Does this stopwatch exist? (for habit-building)

July 26, 2020 12:44 PM

I often don't use free time to work on a hobby that's important to me, believing that a few minutes here and there is nothing. But those minutes add up! I'd love to buy a physical clock or stopwatch where I can cumulatively track how much time I've spent on my hobby. Bonus points for: pretty with large digits [more visibility = more motivation], and the more hours it can track, the better.

Desired behavior: I hit start every time I start my hobby, and the time starts incrementing. I hit stop when I end. Over the weeks, I can watch as I gradually hit 20 hours... 40... etc.

- Must be a physical thing. I've downloaded countless apps but just ignore them.
- I scoured the internet looking for these. The closest I've found are kitchen timers. I'd want more designy if possible (pretty object to display, rather just utilitarian), and everything I've seen caps out at 99 hours, but I'd love more if possible.

I suspect I'm just searching the wrong keywords. Perhaps you've seen something that behaves like I'm describing?

posted by estlin to Shopping (5 answers total)

Would a chess clock work?
posted by sardonyx at 12:49 PM on July 26, 2020 [2 favorites]

The most common use for cumulative time tracking is probably billing, have you been looking for freelancers’ desk doodads? I’m almost sure I’ve seen pictures of such a thing - I don’t remember what the display was like, it was a pointy white shape rather than a cube, and it might have been Kickstarter/Instructables/vapor ware, because I can’t find it now.

A time-card-punching machine and a frame for the timecards? That shows off the number of occasions you’ve done the thing more clearly than the total time though.
posted by clew at 1:03 PM on July 26, 2020

I don’t remember what the display was like, it was a pointy white shape rather than a cube, and it might have been Kickstarter/Instructables/vapor ware, because I can’t find it now.
Timeular?

I haven't used it myself, but I've contemplated it.
posted by CrystalDave at 1:19 PM on July 26, 2020 [1 favorite]

There are many countdown/countup clocks that include days. Here is one example
posted by rockindata at 2:41 PM on July 26, 2020

I use one of these stopwatches for timing things on the grill. It'll do stop/start, but probably tops out at 99 hours. Move times to a spreadsheet daily, and that's not an issue.
posted by dws at 9:08 PM on July 26, 2020