Watches in America: A Growing Market in the Age of Tariffs

Over the past few years, the United States has become increasingly important to the global watch industry. While established markets in Europe remain central to watch culture and countries such as China have historically driven enormous demand, America has emerged as the world’s most important individual market for Swiss watch exports. And it has done so during a period of considerable uncertainty.

Tariffs, shifting trade policies, changing consumer habits and a more challenging global luxury market have forced watch brands to reconsider how they approach the United States. Yet American demand for watches has remained remarkably resilient. For European brands looking across the Atlantic, the message is increasingly difficult to ignore: America still wants watches.

The United States accounted for approximately 17% of Swiss watch exports in 2025, making it by far the industry’s largest individual export market. Its importance becomes even clearer when compared with China. Once one of the most powerful engines of luxury-watch growth, the Chinese market has slowed considerably. Swiss watch exports to China declined by more than 12% in 2025, while the American market continued to demonstrate its importance to manufacturers. This shift is part of a broader change in the geography of the watch business.

For decades, European watchmakers could look toward Asia as the obvious destination for international expansion. Today, the United States offers something particularly attractive: a large affluent population, a mature luxury market and a consumer culture increasingly interested in watches not only as timepieces, but as expressions of personal style.

The opportunity extends well beyond traditional high-end Swiss watchmaking. American consumers can encounter watches through fashion, architecture, automotive culture, streetwear, sports and contemporary design. That creates space for brands operating at very different price points and with very different philosophies. But reaching those consumers has recently become considerably more complicated.

Few subjects created more uncertainty for the watch industry in 2025 than U.S. tariffs.

When the United States initially introduced a 10% tariff on Swiss imports in April 2025, watchmakers and distributors rushed to move inventory into the country ahead of the new costs. The effect was dramatic. Swiss watch exports to the United States jumped approximately 149% in April compared with the previous year. The following month, they dropped sharply as the industry worked through inventory that had already been moved across the Atlantic.

Then came an even bigger shock: a proposed 39% tariff on Swiss goods.

For an industry built around products manufactured overwhelmingly in Switzerland and exported around the world, a tariff of that magnitude represented far more than an inconvenience. Brands suddenly faced difficult decisions about pricing, margins, inventory and how much of the additional cost could realistically be passed on to American consumers. The situation also demonstrated something important about the modern watch industry: trade policy can influence the price of a watch almost as quickly as trends in design or consumer demand.

Fortunately for the Swiss watch industry, the 39% tariff did not become the permanent reality many initially feared. Following negotiations between Switzerland and the United States, trade conditions changed considerably. As of August 2026, Swiss imports generally face a total U.S. tariff rate of 12.5%, with existing Most Favored Nation duties credited toward that total where applicable. It is still a meaningful additional cost, particularly for an industry where pricing, distributor margins and retailer margins all interact. But 12.5% creates a very different business environment from the prospect of 39%. The experience of the past year nevertheless leaves watch companies with another variable to consider when developing their American strategy. Pricing can no longer be viewed entirely independently from trade policy.

Despite that uncertainty, demand has shown surprising strength. Industry data from 2026 points toward continued growth in American watch retail, particularly at the higher end of the market. WatchPro reported that average watch sales per retail door increased nearly 30% during the first five months of 2026, with luxury watches performing particularly strongly. The scale of the opportunity is substantial.

Authorized watch sales in the United States were estimated at approximately $10 billion in 2025. Once the rapidly growing secondary market is considered alongside new-watch sales, the size of the broader American watch economy becomes significantly larger.

There is also another reason brands remain interested in the United States: room to grow.

American spending on watches per capita remains relatively modest compared with some mature European markets. For a country with more than 340 million people and a large population of affluent consumers, even relatively small changes in watch ownership and purchasing frequency can translate into a significant market opportunity.

Perhaps the most interesting opportunity, however, isn’t simply about selling more watches. It is about changing what a watch represents.

For much of the traditional industry, watches have been marketed around familiar pillars: heritage, mechanical complexity, craftsmanship, exclusivity and provenance. Those qualities remain enormously important, particularly in luxury watchmaking. But they are no longer the only way consumers discover the category.

A new generation of customers may approach a watch in much the same way they approach sneakers, furniture, eyewear or fashion: through design. That changes the competitive landscape.

A contemporary watch does not necessarily need to position itself as an alternative to a century-old Swiss manufacture. It can occupy its own cultural space, drawing inspiration from industrial design, architecture, automotive culture, fashion or art.

Italian brand D1 Milano, for example, describes itself first as a design studio focused on watches. The distinction is subtle but important. Instead of defining the company exclusively through traditional watchmaking, the watch becomes the medium through which a broader design philosophy is expressed. It is a positioning particularly suited to an American market where consumers are accustomed to discovering brands across categories and where the boundaries between fashion, luxury, design and lifestyle are increasingly fluid.

The American watch market of 2026 presents something of a contradiction. Entering the United States has arguably become more complicated. Tariffs must be considered. Distribution remains challenging. Customer acquisition can be expensive. The country itself is enormous, and a strategy that works in Miami may look very different from one designed for New York, Los Angeles or Dallas. At the same time, the opportunity has rarely been more compelling.

The United States has become essential to the global watch industry, American consumers continue to spend on watches, and the category itself is expanding beyond the traditional definitions of watchmaking.

For European brands, success therefore requires more than simply making a product available for purchase in America. It requires understanding where the brand belongs within American culture, identifying the right partners, building awareness in the right communities and communicating why the product deserves attention in one of the world’s most competitive consumer markets.

Tariffs may change the economics of bringing a watch to America. They haven’t changed America’s appetite for them.