Omega Just Announced the Craziest Speedmaster of All Time

There’s never been a watch that functions like the Omega Speedmaster Chrono Chime before.

Published October 25, 2022

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Updated October 26, 2022

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It’s #SpeedyTuesday, but this is no ordinary Speedmaster. In fact, there’s never before been a watch created like the new Omega Chrono Chime. Let alone an Omega Speedmaster. One of the most complicated watch movements Omega has ever created, it features a mechanism which chimes the chronograph’s elapsed time and comes in two stunning new watches — including a solid gold Speedmaster.

Let’s unpack exactly what “chiming the chronograph’s elapsed time” means. Chiming watches allow you to hear the time sounded out through dinging gongs from within the watch with the press of a button, and there are different variations on the concept. Some might tell you the hours plus the quarter hours, five minutes or even the time down to the minute. It might be useful in the dark (especially in the olden days when they were invented) or if you’re visually impaired. While the use cases may sound narrow, it’s also important to note that chiming functions in modern horology are a pursuit of high watch engineering – and the new Omega Chrono Chime and its Olympic-heritage sibling are most certainly that.

Omega’s new watch, however, applies the repeater concept to its chronograph. To use it, you’d activate the chronograph as usual and stop it via the pusher in the crown. Then you can read the elapsed time visually — or you can hear it by pressing the button on the case side at 8 o’clock. The button sports a beautifully embossed musical note to make that function clear.

If, for example, you stopped the chronograph at three hours and 52 minutes, you would hear the time articulated via three different chimes. First are three low chimes for the hours; then three double chimes, equalling 45 minutes; and finally seven higher pitched chimes would add up to 52.

Sounds simple enough, right? It’s far easier said than done — creating such a watch, that is (using it is indeed simple). Chronographs are complex to begin with, and chiming watches are ferociously complicated feats of towering micro-engineering. Combining them is something that had never been done, and Omega didn’t stop there. It also added more features with split seconds, a high-beat rate of 5Hz and gave the watch its stringent Master Chronometer certification. It comprises over 500 components and garnered Omega 17 (yes, seventeen) new patents.

While these might not be the kinds of features you need or would even find particularly useful on a daily basis, the cool thing is that the whole concept is actually rooted in a concept of functionality: it’s all based on the chronograph and Omega’s long history timing the Olympics.

In development for six years with Swatch Group sister brand Blancpain, Omega took the 90th anniversary of its role as official Olympic timekeeper as the occasion to announce this new movement and two watches which house it — and it did so with an event in Los Angeles, where the first Olympic Games it timed was held in 1932.

The first watch is the Omega Olympic 1932 Chrono Chime, and its design is based on the pocket watches once used to time the games. Its beat rate of 5Hz is also a nod to this history, as the brand wanted to be able to mechanically measure down to 1/10 of a second, just like those historical stopwatches did. The Speedmaster Chrono Chime, however, is calculated as a crowd-pleaser, taking the form of the watch that famously went to the moon.

Both are truly impressive feats of engineering, but also visually striking (striking — get it?). This applies both from a typical vantage on the wrist, but also under the scrutiny of a loupe. Omega didn’t hold back in any respect on this halo product and gave the watch a haute horlogerie treatment inside and out with incredible finishing — which, yes, Gear Patrol did have the chance to scrutinize in person at the unveiling event in L.A. today.

Both are produced in 18k Sedna gold, the brand’s own alloy, and even the deliciously decorated movement’s plates are gold. The dials use exotic crafts with the Olympic 1932 Chrono Chime featuring hand-laid enamel and the Speedmaster’s 45mm gold case and bracelet contrasting with an aventurine dial.

If you’re thinking these sound expensive and will be hard to actually buy, you are 100% right. Price is on request but we’re likely talking in the multiple hundreds of thousands. These are halo products, meaning they’re meant to show off what Omega watchmakers can do when tasked with a lofty vision, elevate the brand and garner attention amongst watch enthusiasts and collectors. But if you have the cash and the desire, get on the list early – not that there’s a list yet – because Omega can only produce a maximum of five of these movements a year.