Explorer

Explorer timepieces are designed for extreme situations.
Featuring a smooth bezel and a black dial, the Explorer is a tool watch, designed to tell time, no matter the condition.

The model’s characteristic 3, 6 and 9 numerals are now filled with a luminescent material emitting a long-lasting blue glow, like the hour markers and hands. This exclusive Chromalight display offers exceptional legibility in any conditions.

The dial is the distinctive face of a Rolex watch, the feature most responsible for its identity and readability. Like all Rolex timepieces, the Explorer's dial is designed and manufactured in-house, largely by hand to ensure perfection.

In 1971, Rolex launched the Explorer II, heir to the Explorer, featuring a date display, an additional 24-hour hand and a fixed bezel with 24-hour graduations, enabling the wearer to distinguish the hours of the day from those of the night; a feature essential for exploration in dark environments. The Explorer II became the watch of choice for speleologists, volcanologists and polar explorers.

An independent 12-hour hand, which provides a second time zone function in conjunction with the fixed or “home” 24-hour display, and an integrated Cyclops lens that magnifies the date display, are other functions that make the Explorer II highly appreciated by global adventurers.

A scratch-proof sapphire crystal, a clear dial and special luminescent markings allow the rugged Rolex Explorer II to be read even in the most challenging conditions. The high-contrast Chromalight display on the dial innovates by pushing the boundaries of visibility in dark environments. The blue glow of the hour markers and hands lasts up to eight hours with a uniform luminosity throughout, practically twice as long as that of standard luminescent materials.

The Twinlock system guarantees that the screw-down winding crown is perfectly water-resistant thanks to two sealed zones, one inside the tube, the other inside the crown. This principle is used on all the watches in the Oyster collection that are guaranteed waterproof to 100 metres (330 feet).

Specially developed by the brand, Oystersteel belongs to the 904L steel family, superalloys most commonly used in high-technology and in the aerospace and chemical industries, where maximum resistance to corrosion is essential.

Oystersteel is extremely resistant, offers an exceptional finish once polished and maintains its beauty even in the harshest environments.

Few companies have been so consistently identified with the pursuit of excellence, the quest for the absolute, the discovery of original approaches and innovative solutions. Rolex watches have proved themselves from the start in the most extreme conditions imaginable - from the depths of the deepest oceans to the summits of the highest mountains, in the air and on the race track. And to ensure that all Rolex watches can live up to these high expectations, every single one is tested to extremes before it is allowed to leave the Rolex site.

The Explorer is equipped with calibre 3132 and the Explorer II with calibre 3187, both are self-winding mechanical movements entirely developed and manufactured by Rolex. They feature a Parachrom hairspring and Paraflex shock absorbers, offering greater resistance to shocks and to extreme conditions.

In the 1930s, Rolex began to equip mountaineering and diving expeditions with Oyster watches. The feedback it received from this real-life laboratory was used to develop what eventually became known as the Professional range: Oyster Perpetual models such as the Explorer and Explorer II.

Rolex watches have taken part in many great adventures into the unknown. The successful expedition to Everest in 1953, led by Sir John Hunt, when Sir Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay became the first to summit the world’s highest mountain, was just one such occasion.

Explorers wearing an Oyster have pushed the boundaries of what humans can achieve and helped to shed light on unknown areas of the world.