Waiting for this yr’s flagship watch honest, Watches & Wonders, the business appears to be each strong and rising. Working from April 14 to 18 in Geneva, the 2026 version will host 55 returning manufacturers, plus 11 newcomers together with Audemars Piguet. The exhibition space has expanded from 77,000 sq. meters in 2025 to 84,000 this yr, with house for reside performances by rising musical expertise and DJs. Customer numbers are additionally persevering with to develop, up 12% year-on-year in 2025, per Watches & Wonders.
However regardless of the rising curiosity, latest export figures revealed by the Federation of the Swiss Watch Trade paint a special image. Complete exports halved between 2000 and 2025, from 29.7 million items to 14.6 million items, whereas the worth of these exports virtually tripled from CHF 9.3 billion to CHF 24.4 billion ($11.8 billion to $30.9 billion) over the identical interval. Progress has consolidated on the high finish, because the mid and entry-level shopper retreats and the business turns into more and more reliant on the high-end watch fanatic.
The worth of the high-end phase (watches priced CHF 3,000+, or $3,800+) elevated greater than sixfold between 2000 and 2025, from CHF 3.1 billion to CHF 19.5 billion ($3.9 billion to $25.7 billion), whereas volumes rose extra modestly from 488,000 items to 1.87 million. In contrast, entry-level watches (watches priced CHF 200 and under, or $250) noticed volumes collapse from 22.8 million to eight.3 million items, as worth declined from CHF 1.2 billion to CHF 704 million ($1.5 billion to $892 million). The mid-range phase (watches priced CHF 200-500, or $250-650) additionally contracted, with volumes dropping from 3.1 million to 1.8 million items and worth from CHF 1 billion to CHF 554 million ($1.3 billion to $701 million).
The high-end shopper pool is small, and demand varies between geographies. Globally, solely 5% of customers are keen to spend CHF 10,000 to CHF 50,000 ($12,600 to $63,300) on a timepiece, and simply 5% would pay above this threshold — respectively growing to twenty% and 16% in China, and to 18% for watches priced over CHF 50,000 in Hong Kong, in accordance with a research from Deloitte.
Confronted with this uneven backdrop, listed here are the defining traits of the watch business in 2026 and the way manufacturers are navigating them.
Premiumization accelerates
Based on Morgan Stanley and LuxeConsult’s newest Annual Swiss Watcher report, one of many defining options of the watch business stays premiumization. Watches priced above CHF 50,000 accounted for 37% of complete export worth and generated 89% of complete export progress in 2025, regardless of representing simply 1.4% of volumes. This reinforces the growing focus of worth on the very high finish of the watch phase.
