module, with incredible shock and water-resistance properties. Most famously, Casio marketed the G-Shock by having a hockey player use it instead of a puck, and even after smashing the snot out of it, the watch that appeared in the goalie’s glove worked just fine.

I chose that sub-heading for a dual purpose, however. Despite all square Gs sharing DNA with the original 5000C, they’ve only gone on to improve over the years. On top of all those other features, modern G-Shocks now include features like Bluetooth connectivity, step counters, solar charging, radio-controlled timekeeping, and actually usable backlights, with the most recent innovation being memory-in-pixel displays that vastly improve contrast and viewing angles.

My exact G-Shock

When picking out my next G-Shock, I had but one complaint about the DW-5600, and that was that I’ll eventually need to replace the battery in it. The solution was, thankfully, easy, as the natural step-up was the GW-M5610 and its solar charging capabilities. Here are some quickfire specs – it measures in at 43.2mm across, 46.7mm lug-to-lug, and 12.7mm thick, with a weight of 52 grams and 200 metres of water-resistance. As you can see from the attached pictures, and despite the abuse it gets put through (the worst thus far being butterfingered and dropped from about two stories up), it looks pretty much the same as the day it arrived.

After two years of ownership, the battle scars make it all the better, though they’re actually not as visible as I thought they might be. Unfortunately, it still features a mineral glass crystal, though it’s pretty much perfect in every other way, and not even the fancy new MIP displays have made me feel like I need to upgrade.

This is the screen that my GW-M5610 spends most time displaying – a simple 24-hour time format with a calendar at the top. If you look very closely, you’ll see the Tough Solar cells lining the outermost perimeter of the dial, helping the watch achieve 10 months on a single charge, or 22 months in power-saving mode.

In addition to the very cool motion-activated LED backlight that turns on only if you overdramatically flick your wrist, the only other two modes I use regularly are the world timer and stopwatch. The former has five presets that I have saved to my most frequent travelling locations, saving me the hassle of changing the main time, and the latter gets used pretty much daily for interval training timing.

The 3495 module is naturally capable of a lot more than what I use it for, so here’s a very quick rundown of all the things you can pretend you’ll use to more easily justify a purchase. I already mentioned the world time, which allows you to save up to five out of 48 available cities across 31 time zones, also accounting for daylight saving. The stopwatch measures elapsed and split times down to 1/100th of a second, the perpetual calendar displays the day of the week in six languages, and there’s a battery level indicator to warn you in case you haven’t gone outside for more than a year.

However, the GW-M5610’s potentially most advanced feature is radio-controlled time calibration. The watch will automatically check its time against a reference up to six times a day, but you can also request it manually. If you live in Australia, however, request away as much as you like, as there’s no radio station broadcasting these signals. You’ll just join the sea of thousands of radio-controlled Aussie Casios shouting into the void.

The only watch you’ll ever need… almost

I probably don’t need to tell you that you should have a G-Shock in your collection, though it’s not something I’d be comfortable saying with pretty much any other watch. Despite their prices slowly creeping up over the years, as most things have, they’re still a bargain addition to any collection, with the only real danger justifying having more than one. I’ve really taken this watch everywhere; it’s been buried in the snow, rapidly dipped into water I most certainly wasn’t accidentally falling into, and actually accidentally been left too near fires and barbecues. Even the header pic and the one above come from the bottom of a lake, for example. Okay, they’re actually from my fish tank, but you get the gist.

Are there any downsides? Sure. It doesn’t really fit into my canvas travel roll. The resolution? It doesn’t need one, usually reserving a space at the bottom of my backpack along with my accumulated travel lint and charging cables. It also isn’t the most elegant, and would look out of place at a wedding or at a business meeting… But that’s what all your other fragile dress watches are for. Come on, keep up – it’s a G-Shock.