The History of Aviator Watches: From the First Flight to the Modern Day Aviation Timepiece

There was a time when knowing the exact time in an aircraft was not a convenience, a display on a glass panel or something automatically synchronized by satellite. It was part of the navigation equipment, and sometimes a very important part of finding your way home. Long before GPS, inertial navigation systems and modern electronic flight computers, a pilot relied on a collection of comparatively simple instruments, a chart, a compass, careful calculations and a dependable watch.

That is where the history of aviator watches really begins, not as a fashion statement, but as a practical response to the particularly highly demanding and unforgiving world of flight.

At the beginning of the twentieth century, most gentlemen still carried pocket watches. That arrangement was perfectly reasonable while travelling by train or sitting comfortably in an office, but it became considerably less practical inside an early aircraft. Pilots were flying open-cockpit machines that were noisy, cold, unstable and demanding to control. Reaching into a coat pocket, pulling out a watch and opening its cover while keeping an aircraft pointed in roughly the desired direction was hardly ideal.

One of the best-known stories from this pioneering period involves Brazilian aviator Alberto Santos-Dumont and his friend Louis Cartier. Santos-Dumont reportedly wanted a watch that he could read while keeping his hands on the controls, and in 1904 Cartier created a wristwatch for him. The watch that eventually became known as the Santos is frequently described as one of the earliest purpose-designed wristwatches for an aviator. It would be risky to call it the unquestioned “first pilot watch,” since portable wrist-worn watches existed in other forms before then, but the Santos-Dumont connection remains one of the most important chapters in the development of the men’s wristwatch.

The logic was unmistakable. A watch worn on the wrist could be checked immediately, without digging through layers of clothing and without letting go of the controls. Aviation did not single-handedly invent the wristwatch, but it helped demonstrate why a wristwatch could be a serious working instrument rather than merely a piece of jewellery.

As aircraft began flying farther, higher and faster, the requirements of a true pilot watch became clearer. It needed a dial that could be read quickly, even in poor light or a vibrating cockpit. Large numerals, strongly contrasting hands and luminous markings became common. An oversized crown allowed the watch to be wound or adjusted while wearing gloves, while a secure strap kept it in place over a flight suit or jacket sleeve.

Many early aviator watches were physically large because manufacturers sometimes adapted pocket-watch movements for use on the wrist. Others were worn over the outside of a flying coat, where a small conventional watch would have been difficult to see. These functional decisions helped create the visual language that we now associate with classic aviation watches: large cases, black dials, bold Arabic numerals, prominent crowns and clear minute markings.

Accuracy was more than a desirable feature. In the days of dead reckoning, a pilot estimated position using heading, speed, elapsed time and the effects of wind. A small error in any one of those elements could become a much larger error after several hours in the air. The watch did not replace the compass, chart or the pilot’s calculations, but it gave the crew the accurate elapsed-time information upon which those calculations depended.

The connection between watches and aerial navigation became even more sophisticated during the interwar years. U.S. Navy officer Philip Van Horn Weems developed a system that allowed navigators to synchronize the seconds on their watches with a radio time signal without disturbing the minute and hour settings. Longines produced the Weems Second-Setting Watch based on that concept.

Charles Lindbergh later worked with Longines on the Hour Angle Watch, introduced in the early 1930s. Used with a sextant, a nautical almanac and the necessary calculations, its markings helped a navigator determine Greenwich hour angle, an important step in establishing longitude. It was an ingenious mechanical aid, although it should not be mistaken for a watch that could determine an aircraft’s position by itself. Like most aviation instruments, it was one component in a larger system that still depended on training, observation and careful navigation.

During the Second World War, the pilot watch became part of a much larger military requirement for accurate, durable and easily synchronized timepieces. Aircrews had to coordinate departures, navigation legs, bombing runs, reconnaissance missions and rendezvous points—often involving several aircraft operating over great distances and under extremely difficult conditions.

One of the best-known American military watches of the period was the Type A-11. Despite often being discussed as though it were a single watch model, A-11 was a military specification fulfilled by manufacturers including Bulova, Elgin and Waltham. Its uncluttered black-and-white dial, central seconds hand and “hacking” function reflected its operational purpose. Pulling out the crown stopped the seconds hand, allowing multiple watches to be synchronized precisely before a mission.

The A-11 is sometimes called “the watch that won the war.” It is a memorable nickname, but obviously an exaggeration rather than a literal historical assessment. No watch won the war, and the A-11 was used by personnel in many roles rather than exclusively by pilots. Nevertheless, it represents something important: the transformation of the wristwatch into standardized military equipment designed around accuracy, legibility and coordinated operations.

Other nations developed their own aviation and military timepieces. German observation watches, commonly known as Beobachtungsuhren or B-Uhren, used exceptionally large cases, highly legible dials and prominent crowns. They were intended primarily for navigators and observers rather than as general-purpose watches for every Luftwaffe pilot. Britain’s military aviation requirements also produced important cockpit and wristwatch designs, including watches that emphasized accuracy, anti-magnetic protection and immediate readability.

The distinction between a pilot’s watch and a navigator’s watch matters. Popular history often blends the two together, but their functions were not always identical. A pilot needed quick, reliable access to elapsed time while managing the aircraft. A navigator might require additional scales, synchronization features or specialized calculations. In multi-crew aircraft, those jobs could belong to different people, even though both depended upon accurate timekeeping.

After the war, increasing aircraft performance and the growth of commercial aviation encouraged watchmakers to add more functions. Chronographs allowed a pilot to start, stop and reset an independent timing hand, making it possible to measure an approach segment, navigation leg or other timed event without disturbing the main time display.

In 1952, Breitling developed the Navitimer, combining a chronograph with a circular slide rule. The design was created in association with the Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association, better known as AOPA. With the proper knowledge, its rotating scales could be used to calculate values such as speed, distance, fuel consumption, rate of climb or descent and unit conversions. The name itself joined the words “navigation” and “timer.”

The Navitimer was effectively a mechanical flight computer worn on the wrist, although operating one correctly required considerably more knowledge than simply wearing it. Pilots of that era were already familiar with circular slide-rule flight computers, and the watch translated some of those same principles into a remarkably compact form.

As international and commercial flight expanded, the ability to track more than one time zone became increasingly useful. GMT and dual-time aviation watches allowed pilots to keep a reference time—most commonly Coordinated Universal Time, or UTC—while also displaying local time. Aviation traditionally refers to UTC as “Zulu time,” and it remains essential for flight plans, weather reports, air traffic control coordination and other operations that cannot afford confusion between local time zones.

By the latter part of the twentieth century, quartz movements brought a new level of affordable accuracy. Digital aviation watches added alarms, countdown timers, multiple time zones, chronographs and, eventually, electronic flight-computer functions. Some contemporary pilot watches now include GPS reception, barometric altitude, electronic compasses and connections to smartphones or aircraft systems.

This technology changed the role of the traditional mechanical aviator watch. In a modern cockpit, the aircraft’s certified instruments and avionics provide the primary information used for flight. A wristwatch—whether mechanical, quartz or digital—is normally a useful personal tool or backup rather than the aircraft’s principal navigation instrument.

That does not make the classic pilot watch obsolete. It simply means that its importance has changed.

For many professional pilots, military aircrew members and aviation enthusiasts, a watch remains one of the few pieces of flying equipment that can follow its owner everywhere. Aircraft are assigned, rented, sold or retired, but a good aviation watch can accumulate decades of flights and memories. It may mark a first solo, a licence, a military posting, a difficult trip successfully completed or simply thousands of ordinary hours spent doing a job that never feels entirely ordinary.

The best modern aviator watches still carry the design principles established in the earliest days of flight. They are readable at a glance, durable enough for daily use and visually connected to the instruments of an aircraft cockpit. Some use chronographs or GMT movements for genuine practical purposes, while others honour particular aircraft, squadrons or chapters of aviation history.

The term “aviator watch” is now used very broadly. Some are professional flight watches with genuinely useful timing or dual-time functions. Some are historically inspired military pilot watches. Others are aviation watches created to honour a famous aircraft or era. There is room for all of them, provided their history is presented honestly.

More than a century after Santos-Dumont took to the air, the attraction of the pilot watch remains remarkably easy to understand. It comes from a period when time, distance, heading and fuel were worked out by hand, when navigation required as much judgement as equipment and when a dependable watch could be an authentic part of the flight deck.

Modern pilots no longer navigate the way Lindbergh, wartime aircrews or the first airline captains did, and no responsible pilot would substitute a wristwatch for the aircraft’s certified instruments. Yet the aviator watch still represents something that modern technology has never entirely replaced: self-reliance, precision and the quiet satisfaction of carrying a small piece of aviation history on your wrist.

Explore the Sierra Hotel Aeronautics collection of aviation watches and tribute watches, created for pilots, aircrew, collectors and aviation enthusiasts who understand that a watch can tell considerably more than time.