Hands-On: Five Things You'll Want To Know Before You Buy The Swatch x Audemars Piguet Royal Pop — And How To Get It

Earlier in the week, I got a chance to see the new Swatch x Audemars Piguet Royal Pop collaboration in person, the hottest (and most hotly debated) thing since, well, Swatch did their first collaboration with Omega. There were some restrictions, like the fact that I couldn’t handle some of them without gloves, but I did get enough of an impression to have a lot of thoughts.

Yes, I think they’re a lot of fun, and actually pretty impressive in some ways. I get that a lot of people will disagree, and that’s fine. But to answer the last part of our headline first: you can get the Swatch x AP Royal Pop watches only at select retail stores starting May 16. You can find those stores on the Swatch website by going to the homepage, looking for the collab, and clicking the “See Stores” link. One version (with a crown at the right) is $420, while the other (with a crown at the top) is $400. Also, this is not an AP-led product, so don’t call your local AP AD hoping to get one. Swatch is in charge here.

Love it or hate it, the Swatch x Audemars Piguet Royal Pop is big news. How big? A few hundred comments on our site is a good measure. But how about the fact that, in 24 hours, our “Introducing” story on the collab got about 20x an average story would do in a month and 1.75x more page views than the Rolex “Pepsi” GMT cancellation (which was the highest-traffic story of Watches & Wonders to date). We love watches over here, but it can be a bubble. There are a few rare moments when the watch world breaks containment. The sale of Paul Newman’s “Paul Newman” was probably the first big one. The MoonSwatch, however, was much, much bigger.

I still see people around the world wearing new MoonSwatches. I often chat up owners, complementing their “MoonSwatch” by name, and half the time, they don’t even know that’s what it’s called. Yet, some collectors to this day still get upset that the MoonSwatch exists. It’s no surprise that the Royal Pop would reach an audience far outside our normal community.

To those from the “outside world,” welcome to Hodinkee. Here’s everything you need to know (and more) before you buy your Royal Pop. And for our regular readers, there’s plenty of old-school Hodinkee insight here too.

1. What is the Royal Pop actually like in person?

As I mentioned above, the Royal Pop is fun. That’s the point, and I think most buyers will approach it that way. More than anything, I really want everyone to take a deep breath, put down the pitchforks (or pitchforks against pitchforks), and try to take a step back and see these as lighthearted, no-frills ways for someone to express themselves. Whether that’s expressing your personality, your passion for watches, your consumerism (if we’re taking a more negative holistic view of the world), it’s up to you. Or maybe it’s not. But I don’t find it so serious. We’ll talk about the “serious” stuff later on. But as for the watch…

Just like the iconic eight-sided bezel (with eight screws), the watches come in eight colors. Otto Rosso (pink case and dial with red bezel), Huit Blanc (white case, dial, and bezel, with rainbow-colored indices and screws in eight colors, for the eight-sided bezel), Green Eight (green case and dial, with lime-green bezel), Orenji Hachi (navy case with orange/red screws, indices, and hands), and Ocho Negro (black dial and case, white bezel and indices), Lan Ba (blue case and dial, a light blue bezel, crown, and small seconds) and OTG ROZ (pink case, a yellow crown and bezel, a teal dial, pink subsidiary seconds, and black and yellow accents).

Phew, that was a lot. I think it’ll be easier once the community settles on nicknames. White is (very obviously) either the “Rainbow Royal Pop” or the “Murakami.” Navy and orange are rooting for the New York Knicks NBA finals run. The pink/yellow/teal version already got hilarious compliments from Arizona Iced Tea. Those are three of my favorites, alongside the other blue savonette watch and the black and white version. Some colors work better than others, and those with the lighter dials and lighter indices can be difficult to read at a glance.

The first thing that struck me was how relatively small and extremely light the watches were. Being a watch nerd with a big pocket watch collection, I brought two pocket watches to compare. One was Lépine-style, with a crown at 12 o’clock, like 6 of the Royal Pops. The Lépine watches lack seconds (kind of like a “Jumbo” Royal Oak). 

The other was Savonette style, with a crown at 3 o’clock and small seconds. Both watches I brought were technically American equivalents, but they were both noticeably larger than the Royal Pop, which measures 40mm wide without the clip, 44.2mm by 53.2mm mounted on the clip, and 8.4mm thick. It also weighs only 28.20g with the attachment clip and 24.50g without it.

That lightness and small size immediately convey the sense that this is, yes, a lighthearted mechanical fascination rather than a super-serious, ultra-luxurious Royal Oak. If you were hoping for a $400 shortcut into the often-fought-over space of AP ownership with a serious piece of horology, you won’t find it here. Plastic will always feel slightly cheap, for lack of a better word, but they didn’t skimp on build quality for the price. Even the crown is a nice octagonal Royal Oak-style, with branding from both AP and Swatch.

I’ll cover finishing in a minute (which is frankly pretty impressive), but the actual feel of the watch is really nice when you snap it in and out of the cage. There’s a bit of firm resistance, and I was a little worried I might break it, but there are indentations on the side of the octagonal case and protrusions inside the cage that hold the watch. I am sure it’ll get easier as time goes on, but I don’t fear that the watch itself will fall out once it’s properly seated. This isn’t Swatch’s first rodeo with this idea. They’ve been doing their POP series for ages, and even have a necklace version. The lanyard itself seems to be of decent quality, and the contrast stitching is a nice touch, though it gets lost in the larger package you’re looking at.

If you haven’t read my colleague TanTan’s story about the crazy production that is the largely automated SISTEM51 factory, Swatch has basically dialed in making a mechanical movement at an affordable price. No, this is not a high-horology movement. It’s not chronometer certified. Heck, it isn’t easily repairable (if at all), which is one of the fairest complaints I can make about a watch like this. That’s something you should know going in, and it’s up there with the fact that, for a while, you couldn’t get replacement straps for your MoonSwatch from Swatch itself. A lot of us buy watches because they’re not disposable when they break or need service. But that’s a debate for another column.

And yet, the movement is no slouch. In fact, I’m pretty impressed with how far they went. This is a brand-new manually wound caliber. For people not into watches, that means you have to wind the watch yourself—no battery or little disc inside that spins as you move to wind it for you. But that keeps the watch thin. The watch has scratch-resistant, anti-glare sapphire crystals on the front and back, so you can see the movement. If you look at the back, you can see this pop art-style clash of colors and patterns. A giant plate covers the movement; a smaller one holds the balance that ticks at 3Hz (if it’s like other SISTEM51 movements); and then there’s this gold gear on the side that holds the mainspring, which powers the watch.

The watch runs for an impressive maximum of 90 hours, which is great for such an affordable watch. As you wind it, you can see the spring inside will disappear more and more until it’s fully wound. Once you can’t see the silver spring and only the gold barrel color shows, you know the watch is fully wound. As for how accurate it will be, all the watches are regulated in the factory with a laser to -5/+15 seconds per day. They also use a Nivachron anti-magnetic balance.

One negative is that Swatch crowns always feel a little flimsy, and I was a bit worried I might pull the crown out or break it when setting the time. I also noticed that the ratio of crown turns to set the hands made it feel like I was turning it forever. That said, the click of the manual wind was actually pretty satisfying, seeing as the watch was only $400.

There are things I didn’t get a chance to test, like the lume (I was photographing outside and couldn’t get a lume shot for the life of me) or the color-fastness of the cases (which proved problematic with watches like the Mission to Neptune). I also can’t tell you how long the cases will hold up when they’re hanging off the side of your Birkin and being bashed into the side of your chauffeur’s Rolls-Royce, or whatever influencers do these days. They’re plastic, after all, and probably will show dings and dents pretty quickly.

But the level of attention to detail and, honestly, the quality of a $400-ish watch were pretty impressive. I wish I had a Royal Oak (insert petition for Hodinkee to expense one for me for the future) to compare the tapisserie dial side by side, but take a look at that quality. Sure, it’s a stamped pattern in plastic, but it’s pretty damn cool. The bezel’s smooth edges are perfect, and the vertical striations on its top look like brushed metal. The movement “finishing” isn’t much to write home about, but they covered it up with a well-considered pop art motif. Even the small seconds subdial has circular “graining” stamped into it.

Yes, these are both timepieces and are pretty accurately described as toys. They’re not meant to be serious everyday time-telling objects, though I’m not arguing that $400 isn’t serious money to a lot, if not most, people. However, people who view this as an extension of (or siphon off) the AP product line are missing the tree for the forest (to butcher a phrase). Even the name is meant to imply whimsy, and in person, I couldn’t see it as anything but.

2. While there are eight colors, you’ve got more than eight decisions to make (and a chance at a unique watch!)

The first thing that everyone saw in the windows of Swatch stores was these Royal Pop boxes, just like the teaser for the MoonSwatch. Just like the MoonSwatch cases, you can’t buy the whole box set. If you wait in line, you’ll get a chance to pick one of the eight Royal Pops colors. There’s no guarantee that your preferred color (let alone any) will be available by the time you get to the front of the line, so you’d better have a few choices in mind.

What you will get when you buy the watch is this long, rectangular cardboard box with a fabric pull cord at the bottom. Pull on the tab, and a liner slides out, with a foam insert holding the Royal Pop and the calfskin leather lanyard with contrast stitching (kept in a straight line to avoid any weird bends or twists). This lanyard is what Swatch is calling size “S” or “Small” and is 18cm long.

But Swatch said there were three lengths. What’s going on? I immediately wondered about the logistics of people having to choose different colors and different lengths. Are they pre-packaged? Are Swatch stores swapping the lanyards on the busiest day they’ve had in years? No. The different-length lanyards, sizes M (32cm) and L (42cm), are sold separately and can be purchased on swatch.com; they actually come with the cage, so you can swap them around without buying a separate watch. They’ll be available with other accessories soon.

Wait, other accessories? Yeah, that’s what I thought too. When the press release said that there would be stands to put your watch in to use it as a desk clock (something I desperately need), I immediately got excited. I opened the box, turned it upside down, took out the liner, and no dice. Turns out that will be available on the website soon as well. What other accessories will be coming? I don’t know. But I think it gives you a lot to think about. Make sure to budget extra money if you want to buy those added bits and bobs to wear or use the watch however you want. 

Oh, and last little tidbit of information. According to sources at AP and Swatch, because the process of constructing these watches is so automated, there’s a quirky little wrinkle with the “Huit Blanc” white “Rainbow Royal Pop.” You see, all the indices are always the same color across all the watches. The color of the screws, however, is selected at random. If you watch the Swatch reel, you can see that the colors are jumbled. With eight colors of screws and 16 possible placements (front and back), I’m no math genius, but Swatch says that’s over 3 million possible combinations. They’ll always be placed in the right orientation, but depending on the combination, your “Rainbow Royal Pop” could be unique.

3. There are more ways to wear it than you think

Apologies to Malaika Crawford for stepping on her “How to Wear It” toes, but the first thing I thought of when seeing these watches in person was that this is an interesting way to play with the Royal Pop and use them in a variety of ways. Some of this may seem obvious to many of you, but judging from the comments on our “Intro,” some people might need inspiration or clarification. 

The first thing I did (which I had been wanting to do since they were first announced) was pop one watch out of its “cage” and swap it into another. It’s simple, maybe uncreative in the scheme of things, but look how cool that looks when you switch things around and add a little contrast. The bonus, as I mentioned before, is that any new lanyard comes with the full cage, so you can buy a different color without buying a second watch.

The fact that it comes with only one lanyard limits options out of the box. I know some people were calling these “necklaces,” but there’s no way you’d be getting the small lanyard around your neck. Right away, the watch is better suited hanging off a belt loop (it probably wouldn’t sit tight in your pocket without falling out). But there’s this whole other world out there that many of our (primarily male) commenters probably didn’t think of: purse charms.

Yes, that’s right, purse charms. It may seem obvious, but for the uninitiated, that’s part of the reason that Labubu got so big. After K-pop group Blackpink member Lisa was spotted with a keychain version on her purse in 2024, it blew up. Think about the Hermès Kelly and Birkin bags with the handles wrapped in a scarf (a “Twilly,” if you didn’t know) with a little trinket hanging on the side. That charm—a way to customize your already-coveted bag and further show your personality, uniqueness, and ability to get hard-to-get things—can sometimes cost thousands of dollars. I saw an AI mockup of the “Huit Blanc” on a Louis Vuitton x Murakami bag, and it was perfect. And that’s when it clicked for me: this is the target audience.

You can’t force a trend, and you can’t force hype, but AP has brand ambassadors, friends of the brand, avowed devotees, and others who all have immense cultural influence. If you saw LeBron James rock up to a game wearing a Royal Pop dangling from his belt, customized with a swapped cage, a new lanyard, maybe even a few other charms, some people (not most Hodinkee commenters, but others) will go bananas. Serena Williams, Hailey Bieber, Simone Biles—hell, Lisa from Blackpink wears AP sometimes. If she made a trend once, she can do it again. Soon enough, you’ve got influencers rocking a custom combination of three watches, cages, and lanyards (the latter made out of an LV Damier bag) at E11even in Miami.

For the audience that feels turned off by this, how about golf? We like golf, right? Do you know about golf watches? Ben has a little collection of them, I know. They’re small watches, essentially pocket watches, usually with notches that allow a thin lanyard to slip through, and you can hang them off (or, for safer keeping, in the valuables pocket of) your bag so you can always check the time if you’re not wearing a watch. The design of these watches, with the “bow” around the crown, seems perfect for that. I can imagine seeing AP Golf Ambassadors Viktor Hovland, Ian Poulter, Lee Westwood, and others with these on their bags.

Finally, no, there is no wristwatch version. Not yet. And not officially. But Swatch’s own website does say there are a lot of ways to wear the watches, including “on your wrist.” So that’s gotta be coming, right?

Meanwhile, a lot of people are already mocking them up, and I’ve gotten messages from Chinese collectors who say we’ll see some on Temu in a few months. First things first, strap makers will need to get a watch in hand to begin prototyping. Ken Kuan at Delugs was first on my radar to both make a landing page promising straps and make a reel posting about that effort, which has gotten millions of views. But he openly admitted that he can’t even begin making straps until he gets his hands on a sample for him to test. Ming Thein, from the brand Ming (of course), is so fed up with all the discussion that he offered to create a file for people to 3D-print a strap holder, so long as someone sends him a scan of the watch.

There are two questions in my mind: one, how close to the sun can a strap maker fly without violating potential AP intellectual property (by copying their strap design)? It’s possible that AP no longer owns that IP (similar to how they were denied trademark protection for the uniqueness of their Royal Oak in the United States in 2025). And when (if ever) will Swatch actually release a strap?

4. Why did Audemars Piguet do this collaboration?

The why for Swatch is obvious. Collaborating with one of the “Holy Trinity” brands, one that sits outside the Swatch Group (something some people would have said was impossible) and one with a lot of pop culture and horological cache? Sign Swatch up IMMEDIATELY. Swatch doesn’t need legitimacy, at least not commercially. And their production capabilities are the kind of stuff that impresses even people inside AP—they’ve told me that themselves privately. But what Swatch does need (and does well, to some degree) is the cultural relevancy that they’ve got a watch people would literally start fights over (even if it’s just online). Even before the watch was announced, they proved that this collaboration has legs.

For AP, the discussion gets trickier. I won’t get into the business of how this could potentially all play out. Others already have, and maybe our Senior Business Editor Andy Hoffman will break that down in a future story. There are definite pluses and minuses. But let me take the positive view.

This project began years ago, well before the current CEO, Ilaria Resta, joined. The wheels of Swatch (which can produce about six SISTEM51 movements per minute) move fast, but not that fast. It’s no wonder it started with the former CEO, François-Henry Bennahmias. He praised the MoonSwatch in our Talking Watches interview. He was once one of the world’s largest collectors of Swatch watches in the world before donating the collection to the Swatch Museum. But you can’t just decide the whims of a billion-dollar company that produces around 50,000 watches per year solely on vibes, can you? Taking a page from the brand’s old playbook is easier.

So let’s look at that number. Say the brand makes 50,000 watches. Resta told us earlier this year that they see demand between four and ten times higher, depending on the model. Now, a Swatch x AP collaboration doesn’t serve the same market or the same clients that want to buy a “Jumbo” Royal Oak (one of the most iconic watch designs of all time, for those who don’t follow watches). It also doesn’t appease them. 

But when people can’t get what they want, there’s attrition, and you’ll lose potential customers. Not everyone who buys Royal Pop will be a future customer. Heck, imagining they make 500,000 of these things in the first two years, you’d be happy if you got 0.5% as long-term customers. But either way, it brings the brand to an audience it never had before.

Again, we’re thinking about the best-case scenario, but also about the framework I mentioned before: “how to wear it” and who the target audience is. Now you’re killing at least two birds with one stone. First, you’re giving a bit of levity and a taste of AP to someone who hasn’t quite been able to save the money or, if they have, crack the retail experience of AP yet. Maybe you’re making the next Labubu, and things really take off. Maybe things go the way of MB&F and a sizeable part of your income comes from affordable watches (even if you’re donating it all). You’re also building a ton of brand awareness for the next generation. And last, but not least, you’re likely bringing a lot of eyeballs (and therefore potential clients) from a female audience, which is by far the most coveted customer segment in watches.

Now, that can backfire, and the next generation will see the brand as associated with affordable toy watches, but here’s where I think AP made the right call. I understand that many people were hoping for a wristwatch for various reasons. There are young kids, especially, who don’t want anything to do with a pocket watch trinket but would wear the heck out of a plastic Royal Oak wristwatch. However, they would almost certainly get tired of that watch, and that mental connection between experience and quality would potentially remain. So if a wristwatch format comes, there’s an inherent gamble.

Without (yet again) engaging in the debate over whether this project erodes brand equity, I think that by choosing a pocket watch format, AP dodged a lot of the debate in advance—at least at launch. Everyone worked themselves up, thinking a wristwatch was imminent, only to have to change their argument when it turned out that AP was smarter and more cautious. If you roll up to the boardroom wearing a Swatch x AP taped to your wrist, no one will take you seriously. But I doubt anyone would be so insane. The people vying for a 16202ST at the AP House in New York aren’t going to stop doing that to wait in line for a watch they’d have to wear off their belt loop. 

The kicker is that AP is donating all its proceeds to a dedicated initiative supporting the preservation and transmission of watchmaking savoir-faire, with a focus on rare skills and the next generation of horological talent. What that looks like, I am not sure. Will it be the Time Æon Foundation (that basically says the same thing as their raison d’être), which drives the impressive Naissance d’une Montre handmade watch project? Or will it be something to support the brand’s recently announced Atelier des Établisseurs training? I’ll ask for more information and see if there’s an announcement soon.

5. That’s cool and all, but should I wait in line?

That’s entirely up to you, but there are a few other factors worth considering. First, we don’t know how many watches of each color and lanyard length Swatch will stock in their stores. Bigger stores, like New York’s Times Square location (which hosted block-long lines for some releases), will certainly get more. But there are also professional “line sitters” who are there to help ensure the watches get into scalpers’ hands. This is a bummer on multiple levels. So there’s no guarantee that there will be any left on the first day if you’re near the end of the line.

There are a few types of people I can see lining up for the Royal Pop. First are the people who love being, well, first. If that’s you, what are you reading this for? You’ve got a line to get in. Same with the hypebeasts. Logic rarely applies, so I’m not going to argue. Others are die-hard watch enthusiasts who want the cool new thing everyone is talking about, so you can share it at RedBar or whatever meetup you go to. Yes, there will be AP fans who own AP watches. 

Some have been dying to get any watch branded “Audemars Piguet” but can’t imagine ever affording a wristwatch from the brand; frankly, I support you getting a bit of your dream brand, even if that’s the only way you can. We’re an industry built on passion, after all. Then there will be the smattering of people who haven’t heard of AP but have fallen in love with the bright colors and are now very interested in the watch and in AP in general. This is, most likely, the long-term target audience.

If you don’t fall into these categories, it’s probably okay to wait. I was certain that I was going to get up early and go to the Swatch store for the first MoonSwatch day. Then I saw how long the lines were, the police that had to be called in at locations around the world, realized I like sleep more than I like crowds or watches, and I decided to stay in. I didn’t pick up my first MoonSwatch until two years later, while sleepily wandering through the Geneva airport. Oh, and more proof that people care about the MoonSwatch, that was our top-read story of that Watches and Wonders 2024 week.

If you want a Royal Pop, you’ll have chances in the future. Granted, I get that a lot of people don’t live near a Swatch store, which is its own frustrating problem. But if you think back to the MoonSwatch days, people were flipping the watches for insane prices for a while, and eventually, things cooled off.  I also am acutely aware (more than people realize) that people with disabilities can’t necessarily wait in line, so I feel for those who desperately want these but can’t get them. But as for the MoonSwatch, while you can’t get the whole collection online, there are still four options available for purchase. 

There’s no guarantee that will happen for the Royal Pop, but maybe it will once the craze has died down a little bit. Or maybe you can find one for a small markup on eBay. But personally, I find the online listings asking thousands of dollars kind of ridiculous. I mean, many of the accounts were just created recently, a lot of them use AI pictures of old, fake products, and you’re just begging to be scammed. So take a deep breath, smile, maybe wait a bit, and enjoy life. There is plenty of serious watchmaking to discuss, and we’ll certainly get back to that soon. Ultimately, while the watch may not be for you, it’s meant to be a fun product that reaches a broader audience beyond our little world of watch enthusiasm and brings new people into the fold. A relatively affordable price, bright colors, and an iconic design are a great way to do that.

Mark Kauzlarich

2026-05-15 18:00:00