Two Rolex Maniacs Debate the Brand’s Most Important Models

So, is the list most popular or most important? Semantics matter.

It’s most important, but that factors in cultural, historical, and technical contributions as well as popularity. It’s an alchemy of all of these things. So here’s the top 10, starting from the top: Submariner, Daytona, Datejust, Day-Date, GMT, Explorer and Explorer II, Oyster Perpetual, Milgauss, Sea Dweller, and Air-King.

Golden: I can make the argument for both the Sub and Daytona being number one. You’re not wrong to say the Sub is number one—it’s the most iconic watch in the Rolex lineup. It’s the biggest dive watch in the world.

And I absolutely think if Sub’s one then Daytona is two—Daytona is their only chronograph. It is the most recognizable chronograph in the world. It is the aspirational watch for everybody when you talk about Rolex. It wasn’t a commercial success at its launch and it didn’t become big in popular culture until Paul Newman and whatnot. And it really took the Zenith Daytona to become a commercial success. But I think you just can’t understate its importance in terms of watch collecting in general and to Rolex.

It goes to show that there has not been another chronograph model since [the debut of the Daytona], and I don’t think there ever will be one that they produce. Whereas before the Daytona, you had several different models of chronographs throughout their history.

I think the Daytona is probably the one that you guys differed on the most.

Lamdin: I looked at this from a perspective of historical importance. There’s no debate that the Daytona occupies a large percentage of the mind share of the collector community and upwardly mobile buyers today. Everybody wants a Daytona—that is factual. However, I thought if we’re about watches that hold the most importance in the history of Rolex, it isn’t the Daytona, because the Daytona wasn’t their first chronograph, but a wildly important part of their story. What’s important is the Rolex chronograph—whatever pre-Daytona variant you choose to put as the flagship.

My argument is that if you look at it from an importance standpoint, the Daytona is part of that story, but it’s actually the Rolex chronograph, which was the most complicated watch that they made for decades in any of its variations, that’s more important.