The Watches That Won Our Hearts In 2025
It's been a year to remember in the horology stakes
The watch world never really pauses, but 2025 stood out for being an especially good year for horology. Heritage brands celebrated major anniversaries, left-field releases that reminded us why this hobby is fun in the first place, and Indian horology had a moment in the spotlight. It was also a year where brands focused on refinement—smaller cases, smarter mechanics, stronger design ideas, and a renewed respect for craft.
Out of the many impressive launches this year, these watches did more than just make waves at launch. Some pushed technical boundaries, others nailed everyday wearability, and a few simply made us smile every time we looked at our wrists.
What follows isn’t a list of the most expensive or hardest-to-get pieces of the year, but a look back at the timepieces that summed up what it felt like to be a horology enthusiast in 2025. Read on.
Rolex Land-Dweller
Any new Rolex is automatically going to get a seat at the table, but the Land-Dweller draws extra eyes for one simple reason: it’s the brand’s first new “professional” model since the Sky-Dweller in 2012. But wait, that’s not all. The Land-Dweller is Rolex’s first new escapement architecture since the mid-18th century. That alone makes it a landmark release.
Audemars Piguet Royal Oak Extra-Thin Selfwinding Flying Tourbillon Chronograph (RD#5)
This impressive watch is part of the brand’s RD (research and development) line, which is basically where Audemars Piguet goes to show off its technical prowess. A stunning proof of said technical prowess: fitting both a tourbillon and a chronograph into a watch that’s shockingly thin. That meant completely rethinking how chronographs have been built for centuries now. Even the pushers at the side got a modern twist, redesigned to look like iPhone side buttons.
Cartier Tank à Guichets
Cartier Privé remains one of the most reliable high points of the watch calendar, but in 2025, the Guichet felt especially satisfying. Pulled from a late-1920s design, the watch replaces traditional hands with discreet hour and minute windows (“guichets” in French), giving the familiar Tank silhouette a sealed, almost Brutalist presence. It quickly became a red-carpet fixture, worn by Henry Golding, Timothée Chalamet, and Jacob Elordi.
Titan Nebula “JALSA” Tourbillon
Titan has been throwing its hat into the GPHG ring for some time now, and this year, they succeeded with the “JALSA” Tourbillon in the Artistic Crafts category. At 6 o’clock sits a flying tourbillon, but the real showstopper of the watch is the dial: the marble dial hand-painted by Indian artist Sri Shakir Ali depicts a royal procession at Hawa Mahal, executed using natural gemstone pigments and centuries-old miniature painting techniques. The sword-shaped minutes hand also features a little magnifying glass, so that you can appreciate the finer details of the painting as the watch ticks by.
LV Tambour Convergence
The LV Tambour Convergence plays with the same idea as the Cartier Tank à Guichets: instead of traditional hands, it displays the time through two satin-brushed discs, visible through two arched apertures at the top of the face. The sophisticated case work gives a more architectural feel to the wrist. It’s also incredibly tactile - one of those watches that show how much Louis Vuitton 1has fully come into its own as a serious watchmaker.
Breguet Classique Tourbillon Sidéral 7255
Breguet Classique Tourbillon Sidéral 7255
Long before the tourbillon became a shorthand for high watchmaking excess, Abraham-Louis Breguet invented it in 1801 as a solution to gravity’s impact on accuracy. That legacy is front and centre in Breguet’s Classique Tourbillon Sidéral 7255, which marks the brand’s 250th anniversary and introduces its first-ever flying tourbillon. It’s also crafted in proprietary 18k Breguet Gold and paired with a deep-blue grand feu aventurine enamel dial, adding a layer of old-world refinement to its technical expertise.
Tissot RockWatch 2025
Stranger Things may be wrapping up, but its role in keeping the ’80s aesthetic alive is undeniable. Separately, 2025 has been the year smaller watch dials made a proper comeback. All this made it the perfect time to bring back the Tissot RockWatch from the 1980s. Made from genuine Alpine rock, each case is uniquely grained, sized at a compact 35mm, and finished with playful pops of colour on the hands. This limited edition beauty was one of the coolest minimal watches out there this year.
Casio Ring Watch
For its 50th anniversary, Casio leaned into its quirky roots (mind you, this is the same company that made a calculator that doubles down as a cigarette lighter) and made a watch you wear as a ring. The Casio Ring Watch is tiny at just 19.5mm, but it’s fully functional: the ring features a steel case, a seven-segment LCD display that packs a second time zone and a stopwatch, and even a light that doubles as an alarm. It’s ridiculous, charming, and very Casio in the best ways you can imagine.
BVLG0ARI Bvlgari × MB&F Serpenti
Bulgari’s iconic Serpenti gets completely reimagined through MB&F’s retro-futuristic, automotive-obsessed lens, and the result is… a lot. The Bulgari x MB&F Serpenti comes in three ultra-limited editions of 33 pieces each—titanium, black PVD steel, and 18k rose gold. Time is shown on two rotating domes for hours and minutes, meant to resemble a serpent’s eyes. Is it subtle? Absolutely not. But do we love it? A hundred times over.
Biver Automatique Yellow Gold/ Atelier Series Carbon Edition
Actually spotting one of Jean-Claude Biver’s watches in the wild is about as likely as bumping into him at the corner store, but that doesn’t stop them from being fascinating to look at. After launching the brand in 2023 with a wildly over-the-top minute repeater that cost half a million pounds, Biver—now working alongside his son Pierre—has dialled things back in the best way. The new Automatique lands in 18k yellow gold, including an Atelier Series with a carbon-fibre dial. It also helps that the black-and-gold combo makes for one of the strongest dress-watch looks of the year.