My $30 CURREN Watch: How to Open and Close the Back Cover and Replace the Battery

I have a secret. I wear CURREN watches. I love their look and went ahead and bought six different styles and colors to coordinate with my attire and mood for the day. I do have one really expensive watch that I got as a gift. I don’t wear it since it is… expensive. I leave it at home and sometimes I feel bad that I never wear it. I love watches, though. This prompted me to look for an alternative. I discovered CURREN watches on Amazon and bought one.

CURREN Watch and Hairy Arm

I wore my CURREN watch for about a year and then the battery died. The second hand stood still. I actually wore it a couple of times knowing that the battery had died and that made me question why I was wearing the watch in the first place. I took the watch to a watch battery kiosk at the mall and asked for a battery replacement quote. I had a little sticker shock: $15. Yikes. It was $15 US to change out the battery. Well, this led me into a rabbit hole, but I think I made it through and I wanted to share my tools and tips for CURREN watches. I hope this helps you maintain your CURREN watch collection too.

The Facts

CURREN watches use a snap off watch back cover and require SR920SW button cell watch batteries. I spent a lot of time trying to figure out anything about the watch. I didn’t find any YouTube videos and no clues in the comments. I didn’t want to think of the watches as disposable. I wanted to keep wearing them and keep them doing their time.

The Tools

Okay. This is the part that you are not going to like. You do need some special tools. You might be able to figure out alternatives but you run the risk of damaging the front of the watch or mangling the watch in the process. The tools needed cost less than $20 US. And, don’t get lulled into buying a kit with 200 pieces. You don’t need all of the tools unless you are going to repair many different brands.

Here’s what you need to repair CURREN watches:

The Process

Remove the Snap Off Back Cover

Start by looking for a little lip on the back cover. It is subtle, but there is a small lip on the back cover. This is where you use the pry tool. I tried a small screwdriver and ended up scratching the back cover. Align the pry tool with the lip and lift up the cover. If you have it lined up correctly, the back cover will snap off pretty easily.

Snap Off Cover Lip
Snap Off Cover Pry Tool

Replace the Battery

Remove that dead battery and replace it with a fresh SR920SW button cell watch battery. You have to remove the plastic insert that holds the battery down and allows the buttons from the outside of the watch to make contact with the internal electronics. I expect to get a year or so out of the batteries.

Align Plastic Button Insert

A bonus CURREN watch repair trick is to make sure that the plastic insert is properly aligned. On all six of my watches, the plastic insert was just off a little bit. This causes the buttons on the case to not make good contact with the internal buttons. Once I got it aligned, the extra functions of the watches like the chronograph started working reliably.

Make Sure to Align the Plastic Insert Inside the CURREN Watch

Replace the Snap Off Back Cover

Okay, now it’s time for the hard part of the process. You got to properly close a snap off watch cover using a watch cover press tool. The press tool has a mould for the front of the watch and the back of the watch so that you can provide even pressure to close the watch cover. This is also necessary so that you don’t crack the glass on top of the watch. Before I broke down and bought the press tool, I convinced myself that I could do it by hand. I really tried to close the cover but no matter how hard I squeezed or how I changed up my technique, I could not close the back cover. I got the press tool from Amazon at 17:32 today and I had a sealed watch at 17:33. I changed the batteries on all six of my watches and my 5-year-old son helped with a few of them. The watch press works perfectly and effortlessly.

Watch Press Tool Mould Sizes for CURREN Watches

For CURREN watches, use the 50mm mould on the bottom of the press and the 46mm mould on the top of the press. Place the watch in the middle with the glass side fitted into the 5omm mould on the bottom. Squeeze slowly. If it didn’t close the cover, try again, and make sure that the cover is aligned properly.

CURREN Watch in a Watch Press Tool

Hmm. I spent about $20 to repair a $30 watch, but I repaired six watches. I could have spent $15 at the mall to fix one watch. Hmm.

8 comments

  1. Thank you for the instructions, Hans. I’m sure I’ll be needing them soon. I just received my first two Curren watches and they’re even better-looking than I thought. Beats spending 3 times more on servicing my one Swiss watch. I’ll have to get some tools to resize the Curren wristbands and I’ll probably get the battery tool as well. Thanks again!

  2. Thanks for the infos! My watch have been down for a while now,,, and I love to wear them, people think they are expensive😂 I was able to open the back with a screwdriver for glasses.

  3. I bought a Curren watch for the looks, but never wore it. The battery died after two years, and I changed it. I do have a prying tool, but I don’t have a press to close the back lid. Beeing a big, solid watch, I thought that a piece of wood and a rubber mallet will work. And it did!
    Except… the tiny pieces of metal glued to the “hour” markings fell off, more than 50% of them, the factory used just a drop of glue in the middle for each, barely 20% of the metal part was glued. Now I have to figure out how to remove the button from the axle, and, browsing the Internet, I found this nice site. Cheers from Canada!

  4. I have a Curren watch that I haven’t been able to wear for about a year now because the battery died. I thought I might need a watch back removal tool used for Rolexes since my back cover has grooves but it sound like the back is actually a snap on. One thing though, I can’t seem to find the lip where a pry tool can be used. Anybody have any ideas on how/where to locate the lip area?

    1. Does it look like my cover? The lip to pry is subtle. Look all the way around and you should notice where the lip changes slightly from the rest. The small change is the width of the pry tool.

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