Breitling Launches First Titanium Navitimer in New Aston Martin Collab

Breitling announced today that it has become the Official Watch Partner of  British luxury carmaker Aston Martin and the Aston Martin Aramco Formula One racing team. The multi-year global partnership, which marks the Swiss watchmaker’s return to the high-octane world of F1 motorsports after many decades, kicks off with a wristwatch milestone: the Breitling Navitimer B01 Chronograph 43 Aston Martin Aramco Formula One Team, which is no less than the first timepiece in the iconic Navitimer series with a case made of lightweight titanium. 

The two world-renowned companies have some ties throughout their prestigious histories. Breitling, while it has not been as visible in the racing world over the years as brands like Rolex and TAG Heuer, was an early contributor to motorsport timing. In 1907, Léon Breitling, who had founded his eponymous watchmaking firm in 1884, invented a device called the “Vitesse” (French for “speed”), a mechanical chronograph capable of measuring speeds up to 250 miles per hour. Its utility and precision spurred the Swiss police to adopt it for speed enforcement, which led to the world’s first speeding tickets. Just six years later, in 1913, Lionel Martin and Robert Bamford drove their hand-built automobile to a defining victory up the treacherous Aston Hill, giving their company a name and kicking off a long tradition of making cars built for both performance and luxury.

The paths of the Swiss high-horology house and the British marque crossed in 1959, the year of Aston Martin’s F1 racing debut. The entry car’s drivers, Graham Hill and Jim Clark, were both airplane pilots as well as race-car drivers, and they both wore the wristwatch most beloved by aviators: the Breitling Navitimer, which had hit the market several years earlier. The watch’s hallmark slide-rule scale proved as useful in crucial areas of motorsport competition — calculating speeds, lap times, and fuel consumptions — as it did in flying and navigating an aircraft. Breitling and Aston Martin even shared a screen in the 1965 James Bond movie Thunderball. Sean Connery’s main watch in that film was a Breitling Top Time (the first Q-modified watch in the series), and his ride was an Aston Martin DB5, making its return after famously debuting in the previous film, Goldfinger. The new partnership will be the first official collaboration between the two legendary names, both renowned for “precision, craftsmanship, and engineering excellence,” in the words of Aston Martin Executive Chairman Lawrence Stoll, and which Breitling CEO Georges Kern describe as “shar[ing] that same heritage of iconic design” in which “every line, finish, and proportion has purpose.”

The Breitling Navitimer B01 Chronograph 43 Aston Martin Aramco Formula One Team —  a limited edition of 1,959 pieces in homage to the year of the Navitimer’s F1 debut —  is noteworthy in several respects. It is, as noted above, the first Navitimer model since the iconic model’s debut in 1952 with a titanium case. The dial, made of carbon fiber, features details in lime green and Aston Martin’s own familiar Racing Green. Both titanium and carbon fiber are materials used extensively in Formula One racing, where the quest for making cars and engines as light as possible, while still maintaining durability and rigidity, is paramount. All the familiar Navitimer codes are present, including the three-register design of the subdials, the date window at 4:30, the pump-style pushers on the side of the case to start, stop, and restart the built-in stopwatch, and the aforementioned, inner circular slide rule bezel for calculations. The textured leather strap is designed in the style of a racing harness. 

The high-performance engine inside the 43mm case is the now-ubiquitous in-house Caliber B01, a self-winding, COSC-certified movement familiar to Breitling fans but here with an added element of Aston Martin style. As it has since its introduction in 2009, Caliber B01 has a column-wheel-driven integrated chronograph function and a lengthy 70-hour power reserve, accompanied in this iteration by a tungsten rotor with a matte-black PVD coating and an inscription of the Aston Martin Formula One team logo. Of course, Breitling has helpfully put this movement on display behind a sapphire window in the caseback, which also bears the watch’s limited-edition number and the motto, “Instruments for Drivers.”

Breitling’s Official Watch Partner status will be apparent for the first time on February 9, 2026, when the team launches with an Aston Martin Aramco car bearing the Breitling logo, and the partnership officially kicks off at the Australian Grand Prix in Melbourne, from March 6 to 8. Breitling and Aston Martin have promised additional co-branded releases as the multi-year deal continues. Pricing on the limited-edition Navitimer B01 Chronograph Aston Martin Aramco Formula One watch is set at $11,500.