The Most Expensive Watch in the World (List)

The most expensive watch in the world is commonly interpreted differently because there are really three separate records in play. There is the most valuable watch ever created, the most expensive watch ever sold at auction, and the most expensive watch you can actually walk into a boutique and buy. This guide covers all three, with verified prices, auction dates and the results that have redrawn the leaderboard over the past year.

Having handled seven-figure pieces across our London and Dubai showrooms for two decades, we can tell you the numbers below are not marketing fantasy. The market for luxury watches at the very top end has never been deeper, and the auction records set in late 2025 and 2026 prove it.

The Most Expensive Watch Ever Created: Graff Diamonds Hallucination

The Graff Diamonds Hallucination, stated by Graff at its debut, was $55 million, making it the most expensive watch in the world. Unveiled at Baselworld in 2014, it is less a wristwatch than a gem-setting exercise with a small quartz dial hidden among the stones. The bracelet carries over 110 carats of extremely rare and fancy-coloured diamonds, including pink, blue, green, yellow and orange stones, mounted to platinum.

The Hallucination has never been sold at auction, so its price is a valuation set by Graff rather than a hammer result, and that distinction matters. Auction records are public, contested and final, whereas valuations are opinions, albeit ones backed by stones that are individually worth millions. Laurence Graff assembled the coloured diamonds over years, and several of the fancy pink and blue stones would command eight-figure sums on their own.

Graff also holds second place on the created list. The Graff Fascination, valued at around $40 million, carries 153 carats of white diamonds and a detachable 38-carat pear-shaped centre stone that converts into a ring. Both pieces confirm a simple truth about the very top of this market: above a certain threshold, the diamonds do the talking and the movement is almost incidental.

If diamond-set watches are what draw you to this list, the same craft exists at attainable levels. Our in-house team, which includes watchmakers who previously worked at Rolex, handles diamond setting, custom dials and full bespoke commissions from our London workshop, and every stone is hand-selected and certified before it goes anywhere near a case.

The Most Expensive Watch Ever Sold: Patek Philippe Grandmaster Chime Ref. 6300A-010

The most expensive watch ever sold at auction is the Patek Philippe Grandmaster Chime reference 6300A-010, which fetched CHF 31.19 million (around $31.19 million) at the Only Watch charity auction, conducted by Christie's in Geneva on 9 November 2019. Notably, no other watch has ever crossed $30 million under the hammer.

The watch itself justifies the fuss. It carries 20 complications, including a grande and petite sonnerie, minute repeater, acoustic alarm, perpetual calendar and a second time zone, inside a reversible case with two full dials, one in rose gold guilloche and one in black enamel. It is the only Grandmaster Chime ever made in stainless steel; the regular production versions come in precious metals and retailed for around $2.6 million at the time. A steel case on Patek's most complicated wristwatch was a one-off provocation, and bidders treated it accordingly.

Charity auctions do inflate results. Only Watch bidders are buying philanthropy and bragging rights alongside the watch. Which is why serious collectors track a second figure: the most expensive watch sold at a for-profit auction. That record changed hands in November 2025.

The Steel Patek Philippe Ref. 1518: The New Commercial Record

On 8 November 2025, at the Phillips Watches: Decade One sale in Geneva, a 1943 stainless steel Patek Philippe reference 1518 sold for CHF 14,190,000, about $17.63 million, after a nine-minute bidding war between five collectors. It is now the most expensive Patek Philippe wristwatch ever sold at a commercial auction and the most expensive vintage Patek Philippe full stop.

Introduced in 1941, the reference 1518 was the first serially produced perpetual calendar chronograph wristwatch, with almost all examples cased in gold. Only four are known in stainless steel, and this one, case number 508'473, is believed to be the first of the four made. The same watch set the previous record when Phillips sold it for CHF 11,002,000 in 2016, so its owner made roughly CHF 3.2 million holding a watch for nine years.

The steel reference 1518 fell about $120,000 short of the all-time vintage wristwatch record, which still belongs to a Rolex.

The Most Expensive Rolex: Paul Newman's Daytona

The most expensive Rolex ever sold is Paul Newman's own Daytona Ref 6239, which fetched $17,752,500 at Phillips New York in October 2017. Nearly nine years on, it remains the most expensive vintage wristwatch ever sold at auction, and the steel 1518 result in 2025 shows how close that record now is to falling.

The watch was a gift from Newman's wife Joanne Woodward, engraved "Drive Carefully Me", and it is the piece that gave the entire "Paul Newman dial" category its name. We covered the full story of the sale, the watch's disappearance for decades and its rediscovery on the actor's daughter's boyfriend's wrist in our article on the Paul Newman Rolex Daytona auction history.

Other landmark Rolex results include the Bao Dai Ref 6062, purchased new in 1954 by the last emperor of Vietnam, which sold for $5.06 million in 2017. Provenance drives these prices as much as rarity. A standard Ref 6239 without the Newman story is worth a fraction of one per cent of $17.75 million.

The Top 10 Most Expensive Watches in the World

The table below combines both categories, valuations and verified auction results, into a single ranking. Auction prices are stated in the currency reported by the auction house.

Watch	Price	Type	Year
Graff Diamonds Hallucination	~$55 million	Valuation	2014
Graff Diamonds Fascination	~$40 million	Valuation	2015
Patek Philippe Grandmaster Chime 6300A-010	CHF 31.19 million	Charity auction	2019
Breguet Marie-Antoinette No. 160	~$30 million	Valuation	Completed 1827
Jaeger-LeCoultre Joaillerie 101 Manchette	Reported ~$26 million	Valuation	2012
Chopard 201-Carat Watch	~$25 million	Valuation	2000
Patek Philippe Henry Graves Supercomplication	CHF 23.2 million	Auction	2014
Jacob & Co. Billionaire	~$18 million	Retail	2015
Rolex Daytona Ref 6239 "Paul Newman"	$17,752,500	Auction	2017
Patek Philippe Ref 1518 in steel	CHF 14,190,000	Auction	2025

The Historic Heavyweights: Marie-Antoinette and Henry Graves

Two pocket watches anchor the historical end of this list. The Breguet No. 160, on the left, known as the Marie-Antoinette, was commissioned in 1783 for the French queen with instructions that cost was no object. Abraham-Louis Breguet and later his son did not complete it until 1827, long after both the queen and Breguet himself had died. It contains 23 complications, was stolen from the L.A. Mayer Museum in Jerusalem in 1983 and was only recovered in 2007. It is valued at around $30 million and will almost certainly never be sold.

The Patek Philippe Henry Graves Supercomplication, on the right, is the one historic piece with a hard auction number. Commissioned in 1925 by the American banker Henry Graves Jr, who wanted the most complicated watch ever made, it took eight years to complete and carries 24 complications, including a celestial chart of the night sky over Manhattan. It sold for CHF 23.2 million (around $24 million) at Sotheby's in Geneva in November 2014, and until the Grandmaster Chime result in 2019 it was the most expensive watch ever sold.

The Diamond Statements: Chopard, Jacob & Co. and Franck Muller

The Chopard 201-Carat Watch, on the left, valued at around $25 million, is built around three heart-shaped diamonds, a 15-carat pink, a 12-carat blue and an 11-carat white, surrounded by a further 163 carats of white and yellow diamonds. The Jacob & Co. Billionaire, placed centrally, carries around 260 carats of emerald-cut diamonds over a skeletonised movement and carries a retail price of roughly $18 million; a later Billionaire Timeless Treasure version set with yellow diamonds has been priced at around $20 million.

At a slightly less stratospheric level, the diamond-set Franck Muller Aeternitas Mega 4, on the right, pairs one of the most complicated movements ever produced, with 36 complications, with a fully gem-set case, and examples have been valued in the region of $3 million. It is a reminder that the top of this market splits into two schools: pieces valued for their stones and pieces valued for their mechanics. The rarest of all combine both.

The Records Set in 2026

The leaderboard is not static. In June 2026, Phillips New York held the highest-grossing watch auction in US history at $75.8 million, and the star lot rewrote three records at once. An F.P. Journe Chronomètre à Résonance Souscription No. 007 sold for $13.92 million after nearly nine minutes of bidding, becoming the most expensive watch ever sold by an independent watchmaker, the most expensive 21st-century watch sold at a commercial auction, and the most expensive watch ever auctioned in the Americas.

That result matters beyond Journe. For decades this list was a two-brand conversation, Patek Philippe and Rolex, with jewellery houses supplying the valuations. A living independent watchmaker crossing $13 million signals that scarcity and craft, not just heritage, now command record money. The same sale saw a Patek Philippe reference 5004G-020 made for Eric Clapton reach $5.2 million.

If you hold pieces from any of these brands, results like these flow directly into secondary market pricing. Our team provides valuations against live market data if you are considering a sale; you can start the process through our sell your watch service.

What Makes a Watch Worth Millions?

Every watch on this list ticks at least two of four boxes: rarity, provenance, complications and stones.

Rarity is the engine of the auction records. Four steel 1518s exist. One steel Grandmaster Chime exists. Ten Richard Mille RM 56-02s exist. When supply is measured in single digits, two determined bidders are all it takes to set a record. Provenance multiplies the effect: Newman's Daytona is mechanically identical to thousands of others, and the $17.75 million was paid for the man, not the movement.

Complications and gem-setting are the two ways a watch earns value on its own merits. The Graves Supercomplication and the Grandmaster Chime represent the mechanical school; the Graff pieces represent the stones. For collectors buying below the eight-figure line, the same logic applies at every price point, which is why we always advise clients to prioritise rarity and condition over brand hype. Our guide on what to consider before investing in luxury watches covers this in depth, and our Collectors Club exists for exactly this kind of acquisition planning.

Disclaimer: Past performance is not indicative of future results. Watches should not be considered a substitute for traditional financial investments. Always seek independent financial advice before making investment decisions.

The Most Expensive Watch Brands

Judged purely by record prices, the most expensive watch brands are Graff, Patek Philippe, Breguet, Jaeger-LeCoultre, Chopard, Jacob & Co., Rolex, F.P. Journe, Audemars Piguet and Richard Mille. Judged by average selling price across a full catalogue, Richard Mille leads the industry, with entry-level models starting around $80,000 and sapphire-cased pieces retailing above $2 million.

The most expensive Richard Mille ever sold at auction is the RM 53-02 Tourbillon in blue sapphire, which fetched HKD 35.54 million, around $4.5 million, in Hong Kong in 2023. Only eight were made, and the triple-curved sapphire case takes roughly 1,000 hours to produce. At retail, the RM 56-02 Sapphire held the crown at around $2 million, with its case alone requiring up to 40 days of machining and its sapphire bridge a further 400 hours.

Patek Philippe remains the auction king by volume of records, and it is the one brand on this list where relatively attainable references share DNA with the record breakers. The Ref 5930G-001, for instance, is a world time flyback chronograph in white gold, combining two of the complications that made the Grandmaster Chime and the world timers of the 1940s so valuable. We currently have one in stock in London.

For pieces beyond the catalogue, from grand complications to rare sapphire Richard Mille references, our watch sourcing service locates specific references through our dealer and collector network, with all sourced watches delivered within 30 days. And if your ambition runs to a diamond-set statement of your own, our bespoke collection shows what our workshop produces at a small fraction of Graff money.

FAQs About the Most Expensive Watches

What is the most expensive watch in the world?

The Graff Diamonds Hallucination, valued at approximately $55 million, is the most expensive watch in the world. It carries over 110 carats of rare fancy coloured diamonds on a platinum bracelet and has never been offered for sale at auction.

What is the most expensive watch ever sold at auction?

The Patek Philippe Grandmaster Chime Ref 6300A-010, which sold for CHF 31.19 million at the Only Watch charity auction in Geneva on 9 November 2019. The most expensive watch sold at a standard for-profit auction is a stainless steel Patek Philippe Ref 1518, at CHF 14,190,000 in November 2025.

What is the most expensive Rolex ever sold?

Paul Newman's Rolex Daytona Ref 6239, which sold for $17,752,500 at Phillips New York in October 2017. It remains the most expensive vintage wristwatch of any brand ever sold at auction. For more Rolex records, see our essential Rolex facts article.

What is the most expensive Richard Mille?

At auction, the Richard Mille RM 53-02 Tourbillon in blue sapphire, which sold for HKD 35.54 million (around $4.5 million) in Hong Kong in 2023. At retail, sapphire-cased pieces such as the RM 56-02 have carried prices around $2 million.

Why are Patek Philippe watches so expensive?

Extreme rarity, hand-finished complications and unmatched auction provenance. Patek Philippe holds the records for the most expensive watch ever sold at auction, the most expensive pocket watch and the most expensive vintage wristwatch of its own brand, and references like the steel 1518 exist in single-digit quantities.

Are expensive watches a good investment?

Some hold or grow value exceptionally well, as the steel 1518's rise from CHF 11 million in 2016 to CHF 14.19 million in 2025 shows, but results vary enormously by reference, condition and provenance. Authenticity is the first hurdle at any price level; our guide on how to spot a fake Rolex covers the checks every buyer should know. Past performance is not indicative of future results, and independent financial advice should always come before any purchase made as an investment.