Optician

One thing that might surprise you is just how many eye-care places there are in Thailand and in Phuket especially. Most visitors are a little older – forties and up – so many people wear prescription glasses. Many people will see an optician in Phuket, and there are plenty to choose from. Others enjoy wearing glasses for fashion and sunglasses are common around Phuket for obvious reasons; eyeglass shops usually have some for sale.

A typical appointment at the optician in Phuket, if not crowded, can be lightning fast. We stopped into one thirty minutes before closing one time and walked out thirty minutes later with a brand-new pair of prescription glasses! No joke!

The attention to detail at these places may not be what you’re used to. The entire eye exam lasted about seven minutes. Choosing the frames, about ten minutes, and making the lenses for the frames, just over ten minutes.

Some of the more well-known shops where you can visit an optometrist are:
- Top Charoen Optical – their logo is a set of blue glasses, that looks like the number “69”. They are often found in and around malls and busy areas of town. Always in the center of town.
- Better Vision Phuket – located in Phuket Town, this company received good reviews by most customers in Google.

Worth noting that there is a wide range of prices on frames. When you come into a shop, you will probably be presented with frames ranging from 3,000 to 6,000 THB. Some people walk out of the shop with a pair of glasses twice as expensive as they could get at home because of all the add-on prices. It’s possible to walk in, have an exam, choose a simple style of glasses and spend only about 2,000 THB for the entire process.

See your optician in Phuket for prescription changes and new glasses. They do have designer frames, but it seems as if these expensive frames are even more expensive than in our home country. Be careful, anyway. Just because it’s Thailand, doesn’t mean it’s cheap!

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