It is not with low prices but on the contrary, it is with improved quality we cannot only hold the market, but improve it.
- Hans Wilsdorf, Founder of Rolex
1910s - Trench Watch
“I would rather wear a skirt, than a wristwatch”, things changed until WWI
1930s - Oyster Perpetual
Oyster : the first waterproof and dustproof wristwatch.
Perpetual: the world's first self-winding mechanism with a Perpetual rotor.
Late 1930s - Bubble Back
Bubble Back represents the basic, self-winding template that all modern Rolex watches would come to follow. Manufactured between roughly 1930s to 1950s, dozens of different reference numbers fall into the unofficially named, “Bubble Back” category. Rolex’s Bubble Back watches get their nickname from their extremely rounded, protruding case-backs.
1940s - Datejust
The first automatic watch with a date show on dial.
1950s
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Submariner
While the Sub was always a cult favourite among professional divers, its wide-ranging popularity was certainly reinforced in the U.S. by James Bond.
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Explorer
Rolex had been testing watches on Himalayan expeditions since the 1930s. The watches had to keep perfect time at -50 degrees Fahrenheit and with 70% less oxygen than at sea level.
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Day-date
The Day-date represented a worldwide innovation: it was the first watch to indicate the date in the three o’clock position, and the day of the week in the 12 o’clock position.
1960s - Cosmograph Daytona
In 1963, Rolex launched a new-generation chronograph, the “Cosmograph Daytona” featured highly legible dials, with either a black or a light-colored dial or a light color on a black dial. The tachymetric scale moved from the dial to the bezel, therefore allowing clearer reading for average speed calculation.
1970s - Sea Dweller
The Sea-Dweller’s history is deeply linked to the history of diving on its own, and essential to the development of the dive watch that started in the 1950s. After WWII, leisure diving grew in popularity and dive watches began to be commercialized for military, professional and civilian use.