Rolex, Cartier and Audemars Piguet on the podium of best-selling brands

Morgan Stanley Research presented Swiss Watcher 2025, its annual report on the Swiss watch industry, which it produces together with LuxeConsult. The study, now in its ninth edition, takes a snapshot of the performance of the top 50 brands, estimating their sales, turnover and market share. Figures released by the Fédération de l'industrie horlogère suisse (Fh) outline the context: in 2025, exports of Swiss watches worldwide dropped by 1.7% in value, while the Morgan Stanley report quantified the overall value of retail sales at 49 billion Swiss francs (over 54 billion euros), excluding taxes.

Among the points highlighted was an increasingly evident polarisation of the market by the most representative brands, which continue to gain share, with the top four of these holding 55% (it was 52.4% in 2024) out of a total of around 450 Swiss brands: Rolex 32.9%, Cartier 8.7%, Patek Philippe 7% and Omega 6.4%. Equally in evidence is the weight of exports of models costing over CHF 50,000, which was 37% in 2025 (it was 33.5% in 2024), despite being a segment representing only 1.4% of the total number of pieces.

Looking specifically at the performance of the top brands, the report estimated a turnover for Rolex of 11 billion francs (+4% on 2024 with 1.15 million units sold), for Cartier of 3.5 billion (+10% on 2024 with 695 thousand units sold), for Audemars Piguet by 2.6 billion (+9% on 2024 with 53 thousand units sold), for Patek Philippe by 2.5 billion (+9% over 2024 with 72,000 units sold), for Omega by 2.2 billion (-8% over 2024 with 460,000 units sold), for Richard Mille by 1.75 billion (+9% over 2024 with 5,960 units sold), for Longines by 920 million (-18% over 2024 with 780,000 units sold).

In terms of market share, the Rolex Group (which includes Tudor) scored 34.4%, followed by Richemont (Cartier, Vacheron Constantin, Iwc, Jaeger-LeCoultre, Van Cleef & Arpels and Panerai, among others) with 17.6%, Swatch Group (Omega, Longines, Swatch, Tissot, Breguet and Blancpain, among others) with 16.1% and Lvmh (Bulgari, Tag Heuer, Hublot, Louis Vuitton and Zenith, among others) with 5.3%. Within Lvmh, the study highlighted the 9% growth in Louis Vuitton's market share (estimated sales of CHF 165 million), emphasising its positioning work towards haute horlogerie, while independent brands such as F.P. Journe, H. Moser & Cie, MB & F and Christopher Ward were mentioned for their solid results.

Following the report, the Swatch Group took a tough stance on the evaluations that emerged on the performance of its brands. A few days ago, the Swiss watchmaking group published a very detailed open letter on its website addressed to Morgan Stanley in which it contested the methodology of the research, stating that "data and statements contained in the report are unreliable and unverifiable", adding that "the numbers on the actual turnover of our brands deviate by an average of 24% from those in the report". The group also wrote that it might consider legal action.