Manufacturer: Zelos Watches | Price: from $649 USD (£500 GBP, €575 EUR approx)
Introducing the Zelos Horizons GMT. A sleek GMT timepiece that will take you from the boardrooms to the depth of the seas and everywhere in between. Inside is a Swiss ETA 2893 Elaboré movement displayed under a sapphire caseback. Available in two different case finishes with four different dial options. *Note – Prices will increase to $849 USD after the initial launch period.
Specifications
- Dimensions: Case Diameter – 40mm, Thickness – 13.3mm, Lug to Lug – 45.2mm, Lug Width – 20mm
- Movement: Swiss ETA 2893 Elaboré Automatic, Hackable & Self Winding, Custom Rotor, Date Window at 6 o’clock
- Case Material: 316L Stainless Steel or CuSn8 Bronze
- Weight: 95g Extras: Leather Watch Roll, Wooden Presentation Box
- Straps: Tropic Rubber & Horween Leather (316L Stainless Steel Bracelet Available Separately – Summer 2019)
- Crystal: Box Style Sapphire with AR Coating
- Water Resistance: 20ATM / 200m / 660ft
- Lume: Swiss Super Luminova C3 X1
- Crown: Signed, Screw Down Caseback: Display, Sapphire Crystal
- Warranty: 1 Year Where to Buy: zeloswatches.com
- Options: Dial – Meteorite / Cobalt Blue / Hunter Green / Slate Grey, Case – Stainless Steel / CuSn8 Bronze
Delivery & Packaging
Delivery of the Horizons GMT took 4 working days to arrive in the UK from Singapore. Zelos do offer free worldwide shipping via FedEx with all their watches. The packaging is one of my favourites out of all microbrands. You get a very nice solid wooden presentation box with an engraved Zelos logo on the lid.
The box itself is very well made with good quality hinges and magnets at the front for that nice secure ‘clunk’ sound when you close the lid. I personally have quite a few of these boxes and I use them to store all my spare watch straps.
Inside you get a great quality leather watch roll, which is capable of housing 4 watches. The watch roll itself contains the watch on a tropic rubber strap, a fantastic quality horween leather strap and a steel warranty card. All-in-all, it’s very nice presentation and a very pleasant unboxing experience.
The Case
The Zelos Horizons GMT is another watch that sits right in that sweet-spot of 40mm with a short lug to lug distance of 45mm. The case is mainly brushed with rather nice looking polished accents along the sides of the case and down the side part of the almost inverted style lugs. The lugs themselves are not drilled, which although won’t make it a strap monster as such, unless you don’t mind putting your Bergeon tool to good use. It does however give the watch a hint of elegance and wouldn’t look out of place under a shirt cuff. The caseback sports a sapphire display crystal which showcases that lovely Swiss Elaboré grade ETA 2893 movement with custom rotor.
The case, bezel, crown and sapphire display caseback surround are all stainless steel of the 316L variety (do we really expect anything less these days?) The overall height, with the inclusion of the vintage inspired box style sapphire crystal I measured at 13.3mm. The signed crown at the 3’oclock position has a great feel to it, nice and smooth when setting the time, changing the date etc and when screwing it back down to the case with no cross-threading.
Straps / Bracelet
The Horizons GMT comes fitted with a 20mm tropic rubber strap with an additional 20mm horween leather strap supplied in the box. The tropic rubber strap is very nicely made, extremely comfortable and a great pairing to the GMT, which to be fair, is essentially a dive watch, with a realistic water resistance rating of 200m.
The horween leather strap that’s also included, isn’t some cheap & nasty thing you’d find on eBay. Hell No!! This is a gorgeous strap. Kudos to Zelos for supplying it with the GMT. I actually prefer the horween leather over the tropic rubber strap as it’s just looks and feels way nicer. It’s not as if I go diving anyway, unless I happen to be doing the dishes on the floor of the North Sea.
Both straps are 20mm at the lugs, tapering down to 18mm at the buckle. I measured the tropic rubber strap length at 120/70mm and the horween leather at 120/75mm excluding the buckle. As a first from Zelos, both straps come equipped with a matching signed, brushed stainless steel buckle so no need to swap them over when you feel the need to change straps.
Elshan from Zelos has informed me that there will be a stainless steel bracelet available separately at some point during the summer. I have seen a prototype and I’ve got to say the build quality looks phenomenal with solid end links, milled clasp and everything else you would hope for from a high-end stainless steel bracelet. Oh yeah, it won’t be ridiculously expensive either, expecting to retail at approximately $60 USD (Don’t quote me on that price).
Movement
The chosen movement is the Swiss Elaboré grade ETA 2893, a premium movement that is hand winding and hackable. The 2893 is a 28,800vph, smooth sweep, 21 jewel movement. Checking the accuracy after running the Horizons GMT for nearly a week, mainly on my wrist and occasionally in my watch winder, I was more than happy with the accuracy with it showing an average of +5.8 seconds per day.
You might wonder while reading this, what the difference is between the more commonly used ETA 2892 and this one. Well, the ETA 2893 used here has the addition of a GMT complication. (Thanks for that, Captain Obvious!) 
Zelos also decided to add a custom rotor, which is engraved with the world map with the addition of a Zelos logo bang in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean.
Dial & Bezel
The Horizons GMT has a 60 click bi-directional bezel with a sapphire insert. It is of fantastic quality with everything lining up perfectly. The bezel action is absolutely fantastic with zero backplay. The hunter green version does come with a ceramic bezel insert instead of sapphire, I’m not exactly sure why, but hey, it is what it is.
The dial itself has very neatly applied indices with heaps of lume as do the minute and hour hands. The text and the applied Zelos logo are all very neatly done. There is also a date complication at 6 o’clock.
The cobalt blue version that I have here, sports a fantastic sunburst dial. Additionally, the applied indices are set back into the chapter ring giving a really premium look. As previously mentioned, they are also pumped full of lume, as are the hour, minute, GMT and second hand. To give you an idea of the attention to detail, the GMT hand and bezel pip has blue lume to contrast against the green lume used everywhere else. Perfect!
Conclusion
An absolutely fantastic watch that ticks all the boxes in my opinion. There was a lot of hype before the release of the Zelos Horizons GMT and quite justifiably so. The only alternative GMT watch at this price point with similar specification that I could find was the Steinhart GMT Ocean. Although the Steinhart is a very nice watch, it’s just another Rolex homage in my opinion. Personally I much prefer this original design from Zelos.
Zelos should definitely be applauded for making another diver at 40mm with an original aesthetic, yet this time, adding a GMT complication into the mix. The level of attention to detail and the fit & finish is phenomenal. It is pretty difficult to try and describe just how good this watch is, that is, until you see it for yourself in the flesh. My favourite aspects of the watch is the perfect size, the dial, the indices and of course the superb case design. If you’re in the market for a GMT watch, I can, without hesitation, 100% recommend the Zelos Horizons GMT.
10/10
10/10 HIGHLY RECOMMENDED
Thanks very much to Elshan from Zelos for sending out the Horizons GMT so promptly. Excellent service as always.
To view the entire collection visit Zelos Watches.