Wristwatches have been a part of aviation since the first ever timepiece was created for a pilot in 1904- Louis Cartier designed a wristwatch (the iconic Santos watch) for pilot Alberto Santos-Dumont to wear on his wrist while flying on his single engine plane. It can be said that Cartier established the role of an aeronautical watch, as it served several functions. Watch could be used to calculate the fuel consumption, air speed, lift capacity, navigation and finally, it was useful for time keeping.

In the 1930s, watchmaker Breitling introduced onboard chronographs for planes in the Royal Air Force so pilots could determine their speed, distance traveled, and fuel consumption. In 1952, Breitling introduced the Navitimer mechanical chronograph, which featured a circular slide-rule bezel that was expressly designed for pilots to calculate aviation navigations while in flight. This quickly gained a good reputation among pilots. The brand earned its nickname as the ‘official supplier of the aviation world’. Nowadays, Breitling Navitimer is one of the coolest watches to wear every day. 

In the jet-age, as pilots found themselves flying across multiple time zones a new requirement emerged. In response, Rolex launched  the GMT-Master, the world’s first wristwatch with a GMT function. Rolex GMT-Master watch was born in the year of 1955, which can make the pilot read the time information of the two time zones at the same. GMT-Master II was launched in 1983 as an improvement in the GMT-Master. Replica Rolex GMT Master II features two hour hands, one corresponding to the traditional 12-hour watch face on the dial and the other synchronized to a 24-hour bezel. This allowed pilots to track flight time with the Zulu bezel and still use the local timezone while on the ground.

In addition to the watches discussed above, there are some other famous Swiss pilot watches, such as Omega Speedmaster, IWC Pilot watches, ect.