If you’ve ever misplaced your wedding ring after removing it for an epic adventure and scrambled to find it before your spouse found out, you know the value of a functional wedding ring.
Today, many active couples are avoiding the traditional metal-and-diamond ring route altogether, instead opting for a set of longlasting, silicone-based commitment rings. With roots that lie in quality, athletics, family, and the outdoors, QALO helped set this precedent.
Before QALO, the original functional wedding ring-maker, this wasn’t even on the radar for most people. Now, indestructible rings come up as a brilliant, budget-friendly alternative for athletes, young families, and pretty much anyone who wants to crush it out there without crushing an expensive asset.
Here’s how silicone wedding rings stack up against metal bands.
Advantages of Silicone Rings
Defy the Elements
Silicone is a versatile material with all kinds of helpful features like flexibility, malleability, and resistance to water and extreme temperatures. It’s easy to see why those elements are important when wearing the ring during outdoor sports and adventures.
Two assets stand out: grip and nonconduction.
Because QALO silicone rings wrap naturally around the skin, grip gear well, and repel sweat and water with rubber-like properties, they don’t move around like metal. So they’re less slippery when wet, which we all know is a regular side effect of both weather and movement.
Likewise, silicone doesn’t conduct like metal. So a QALO ring is safe up against an ice pack or a lightning strike.
Super-Tough, Break-Smart
Go ahead, try to scuff a QALO silicone band on your mountain bike handlebars, scraggy pitch, or dumbells. You won’t see a scratch.
That’s because nonporous, nonconductive, temperature-tolerant silicone, a hybrid between synthetic rubber and plastic polymer, doesn’t nick the way metal does.
Yet it’s also strong. Silicone is a radically durable material, but it’s not so rigid that it won’t give when you need it to. Unlike a metal ring, a QALO silicone band won’t hold your finger hostage should you snag it on a rock while climbing, or injure your finger in an accident while you’re off the grid.
These rings break appropriately at around 17-20 pounds of force. Or, in the event of an emergency, you can cut off a QALO and set yourself back only about $30.
Cheap to Replace
Speaking of money, that’s one of QALO’s biggest benefits: price. The functional silicone wedding rings range from $20 to $40, plus a little more if you want to customize one.
If you break one in the wild, you can buy a replacement online the same day — maybe even before your significant other notices. And, well, you can’t put a price tag on not having to worry about someone stealing your one-of-a-kind diamond wedding ring.
Smooth Riding
We do all kinds of things to make metal wedding bands do what they’re supposed to: stay on and stay pretty.
Sometimes, we add ring adjusters or “speed bumps” to account for when hands swell in life, not to mention on long hikes. We constantly twist top-heavy diamond rings that flop around and get stuck uncomfortably under a bike or ski glove.
Then, we must even occasionally clean dulled precious metal and use a toothpick to pry campfire food bits out of diamond settings.
None of that’s happening with a silicone ring. The plasticity of molded silicone means that, once you measure your ring finger size, it forms around your digit’s natural curve.
And these rings weigh next to nothing. They wear discreetly and comfortably against bike and fishing rod grips, inside gloves, underwater, or over a paddle. QALO calls all this “comfort fit,” but all this means is that you can put the silicone ring on and forget about it.
Your Own Diamond in the Rough
Sure, a QALO isn’t your grandmother’s diamond that she passed down two generations for you to use in crafting a custom wedding band. But who wants the stress of losing a family heirloom, especially when you can customize a perfectly practical wedding ring to make it all your own?
QALO keeps adding new styles, including rings with metallic sheens, laser cutouts, modern colors, and special sayings. But you can also fully customize a ring with any engraving that will mean something exclusive between you and your spouse.
Oh, and grandma’s free diamond? Put it in a necklace, turn it into a down payment, or pass it along.
This article is sponsored by QALO. Check out the latest functional wedding ring styles here.