VIDEO: Every TAG Heuer Monaco in the Current Line-Up by Time & Tide

 

VIDEO: TAG Heuer Monaco Calibre TH20-11 by Casual Dude Reviews

 

ON THE WRIST: TAG Heuer Monaco Calibre TH20-11 & Pastel Formula 1 Solargraphs

TAG Heuer Boutique / Leicester, 4th May 2026

It's been a while since I'd visited the Leicester TAG Heuer boutique, and if I remember correctly last time it felt like a bit of a waste of time (compared to Sheffield and Milton Keynes) as it's quite small and generally doesn't seem to get the new watches very quickly. So I was quite surprised to find they had all five of the new limited edition 'pastel' Formula 1 Solargraphs and the new left-hand crown, titanium cased Monacos in stock (two out of three anyway), even if the watches I really wanted to try on (the latest versions of the Super Diver) were nowhere to be seen.

FIRST IMPRESSIONS: TAG Heuer Monaco Calibre TH20-11 Chronographs

And so Watches & Wonders 2026 came around and to literally no one's great surprise it turned out that those Monaco wall clocks that we'd seen in the F1 paddocks were indeed 'leaks in plain sight' just as expected! But how would the Heueristas react to this? A new 'Calibre 11' style (read - left hand crown) movement and reshaped case but now wearing a TAG Heuer badge. 

Sacre bleu indeed! 

Not that it bothered me of course, in fact I'd always preferred the Calibre 12 Monaco because of the TAG Heuer branding and the right hand crown (yes, really), but I always wished it had the horizontal hour markers from the Calibre 11 instead of the weird (radial) batons. So now I've got two out of three, but the crown is still on the wrong side of the case. Hey ho.

FIRST IMPRESSIONS: TAG Heuer Carrera 'Wempe' Limited Edition Chronograph

One of the nicer Carreras of recent times has to have been the 'Swiss Alps' tourbillon that came out in a limited run of fifty pieces back in 2024. Despite being hampered by being a 'glassbox' this one fared rather well with the 'Council of Considered Opinion', scoring a creditable 6.5 on release (falling slightly to a 6.3 at the end of the year) and to me it was a no brainer that the blue/silver 'panda' would return at some point... and hopefully without the dirty great hole in the dial needed for the tourbillon. 

And sure enough, here it is (kind of), albeit once again in a limited run of fifty for the German luxury watch retailer 'Wempe'. Which seems a little odd to me, because surely it's easier to sell 50x 39mm chronographs than 50x tourbillons, no?*

*And no, it's not just 50x watches in Germany because I am reliably informed that Wempe operates in the US too.

VIDEO: TAG Heuer Carrera 'Skipper' by Random Rob

 

FIRST IMPRESSIONS: TAG Heuer Carrera Calibre TH20-00 'Australian' Limited Edition Chronograph

 

"Am I missing something?" asked my watch enthusiast (and COCO member) wife. "Is there supposed to be something here that I can't see, like a koala or a kangaroo or something?"

"Errr, no," I replied.

"Oh, so what's 'Australian' about this watch exactly?"

Here we go... I thought.

"Ah yes, well as it happens I can help you there, because I read an article about the watch on the Time & Tide website. So the design is basically a mash up of the vintage Ronnie Peterson Carrera and the Jo Siffert Autavia. The stripe on the dial is from the Carrera and the blue hands and black subdials are from the Autavia."

"Who are Ronnie Peterson and Jo Siffert?"

"They were Grand Prix drivers."

"Australian Grand Prix drivers?"

"Nope, Ronnie Peterson was Swedish and Jo Siffert was Swiss, they are both dead unfortunately. But when they were alive they were mates with Jack Heuer and Jo Siffert in particular used to buy watches from Jack and sell them to people in the pitlane, which helped create the bond between Heuer and F1."

"Okay... but what does that have to do with Australia?"

"I'm glad you asked, because again, according to the Time & Tide article this watch 'represents the bond of friendship'. And as everyone knows friendship is a big thing for Australians."

"I'm not really seeing the connection. Is friendship uniquely Australian?"

FIRST IMPRESSIONS: TAG Heuer Carrera Calibre TH20-00 'Fragment' Limited Edition Chronograph

 

You know, some posts are a lot easier to write than others. This one I've already written twice and I'm still not happy with it... so here I am three hours before the publishing deadline trying yet again to finish it. Given how short of time I am, instead of tying myself in knots trying to be clever or sarcastic or whatever, I think instead I'm just going to be brutally honest. 

And okay, maybe a little sarcastic... (to be honest it's going to be hard not to be).

TLDR: I really don't like this watch. 

Don't get me wrong, it's not the worst watch I've ever seen, it's not even the worst TAG Heuer of 2025; that 'privilege' undoubtedly belongs to the godawful 'Osaka Expo' Carrera. But in a way it feels worse. Because while that watch is intrinsically flawed in its 'design', it at least feels kind of 'honest' in its 'execution'... whereas this one genuinely feels like a case of the Emperor's new clothes.

FIRST IMPRESSIONS: TAG Heuer Carrera MEIA & UK Limited Edition Chronographs

 

As you may have noticed, I recently revamped the 'Part Number' index page with photo banners for each model instead of text. This not only makes the page look much nicer but is also easier to click on if you are viewing the blog on a phone (which I know a lot of you do). I also tidied up the text on the individual pages and increased the font size to make it easier to read. 

As I was doing this it occurred to me that I could write some posts about region specific 'Limited Editions' and the first one that I thought of was 'Middle East' L/Es. You might be surprised how many there have been, starting way back in the 1990s with a 'Saudi Arabian Equestrian Foundation' Formula 1 chronograph and most recently with these new glassbox Carreras. I will most likely post this in January, so look out for that, but for now let's investigate these new models further.

FIRST IMPRESSIONS: TAG Heuer Monaco & Carrera Extreme Sports 'Las Vegas' Limited Edition Chronographs

 

Believe it or not we're pretty much set for 'First Impressions' posts all the way up to Christmas now. As you can see from the TAG Heuer Enthusiast Gallery we still have a ton of new watches to look at and I keep hearing there's still more to come. Quite why they've decided to release like TWENTY watches in November and December is beyond me! Anyway, we'll do what we can, and if I have to post more frequently to get through them all then that's what I'll do. So long as the Council get their fingers out and send me their scores fast enough of course! 🤣

FIRST IMPRESSIONS: TAG Heuer Carrera 'Chinese Zodiac' Limited Edition Chronograph

I don't really understand these watches, or rather the release logic of these watches. Why did we have a 'Year of the Rat' Autavia for 2020, a 'Year of the Tiger' Carrera for 2022, a 'Year of the Rabbit' Carrera for 2023 and 'Year of the Dragon' Carreras (one steel and one solid gold) for 2024 but we missed out the Ox (2021, well okay, maybe Covid killed that one) and the Snake (2025)? 

In a way I can understand the Ox, because after all there's nothing sexy about an 'Ox', but then there's nothing particularly sexy about a rat either, and 2027 is the year of the goat (or sheep). I just can't imagine a Carrera with a goat on the back, can you? Oh I do hope they prove me wrong... a Carrera Tourbillon with a goat skull (and maybe a candle) on the back would probably sell well to affluent members of the Metal community at least. 🤣

VIDEO: TAG Heuer Monaco 'Las Vegas' Limited Edition Chronograph by Armbanduhren

 

VIDEO: TAG Heuer Carrera CBK221F Chronograph by The 1916 Company

FIRST IMPRESSIONS: TAG Heuer Carrera and Monaco TH-Carbonspring Limited Editions

Hello dear reader! As you can see from the blog header above we are about to celebrate nine years of the TAG Heuer Enthusiast. Quite an achievement you might think, but as the late, great Ian 'Lemmy' Kilmister once said when asked how he managed to keep Motorhead going for forty years, the key to keeping going is simple - don't stop. Wise words indeed. And as it happens, I may well be paying homage to the great man as you read this as I intend to visit Stoke on Trent this week to see the statue they've erected there for him. Not that most of you are Motorhead fans I'm sure, but my very first gig ever was Motorhead in 1983, so Lemmy will always have a special place in my heart. 

Anyway, you didn't come here to read about my teenage exploits did you? So let's turn our attention to the matter in hand, namely carbon hairsprings. Now, I'm sure some of you will remember about seven years ago TAG Heuer launched the Carrera Nanograph, a funky looking thing that was covered in hexagons and topped with lime green accents... I loved it, but unfortunately at £26000 it was definitely out of my reach (currently there's one on Watchfinder though for about half that, if you're interested).

VIDEO: TAG Heuer Carrera and Monaco TH-Carbonspring by Time & Tide Watches

FIRST IMPRESSIONS: TAG Heuer Carrera Astronomer Calibre 7 Limited Editions

Sure enough, and just as I predicted, the Carrera 'Astronomer' sent to the GPHG for appraisal wasn't a stand alone model and so now we have two more 'Astronomers' to add to the 2025 'Council of Considered Opinion: Watch of the Year' entry list. Unlike the initial piece though these two are limited editions (both made in runs of 500), but with one of them carrying quite a hefty price premium over the other... well, they don't call 'em precious metals for nothing you know!

ON THE WRIST: TAG Heuer Monaco Limited Edition, Carrera Extreme Sports Chronograph & Aquaracer 'Beaverbrooks Exclusive' Solargraph

 

Beaverbrooks / Meadowhall, Sheffield 6th September 2025

TAG Heuer Boutique / Meadowhall, Sheffield, 6th September 2025

Well my last 'On the Wrist' post was a bit negative wasn't it? So let's redress the balance slightly with this one, which also focuses on watches I tried out on the same day in Sheffield.

First of all, my wife and I visited Beaverbrooks where she was eager to see the new 'Beaverbrooks Exclusive' Aquaracer in... turquoise (or Tiffany blue, if you prefer) and since I've already made my reservations about the new 34mm Aquaracers clear (mainly the ugly-ass bezel!) I decided to keep my mouth well and truly shut and let her make up her own mind. 

Well she certainly liked the colour (although it wasn't quite as striking as she'd hoped), we know she likes diamond hour markers, the bezel didn't seem to be an issue for her and she loves the idea of a 15 year battery (and speaking as the person who ends up changing all her batteries for her, so do I!) but in the end she concluded that £2700 was a lot of money that could buy her something more exciting from Watchfinder. 

FIRST IMPRESSIONS: TAG Heuer Carrera 'Astronomer' Calibre 7 Watch

 

I've often wondered when, or indeed 'if' TAG Heuer would ever get around to making a watch with a 'moonphase' complication... after all, moonphases tend to be reserved for the kind of watches that have blued hands, white guilloche dials and Roman numerals - which is clearly not TAG Heuer's bag. But with the release of the Seafarer last year we were told it was a variation on the moonphase complication, so you might have expected a new moonphase to come in the shape of a modified calibre TH20-00, but it seems that isn't what this is. According to the GPHG website the movement is a Calibre 7 (so Selitta) which seems a bit odd, to submit a watch to GPHG without an in-house movement (unless this is one of those 'designed with Selitta, but not actually in-house so no 5 year warranty watches, maybe?). 

As far as I know this watch doesn't actually come out for a few weeks yet and normally I wouldn't post about a watch before it's released, but this one has been submitted to GPHG for appraisal so effectively it's 'out there' and fair game. You might remember this happened last year too with the Carrera Skeleton Extreme, and like that one I have a feeling this might not be a single watch release so it will be interesting to see what comes along.

SPOTLIGHT ON: New Variations on the Titanium Solargraph and the 2021 39mm Carrera

We seem to be reaching the point of the year where TAG Heuer aren't actually releasing new watches so much as putting straps on existing models and trying to generate excitement about them by calling them 'Online Exclusives'... which is something I've never really understood. 'Boutique Editions' I understand (watches you can only obtain by travelling to a particular boutique, possibly in an exotic location like Monaco), but suggesting that something is 'exclusive' because you can 'only' buy it on the internet makes so little sense that I feel like I would need the world's most powerful microscope to measure it!

Anyway, I feel somewhat duty bound to at least show you a picture of these most elusive timepieces, but I really don't think there's any need to trouble the C.O.C.O. with either of them. After all, they'll still get to score them at the end of the year.

FIRST IMPRESSIONS: TAG Heuer Carrera Calibre TH20-00 'Osaka Expo 2025' Limited Edition Chronograph

Let's be frank, I've been fairly withering about TAG Heuer's 2025 releases, haven't I? I mean there are a few I like a bit, but generally speaking I've been left decidedly underwhelmed. And now we have this... mess of a Carrera to look at and I simply don't know where to begin.

Okay, look. Let's back up a bit. First of all, this is clearly not aimed at me, as until today I had never heard of Myaku-Myaku (which is the character logo for the Osaka Expo 2025). If you Google it you will see it's clearly popular, you can get all sorts of merchandise for it, including some bonkers looking trainers... so maybe all 125 pieces will be snapped up and flipped at a profit? I really don't know..