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The best Swiss watches under $500: Your best buy is a Swatch watch (and these are the best)

There's more than just the ultra-trendy moonswatch

Swatch Watch Face
Courtesy of Swatch

Most of us have our favorite watch, which we wear on our wrists to look elegant, mature, and ready to face the world personally and professionally. However, we also want a second watch that is stylish, fun, and expressive. We want a way to show off our personality. That is where a Swatch watch comes in. While some people believe it stands for Swiss watches because it is a watch brand in the watch capital of the world, Switzerland, it actually stands for “second watch” because the company realizes there’s a market for fun alternatives to classic men’s watches.

With the oversaturated industry of men’s watches often adopting a stuffy and old-school feel, Swatches are intended to be different—more fun than your Rolex or Omega but as dependable as both. The choices in watches are aplenty, but here are the ones to keep your eye on.

Swatch Antarctic
Courtesy of Swatch

Antarctic Ocean Bioceramic Fifty Fathoms

The Fifty Fathoms Collection honors life on the Seven Seas with a true dive watch dedicated to each of the oceans. The Antarctic version is a beautiful all-white, ice-centered piece that will stand out no matter what you wear. Most guys don’t think they can pull off a white watch, but this bad boy does the job for you.

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Swatch Mission to Saturn
Courtesy of Swatch

Mission to Saturn Bioceramic Moonswatch

The Moonswatch line is 11 models combining the beautiful Swatch bioceramic construction with Omega Speedmaster. Due to its involvement in the moon race of the 1960s, the latter has a following. There is no question why this line is so popular in the Swatch world, and the Mission to Saturn version, with its earth-toned colorway, can take the place of any brown watch you own, giving your outfit a little personality.

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Swatch Core Sistem Boreal
Courtesy of Swatch

Core Sistem Boreal

From the solar system back to the oceans, this beautiful work of art features a watch face and dial inspired by a maritime compass. While it may look similar to your other silver bracelet watches in your collection, the subtle detail outshines the rest in a way that will keep you on the right heading throughout the day.

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Swatch Big Bold Checkpoint
Courtesy of Swatch

Big Bold Checkpoint Black

Black isn’t the usual color you think of when you think of bold. While it usually fades to the background, this version stands out due to the eye-catching checkered pattern on the face and the secondary dials’ bold striped patterns. This may be an all-black piece you think of as a subtlety with an outfit, but you’ll get more questions about it than you are ready for.

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Swatch Irony Blue Grid
Courtesy of Swatch

Irony Blue Grid

This version may be the most basic of the bunch, as it looks similar to many other watch faces with the blue dial and pops of red. It feels very similar to the Omega Seamaster with the blue rubber strap that will keep the attention. This watch is perfect for your weekend backyard barbeque or trip to the coast.

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Swatch SkinEarth
Courtesy of Swatch

Skin Irony 42 Skinearth

Sometimes the best way to stand out is to remain small and sleek. The Skinearth collection is the perfect way to do that with its ultra-thin profile. The green strap and sun-brushed dial take you back to the roots of the collection, sticking to the earthly green colors. No matter how small and sleek it is though, the pops of orange and white won’t go unnoticed for long.

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Swatch September Carbonic Green
Courtesy of Swatch

The September Collection Carbonic Green

For those of us who like to wear green but don’t want to be as subtle or earthy as the Skinearth, there is the September Collection’s Carbonic Green. This green is louder and will definitely stand out with the solid rubber strap combined with the bright green digits and white dials.

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Swatch Core Night Flight
Courtesy of Swatch / Swatch

Core Night Flight

This is the most classic look of everything on the list. While you may be looking for something that stands out against the rest of your collection, this option is perfect for the guy just starting out and looking for something basic and ready to be worn right away. The black dial and silver bracelet are about as straightforward as they get with Swatch.

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Swatch Halloween Capsule Your Time is Coming
Courtesy of Swatch

Halloween Capsule Your Time is Coming

Okay, forget the straight-forward, and let’s look at something truly unique, something Swatch does better than anyone. With Halloween right around the corner, pick up something spooky and fun to get in the mood for the big day. The dial already has a terrifyingly cool dial that really steps it up in the glow of trick-or-treating light.

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Swatch OOPS! Big Bold Planets
Courtesy of Swatch

Big Bold OOPS

Finally, get yourself something that will stand out not only because of the color but also because of the style. Its black rubber strap and bright orange colorway will become the centerpiece of any outfit, but that is only the beginning of what makes this piece striking. The transparent watch face allows you to see the working dials and the numbers are jumbled up in a crazy way to give the watch a zany look. The seven lands on one of the inner gears, the eight is bigger than the rest, and the nine is outside the dial on the bezel.

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If you are more of a fan of orange than black, you can swap out the strap for an all-orange look to really make it pop. The definition of what Swatch watches are meant to do.

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Mark D McKee
Mark cut his teeth in the men's style world when he sold suits first at box stores such as Men's Wearhouse and Jos. A. Bank…
Swatch’s new gold MoonSwatch is priced like it’s 1969
The Mission to the Moon 1969 packs 11 grams of real 18K gold — priced at the 1969 gold rate.
Wristwatch, Arm, Body Part

Guess what? It's another MoonSwatch — but this isn't just another colorway. The new drop from the Switzerland-based watchmaker, the MoonSwatch Mission to the Moon 1969, is the first to use real gold across the dial, hands, crown, and pushers.

The watch marks the anniversary of the Apollo 11 landing on July 21, 1969.

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Breitling’s new Top Time is a wearable tribute to the Aston Martin DB5
The new watches rep the iconic Bond car right down to subdials shaped like its dashboard gauges.
Car, Watch, Man

Breitling just released a trio of heaters: the Top Time B01 Chronograph 41 Tribute to Aston Martin DB5, a three-edition collaboration with the British carmaker. The connection between the Swiss watchmaker and the British car company runs back to 1965, when a Top Time ref. 2002 appeared on Sean Connery's wrist in Thunderball, worn alongside the DB5 — the first Q-modified watch in the Bond series. It's a nice bit of trivia that the DB5 and that Top Time shared the screen in the same film, and both went on to outlive the movie by decades.

The car cues go deeper than the "squircle" gauge-shaped subdials: a wooden inner ring nods to the DB5's steering wheel, and each edition rides on a hand-colored gradient calfskin strap meant to read like automotive upholstery. All three run on Breitling's in-house Manufacture Caliber 01, a COSC-certified automatic chronograph with a 70-hour power reserve, visible through a sapphire caseback and finished with an Aston Martin-engraved rotor. The case measures 41mm. The editions are divvied up by material and rarity. Stainless steel with a silver dial is limited to 1,022 pieces and sticks closest to the original ref. 2002, while steel with a platinum bezel and black lacquered dial drops to 315 pieces.

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Look to the sky for these space themed watches
These 5 space themed watches will have you seeing stars
Accessories, Strap, Wristwatch

It was the 1960s. We were in the middle of a Cold War with Russia, and instead of escalating to an actual war with bullets and bombs, we took the conflict to the sky. We created a war of economics, science, and morale in a race to the sky to be the first nation to reach the moon. While the race picked up throughout the decade, it came down to the wire before the USA won the race by landing on the moon (if you believe that sort of thing and don't believe Stanley Kubrick directed the greatest ruse of all time). In any case, no race can be run without a good timekeeper. And watches were a must-have for all involved. Ever since, chronophiles like me have been obsessed with space-themed watches and, in particular, moon mission watches.

That is why I happened to have this list in my head. Five watches that bring the space race and the great beyond to the forefront of thinking to build a collection that is out of this world.

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