Tissot Roars Out of the 2025 Gate with New PR516 Chronographs — and the First Powermatics

Last year, Tissot revamped its motorsport-inspired PR516 collection, which originally launched in the 1960s, with new quartz-powered chronographs as well as a chronograph outfitted with a mechanical movement, one descended from the vintage Valjoux calibers used in historic models. This week, as its first major rollout for 2025, Tissot expands the collection, adding a sleek new colorway to the enthusiast-friendly Valjoux model, two gold-toned versions of the Quartz Chronograph, and the first three-handed models in the retooled PR516 series equipped with Tissot’s Powermatic 80 caliber.

As I delve into in greater detail in this article, the PR516 has been a mainstay in the Tissot lineup for many decades, taking its alphanumeric name from its “Precision and Resistance” (or for being “Particularly Robust;” there seems to be no consensus) and even once finding its way into a James Bond movie, on the wrist of Roger Moore in Live and Let Die. The watch’s popularity in the 1970s ushered in a longtime association between Tissot and motorsports, as a sponsor and official timekeeper, which continues to this day and eventually sparked the retro-flavored relaunch of the collection in 2024. 

Among the latest wave of PR516 releases, the three-handed PR516 models offer the most choices — four versions, all in modest 38mm stainless steel cases with mineral glass bezels, two on steel bracelets and the other two on perforated leather straps that evoke gloves worn by racing drivers. The options include a black dial-and-bezel combo on a bracelet, with a contrasting red seconds hand; the same black colorway with a yellow seconds hand on a brown leather strap; a blue dial-and-bezel version with a red seconds hand; and a two-tone steel-and-gold-PVD model on a bracelet, with a cream-colored dial, a  black seconds hand, and a black bezel with gilt details. Inside each of these watches, and on display behind a clear caseback, is the Powermatic 80 movement, a self-winding caliber proprietary to the Swatch Group stable of watch brands (of which Tissot is one), which is noteworthy for its antimagnetic Nivachron hairspring and 80-hour power reserve. Both of the watches on leather straps are priced at $650; the steel-bracelet version, at $725; and the bi-metal version, at $795.

Two new options await fans of the Quartz Chronograph version of the PR516, one a bicolor model combining stainless steel with gold PVD elements on the bracelet, the other featuring an all-over gold PVD treatment on the case and bracelet. Both watches have the same black tricompax dial, with golden accents on the subdials and on the bezel’s combined tachymeter/pulsometer scale, a vintage-evocative feature of historical PR516 models. The movement in this one is, of course, quartz, with a user-friendly end-of-life indicator for the battery, and hidden behind an ornately engraved solid caseback depicting the laurel wreath awarded to winning race car drivers and a steering wheel motif. Both new watches feature 40mm tapered cases mounted on "Interchangeable Quick Release" bracelets. Prices range from $550 (two-tone) to $595 (all-gold PVD).

Leading the pack in horological savoir-faire, as in the first wave of PR516 releases in 2024, is the "Valjoux" version of the watch, the PR516 Automatic Chronograph, whose case is slightly larger than that of the Quartz models (41mm) and which houses the ETA Valjoux A05 self-winding chronograph caliber, based on the ubiquitous Valjoux 7753 and re-engineered specifically for this watch. (The model released last year, notably, had a manually wound version of this proprietary mechanism, Caliber A05.291). The dial is distinctively, albeit subtly, different from that of its quartz-powered siblings, with the three chronograph subdials positioned lower on the dial; the crystal over said dial is box-shaped on the Automatic watch while it is flat on the Quartz. And of course, Tissot opts for an exhibition caseback on the Automatic model to show off the movement, with its Tissot-branded rotor, Nivachron hairspring, and souped-up 68-hour power reserve (a substantial step up from the 48 hours offered by the base 7753 movement). 

Contrasting from last year’s model, which mixed things up colorwise with a black dial, orange and blue details, and a bicolor black-and-white bezel, this new Automatic brings a more streamlined aesthetic to the table, with a clean white dial, blue subdial borders and central seconds hand, and a blue bezel with a white-printed scale for the pulsometer/tachymeter readings. The Tissot PR516 Automatic Chronograph retails for $2,050.