4 Chinese Luxury Watch Brands Pioneering Change

The watch industry is slowly shifting away from Swiss dominance, as the rest of the world establishes their own talents for watchmaking and patriotic independents look to grow their own brands, rather than partner up in Switzerland. This blog looks at 4 of the most well-known and biggest Chinese watchmakers and brands, and what they are doing for their region in the Watchmaking world. 

What was once a region renowned for fakes and low-quality products, in recent times the location has been home to fast development in watches, with some big-name brands entering the market via well-crafted pieces, unique designs and budget-friendly price-points, leaving the other once-dominant regions trying to catch up.

Ciga Design

Ciga Design was founded in 2016 by Zhang Jianmin, and in the following year they produced their first production watch, the C Series. 

The brand's big break came in 2021, in which they won the Challenge Watch Prize at the GPHG Awards for their Blue Planet II Watch, the first Chinese brand to win at the GPHG awards, which set the tone for the rest of the watchmaking world that they had competition from a region that is incredibly cost-effective and can produce large amounts of raw materials cheaply, making the process of watchmaking and designing easier and cheaper, which reflects in the RRP and cost to the consumer, therefore being the go-to option for money-conscious buyers, while getting good value-for-money.

Ciga Design have a wide catalogue with many collections of unique and mechanical watches, which are good-value-for-money in comparison to watches in a similar price bracket from other regions.

Olto-8

Olto-8 are another Watch company born in China, also taking the unique and cost-effective approach to luxury watchmaking. Founded in 2018, Olto-8 produce a wide range of watches with a variety of different time-reading methods, from the highlight collection in the ChronoGate, to the casino-inspired ROTO collection.

Olto-8 research and design movements that challenges traditional Swiss and the rest-of-the-world watchmakers and companies in price and value-for-money.

The ChronoGate is a highlight in the brand's roster as it contains all of the features of a well-made Swiss watch, with a unique movement in a 24-Hour Jumping index wheel and guilloche dial pattern, all while starting at £449. It has a variety of colours too, with a stunning Glacier Blue, and the small details of the hands lining up to create the brand logo shows the thought put into the piece, somewhat resembling high-horology designs such as the Ludovic Ballouard Upside Down.

Atelier Wen

Atelier Wen are one of the most well-known Chinese brands, for good reason. They have consistently shown the rest of the industry the potential of the Chinese region in crafting and creating tasteful watches, most notably with the Perception collection - an Integrated Sports Watch - which the first creation sold out in 16 Hours, showing the trust and support from the industry towards Atelier Wen.

The Perception collection has had upgrades and variants over the years, yet still remains the brand's most popular and famous piece, with high specifications, Chinese-inspired features using complex techniques and materials, and a reasonable price, placing it high in the mid-range luxury sports-watch category, with the likes of the Zenith Defy Skyline and the and IWC Ingenieur.

A smaller catalogue of watches compared to the other Chinese brands in this Blog, yet their goals and audience are less price-sensitive, and the craftsmanship and time taken to create the timepieces are raised.

Earthen Co.

Earthen Co. are the final brand covered in this blog. While there could be more great Chinese Brands such as Behrens, this list covers some of the known and unknown to many.

Earthen Co.'s core value of the brand is to make watches accessible, and the choice of material and price point does just that. Ceramic is used in all of their current models, which is a material that is usually reserved for high-end pieces, due to it's unique properties and benefits, yet Earthen Co. have made this material available to the price-sensitive customer.

The brand have had huge success with this approach, selling out their recent Moonglow and Nightfall Aventurine Dial models in short time (it's clear to see why), and their standard models operating on a Pre-Order Basis as of May 2026. The white ceramic model provides a great alternative to the popular ceramic Pilot's Watches by IWC, in particular the Lake Tahoe. At the sub-£1,000 price-point, these watches are great for anyone looking for a ceramic piece, and it is a great USP for the brand, as there is little competition in this price bracket for now using this style. The dials are great as well, using clean and minimalistic indices or markers, appealing to the 21st century aesthetic.

Which is your favourite Chinese Brand, and do you think that there will be a shift from Swiss-centred watchmaking in the future, or will Switzerland always dominate the market for it's history and premium-status?