The enduring legacy of Rolex's 70-year-old GMT-Master: it revolutionised time zone tracking and brands like Tudor and Panerai are adding extra complications with GMTs to appeal to collectors
West Kowloon Cultural District's Freespace in Hong Kong between May 26 and June 8 can catch an exhibition on one of Rolex's most important models: the GMT-Master. The watch celebrates its 70th anniversary this year, an occasion that marks one of watchmaking's most elegant answers to the problem of tracking multiple time zones.
The watch and its namesake GMT complication gain their name from the addition of an extra watch hand that tracks time on a 24-hour index. The GMT hand can be set to one's home time zone, or to Greenwich Mean Time – also referred to as UTC or Zulu Time. The Longines Zulu Time from the 1920s also allowed for multiple time zones, but the 24-hour index of these watches was located within the minute track rather than on a rotating outer bezel.
Armin Strom Dual Time GMT Resonance First Edition. Photo: Armin Strom
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The GMT complication was mainly seen on pilot's wrists in the mid-20th century – indeed, Rolex developed the GMT-Master together with the historic airline Pan American Airways. Today however, anyone who travels frequently might consider getting one.
'Nowadays, we are travelling on planes more than ever,' says Helbert Tsang, co-founder of watch community The Horology Club, 'and the GMT-Master still looks pretty much as it did when it was first launched in the 50s. What has changed since then is the reason people buy and wear watches. What used to be an essential tool (for fliers) is now a luxury item or a status symbol. People working in front of a screen all day may still imagine themselves as a globetrotter or a commercial pilot landing at different destinations every day, and a GMT watch is the perfect prop for them to live out that fantasy.'
The GMT complication's history, combined with its surprisingly modern utility, has led to its consistent popularity. Unlike dive watches or chronographs – the functions of which have since been supplanted by computers – wearing a GMT watch means one can still use the complication to track time for loved ones in a different part of the world, or to recall important international meetings at a glance.
Parmigiani Fleurier Tonda PF GMT Rattrapante 2025. Photo: Handout
Luxury brands now put design at the forefront of GMT watches to appeal to collectors. At Watches and Wonders in Geneva this year, manufacturers made their own efforts to show multiple time zones elegantly. Rolex interpreted their modern GMT-Master II with green Cerachrom and tiger iron dials. Panerai, Armin Strom and Parmigiani Fleurier chose to add additional complications with GMTs (respectively, perpetual calendar, simultaneous dual time display and rattrapante).
Tag Heuer, known for its racing chronographs and divers, added a Twin-Time model, which tracks the second time zone along a two-coloured internal 24-hour index, to its Carrera pieces.
Nomos Glashütte developed a new automatic movement and introduced a world time complication to their Club collection.•
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