Nomos has been busy. Along with the recent introduction of a quartet of new Tetras to the lineup which we discussed just last week, the German brand has also introduced a new version of the Metro. The Metro has an interesting place in the Nomos lineup. It’s not one of the original designs from the launch of the brand, but over time it’s come to be fairly emblematic of what the brand stands for from a design perspective. The simple circular case and wire lugs have a modern, minimal vibe to them. When wearing the watch you come away with the feeling that there’s only enough material here to hold everything together and keep it looking like a Nomos, and nothing more. The dial, too, is quite distinctive, with ultra thin and elongated syringe hands and a series of simple dots to mark minutes and hours. This new reference is a subtly updated take on a classic version of the Metro, with a new movement that solves a longstanding issue.
The headline here is that the new Metro 38 Date runs on the still relatively new DUW 4601 caliber. This movement made its debut in the still incredibly weird and polarizing Tangente 2Date, which will be forever remembered for featuring not one but two date indications: one in a window at 6:00, and the other at the perimeter of the dial. This Metro, unlike the Tangente before it, only has a single date indicator at the 6:00 position. There have been many iterations on the Metro over the years, but this is the first time we’ve seen a date version in the classic 38mm case size (this case actually measures 38.5mm, technically).
The upgrade to the DUW 4601 is meaningful as it allows for Nomos watches with a date to be changed quickly. The previous date enabled movements in the old Alpha caliber family (which were based on the architecture of manually wound Peseux movements) had frustratingly old fashioned date mechanisms that lacked quick advancement. There was a trick that allowed users to cycle through the date more quickly by repeatedly passing the hands over midnight in both directions, which always seemed like a needlessly cumbersome hack. Speaking personally, it’s definitely something that turned me off of Nomos watches with date complications in those days. The DUW 4601, also manually wound, and more nicely decorated to boot, offers real world advantages to the end user. It’s also an interesting movement mechanically, with the date module mounted to the outside perimeter of the caliber (this is what allowed Nomos to create a second date indicator for the Tangente 2Date).
In terms of the dial, this Metro hews very close to the original design. Light blue dots mark the hours at 12, 3, and 9, and we get smaller black dots for a minute register at the dial’s perimeter with Arabic numerals every 5 minutes (except at 6:00, where we have a date window). The placement of the date window on this Metro and others before it has been a bit controversial – it takes up a lot of space and creates an unusual “stack” with the subsidiary seconds. Honestly this is not really to my taste, but it’s completely subjective and some people dig it. I like a no-date Metro myself, but the point of this dial is really the easy legibility via the use of and creation of negative space with the thin hands and small but easy to recognize minute and hour markers. It’s quite easy to tell the time to the precise minute on just about any Metro thanks to the way the dial is laid out.
The new Metro 38 Date retails for $3,830. More information can be found at the Nomos website here
Zach Kazan
2025-11-03 19:00:00