How we measure

Every night we read the public online stock lists of several established grey-market watch dealers in Tokyo. We record each watch’s reference, condition (new, unworn, pre-owned, vintage) and asking price including Japanese consumption tax.

We publish medians, not averages, so a single unusual listing cannot move the number. A figure is shown only when at least 5 watches are on sale. We never publish dealer names or individual listings.

“vs retail” divides the unworn median by the current Japanese retail price. Visitors from overseas may be able to reclaim consumption tax under Japan’s tax-free system (a refund system from 1 November 2026), so the price you finally pay can be lower than the figure shown.

Tokyo Market Balance will combine inventory, time-to-sell, price cuts and price momentum into a single score from buyer’s market to seller’s market. It needs about 90 days of history before the first reading.

We collect politely: one visit a day, several seconds between pages, honest identification, and we follow each site’s robots.txt.

Who runs this

Tokyo Watch Index is run by SN0W8ALL LLC, a one-person company in Japan, and was started by a watch enthusiast who wanted an honest record of where Tokyo grey-market prices sit. We don’t sell watches, we don’t name dealers and we don’t take dealer advertising, so we have no reason to talk prices up or down.