Titanium is reshaping watchmaking with its strength, lightness, and durability, driven by Rolex’s bold adoption.
Buying a new Rolex has become a significant task even in 2025 when the AAA+ replica watches market has dropped.
Perhaps more than any other material that we have covered so far, the stars might be right for titanium to truly take off. We first tackled this material in 2021, right on the heels of our ceramic special, and there were some links. While the world has since moved on from sweeping post-pandemic concerns, the watch-buying world has embraced titanium wholeheartedly, even though statistics indicate that this metal (and its alloys) accounts for under 10% of Swiss exports in 2024 (source: Statista). This will no doubt trend upwards because no less than Rolex has finally gotten into the game.
The Rolex Oyster Perpetual Yacht-Master 42 debuted in 2023 in RLX titanium (more on this later) and marked the first full best selling Rolex copy watches case in any kind of titanium alloy for the brand; Rolex had previously used titanium for the caseback of the Deepsea watches. It is this watch, and Rolex’s subsequent Deepsea Challenge watches, that made us decide to give titanium, as opposed to all other materials, a more thorough re-examination of this issue. As usual, though, we are getting ahead of ourselves…
To move things ahead and bring you up to speed, here is a brief primer on titanium, pulled and distilled from our 2021 special. If you have best clone Rolex watches cased in Grade 2 titanium, then that is commercially pure titanium; yes, commercially pure titanium is suitable for use in finished products. This is one of the amazing things about titanium, and is quite unparalleled, except perhaps for platinum (as far as watchmaking goes). So, what is titanium anyway?
A metallic element, titanium appears grey, or perhaps like unshining silver. In other words, it is colourless and not particularly lustrous. Its chemical element symbol is Ti and its atomic number is 22. A Group 4 transition metal, it lends its name to its grouping of metals, including zirconium (Zr), hafnium (Hf), and rutherfordium (Rf). See the gold section for more details on what the atomic number means.
Now, titanium offers a high level of mechanical resistance, otherwise known as mechanical impedance, making it extremely durable. It would not be suitable for a long-wearing item such as a wristwatch otherwise. It would certainly be no good for something like a dive AAA+ fake Rolex watches, where it will be expected to take a beating and keep on ticking, as the saying goes.
On the matter of hardness, we will use the Rockwell scale (see ‘Hardness’). Approximately, 316L registers 79 while Grade 5 registers 41. Now, there are some subtleties to this measure, but broadly speaking, this result speaks to the point some collectors have noted on forums about titanium being softer than steel.
The main benefit of titanium versus steel, though, as far as watches go, comes down to its corrosion resistance (‘Passivation’). This is a defining characteristic of titanium and carries over to most of its alloys. It marks the metal as quite special, as noted in our original segment on why the biomedical field uses it. In simple terms, high quality fake Rolex watches in titanium will not react to fresh water, sea water, typical swimming pool water, alkalis, acids and just about anything. It is the next best thing to platinum (which is a comparison we like to repeat, but it is relevant), but much cheaper and lighter.
Finally, titanium has been gaining notice for its usefulness in movements, as seen in TAG Heuer and Ulysse Nardin this year. Whether this picks up momentum – and we have every reason to think it will – will also be key to the rise of titanium.
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