Massdrop x ArmourLite Ember T100 Tritium Watch

Tactical watches are great when you’re in the field or going for a swim, but they don’t transition well at the office or out on the town. Dress watches look great, but you’d never wear one on a camping trip. With the help of ArmourLite, we set out to build a timepiece with the best characteristics of both. Enter the Ember. Designed with a strong and lightweight titanium case, it’s easy to wear and tough as nails. It’s also easy to read in the dark: Made with 15 tritium tubes for a total rating of T100 (currently the brightest rating in the world), the Ember glows bright for decades with no external power. With Arabic numerals at the hours and a dual-language day-date window at 3 o’clock, the Ember’s dial is clean, minimal, and sophisticated. Driven by a Swiss-made Ronda 517 quartz movement, it’s accurate and precise—not to mention it’s water resistant to 100 meters and has a sapphire crystal to prevent scratching. The watch comes on a nylon band, but you can upgrade to titanium at checkout.

Tritium gas is a self-powered isotope of hydrogen that glows in the dark for up to 50 years without any external charge. Typically found in tactical military-inspired watches, it’s super handy in dark conditions when you want to read the time at a glance. The Ember is fitted with 15 tritium tubes to achieve a T100 rating. Compared to T25 tritium—the most common rating—T100 is up to four times as bright for even greater legibility. Plus, with the increased brightness, the transition from bright environments to dark ones is a lot easier on the eyes. 

Based on ArmourLite’s popular T25 Field Series watch, the Ember is slimmer, lighter and brighter than its predecessor. Made with titanium instead of steel, the Ember cuts the weight of the original in half and shaves off 3.4 millimeters of case height, making it easy to wear on a hike, at work, or out to dinner. We’ve also swapped ArmourLite’s Armourglass crystal in favor of a more traditional sapphire crystal. This change increases scratch resistance, reduces the height of the case, and cuts down on the overall weight of the watch. Aesthetically, we’ve scaled back the tactical look, added a day window, and made the watch more applicable in urban and dressy settings. Even with the addition of the day window, the dial is much less crowded thanks to the removal of the 24-hour markings and Arabic numeral at 12 o’clock.

Based in North Miami Beach, Florida, ArmourLite makes field-tested timepieces for military and law enforcement personnel, first responders, and outdoorsmen. Founded in 2007, the company has been creating high-quality tritium watches with the ultimate combination of accuracy and reliability for over a decade. Today, it continues to innovate with a wide range of designs, including field watches, chronographs, divers, and dress watches.