Feature: Is Omega still a better choice than Rolex in 2023?
In 2022, I could’ve given you a hundred reasons why you’d be better off putting your money into an Omega Seamaster instead of a Rolex Submariner. But it’s not 2022, it’s now. Have things changed?
Omega vs Rolex in 2022
Let’s first have a quick recap and remind ourselves why the Omega Seamaster made a better purchase than the Rolex Submariner in 2022. It was certainly no easy choice when it came to specs: they’re both capable of withstanding depths up to 300m, thanks to chunky steel cases—42mm on the Omega, 41mm on the Rolex—they’re both built to an exquisite level by utter powerhouses of the Swiss watchmaking industry and they both look like they could take a round or two with a bulldozer.
They been trading blows for decades, over half a century even, competing to reach the murkiest depths of the ocean even today with the extreme dive watch flagships the Ultra Deep and Deepsea Challenge, punching each other right in the face seven miles below the surface. It’s hard to believe that Rolex was once the young pretender, the scrappy pup taking on giant Omega, but that’s how it was. The roles were reversed so hard Omega got whiplash, now outpaced by cheeky Rolex four to one.
It really is nip and tuck with these two. Omega's calibre 8800 not only packs such features as the Co-Axial escapement, a low-friction mechanism pioneered by the greatest mind in modern watchmaking, and anti-magnetism, you can actually see the thing through the back, which means you don’t just have to take Omega's word on the quality like you do with the Rolex.
You can’t see the Rolex calibre 3235, but you can measure its two second per day accuracy and 70-hour power reserve, which beat Omega's five seconds and 55-hour power reserve. It probably looks just as lovely as Omega's calibre too, although with that solid case back it may well be painted bright pink and dipped in glitter for all we know.
It’s easier to split the atom than it is to split these two apart, and it’s for exactly that reason that, to decide, you’ve got to play a bit dirty. Well, I think this is one of those cases where Omega’s low blow will follow immediately with a cry of, “Well, Rolex started it!” and you can imagine that ultimately both are as bad as each other.
Basically, you could think the Rolex is the best thing since heated slippers and it kind of doesn’t matter, because if you actually attempt to buy one, you’re going to come a bit unstuck. You’d have better luck finding a needle in a needle stack during the Saint Needles Day parade on the Isle of Wight. As far as you’re concerned, the Rolex Submariner is discontinued forever and ever and that’s it.
Even if you could get one, you’re still faced with a fresh, steaming dilemma: is it worth it? The entry no-date Submariner costs now a cool £7,700. Add a date and that goes to £8,650. If you fancy having the bezel in green, you’ll need to up that to £9,100.
By contrast, the Omega Seamaster is going to spend just £4,800 of your money on a rubber strap and £5,100 on a steel bracelet. And although the green Seamaster is a pretty hard-to-get watch, it still won’t cost you more than the black one like it does with the Rolex , whose holistic attitude to colour is the very embodiment of one Henry Ford.
The Seamaster used to be even cheaper than that, but then so too did the Submariner. The gulf is as vast as it’s ever been, a great chasm whose only occupants are a string of people queueing up on the Rolex waitlist. But things have changed a lot since we last spoke about this. It’s a different landscape, and that might change our perspective. Let’s see.
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What’s hard is that until incredibly recently, the Seamaster in this guise was a watch with a price that started with a three. Top threes, mind, and only on the rubber strap, but nevertheless it was a remarkable piece of good value even without the lofty shadow cast by the Rolex weighty price tag.
It was a fairly obvious play by Omega to recoup some lost ground to Rolex and it was never going to last forever, but at that price point the only real contender it had was the other Rolex, Tudor. And who’d want a watch named after domestic violence poster child Henry VIII, when given the opportunity to buy an actual Omega instead?
I’m sure it really sucked for Omega to be the consolation prize in the dive watch game, but even if you’re selling something for disappointed customers who’ve just left the Rolex store empty-handed to dry their eyes with, you’re still selling watches. Up that price to today’s £5,100 and it makes spite-spending on a revenge purchase a little harder to justify.
It’s still, like, half the price though, which is kind of nuts when you think about it. Is the Rolex really worth that much more? In terms of the physical product, of course it’s not, and that’s why we’ve pinned the badge on Omega for being the better watch purchase. You really, really, really have to like Rolex more to justify the difference.
And people really do like Rolex that much more. The only thing that’s been stopping them has been the physical impossibility of actually getting one. If the laws of physics dictated that the Submariner had to be a plentiful element in the universe, Rolex would still find a way to make sure you couldn’t have one.
So, what’s changed in 2023 apart from equal parts inflation? Well, you might remember how Bitcoin decided to throw itself off a cliff and take down Rolex with it from the insane heights it found itself at, and that journey is coming to an interesting conclusion. The gap between RRP and resale price on the Submariner has become small enough to start tempting people’s wallets out of hibernation.
The previous generation Submariner, in 40mm instead of 41mm, is so similar to the new generation even its own mother would get them mixed up, and right now you’re looking to spend ballpark similar money to a brand-new green-bezelled SubmarinerLV. If you were tempted by the prospect at RRP, you’ve got to be tempted by that, and if it’s the watch you’ve got to have, the Seamaster could cook you dinner and massage your feet and you’d still give it the cold shoulder.
So, is the Omega Seamaster still the right choice to have in 2023 over the Rolex Submariner? It’s still substantially cheaper and still an equal match to the Submariner in terms of specs, so yes, one hundred percent. Not to mention that the investment benefits of getting a Submariner at RRP have been massively reduced, so it’s not like you’d be thinking of hoping to get the call and then sell the Submariner to buy seven Omega Seamasters either.
But if the Rolex is the one that simmers your juices, then where it was once as unobtainable as a unicorn’s 90s house mixtape, once a recipe that sent buyers streaming into Omega's arms to get a there-there and a shiny new Seamaster—now it’s not looking quite so bad. No internal organs need be sold anymore. Now could be the time you’ve been patiently waiting for.
What do you think? Is the Omega still the sensible choice or have Rolex clawed back your favour? Have you been loyal to the Swiss giant the entire time?
