2022 TAG Heuer Aquaracer Ibiza - WBP201E.BA0632

The trend is most certainly not obvious in jeweller’s windows. These are watches that have been designed years ago. Change almost never comes from industry leaders. They wanna keep doing what they have been doing. Change comes from the bottom up, by challengers. Sports watches with bezels will usually be bigger but dress watches and classic chronographs are reducing in size. It takes time for these things to trickle down to a general wave but my money’s on it that it will happen. 43-45mm watches will start looking really weird at a given point and people won’t understand how anyone wore such large clocks.
Rolex increased but also reduced. The sub increase is only about 0.5mm though.

While society remains 'more is more' I think watches will stay quite big. And one reason for that is women's watches are bigger than ever. Men's watches will always be bigger than women's, so not only would the men's need to come down but so will the women's.

You know, it's funny... people say nobody wears watches any more they use their phones, but just go to a shopping centre and look how many watches are in the windows (at all price points, not just luxury). Clearly people still buy watches.

I’m indeed referring to men’s watches. Women’s are moving up but like from 28-32 to 32-36, well below most men’s sizes. You don’t see many women with 43mm watches. Doesn’t mean men won’t move to 38-40mm.

Some people prefer small and some prefer big..no point arguing which one is better... You buy whatever you think is suitable for you.

Not about which is better obviously. Just a discussion about watch trends in the longer term.

Exactly, and you can love and wear different sizes, just like you can have a Mercedes S-Class and also a smart fortwo in the garage

As mentioned, as long as they are sizes neither ridiculously large nor small, it is a matter of habit. I remember that when I bought my S/el in 1996, its size seemed perfect... now, when I wear it after having worn 41-43-45 mm watches for days, it seems very small, almost for women... except at the end of the day, or if I wear it several days in a row, and then I get used to its size again and to see it well on my wrist.

I think that, leaving extreme measures aside, many measures are valid as long as the watch design is proportionate to each measure... just as an S-Class is well designed for more than 5m, and a smart fortwo for 2.5m

And of course it depends on a) your wrist and b) how the watch wears.

Sometimes I think my 45mm skeleton is too big and sometimes I don't...

Maybe you and I are talking at cross purposes? I could see the F1s going back to say... 42mm from 43mm. But I don't see watches generally going back to say 37/38mm like they were in the 80s. Practically every standard men's watch in the TAG catalogue in the 1980s was 37mm.

The funny thing is that i compared our H01 skeleton dial with my friend's Hublot big bang unico that both said to be 45mm and guess what, the H01 looks smaller. I dont know if it is because the way lugs are constructed or what. But surely my friend was asking, are you sure yours was 45mm ? I dont know the exact ref of his hublot though.