A chronograph is traditionally a large watch, not for aesthetic reasons but for functional ones: it has more movement components than other watches, including tourbillons and annual calendars. There is an extra gear train for the stopwatch function, a mechanism to manage the stop, start, and reset functions, and a power source big enough to handle the energy required. A chronograph movement simply needs more space. Micro-technology has evolved, however, and brands are creating smaller, more simplified movements. At the same time, quartz is making something of a comeback, or at least carries less stigma than it has over the past 20 years. Here are 16 chronographs with diameters of 38mm or less that can time laps at the track and still fit under a shirt cuff.
[toc-section heading=”Timex Q Timex Continental Chronograph”]
Price: $259, Case Size: 36mm, Thickness: 11.5mm, Lug to Lug: 43mm, Crystal: Mineral, Water Resistance: 50 meters, Movement: SR920SW quartz chronograph
The Q is a chic, functional, and wearable stainless-steel chronograph with an unbeatable price: $259 for the steel versions and $279 for two-tone. The 36mm x 11mm-thick, brushed, stainless-steel case has polished edges and a stationary bezel with a tachymeter index, and a steel bracelet to match. The black and gold-tone dials are finished with a radial CD texture. All have contrasting subdials and lumed hands.
[toc-section heading=”Studio Underd0g 01Series”]
Price: $800, Case Size: 38.5mm, Thickness: 12.9mm, Lug to Lug: 44.5mm, Crystal: Sapphire, Water Resistance: 50 meters, Movement: ST-1901B manual winding
The 38.5mm 01Series chronograph, known for its fun colors, has been upgraded with the manual-wind ST-1901B, developed in partnership with Seagull. It is regulated to -10/+15 seconds per day, an improvement over the previously offered 15/+35 seconds per day. Other improvements include a slimmer profile, with a thickness of 12.9mm (down from 13.6mm), and a re-tooled dial to feature an “Assembled in Great Britain” mark.
[toc-section heading=”Furlan Marri Mechaquartz Nero Sabbia”]
Price: $716, Case Size: 38mm, Thickness: 12mm, Lug to Lug: 46mm, Crystal: Sapphire, Water Resistance: 50 meters, Movement: Seiko VK64
The unique movement, mechaquartz Seiko VK64, is a hybrid that combines a quartz base with mechanical chronograph module, and is accurate to +/- 20 seconds per month. Like a mechanical chrono, it has an instant reset, a smooth sweeping central seconds hand, and a soft, responsive pusher action. The pump pushers, pulsometer and applied Roman numerals give it a mid-century design feel.
[toc-section heading=”Sinn 356 Sa Flieger”]
Price: €2,750, Case Size: 38.5mm, Thickness: 15mm, Crystal: Sapphire, Water Resistance: 100 meters, Movement: SW500
The “Sa” is an optimized version of Sinn’s best-selling 356 Flieger pilot’s watch, but with a sapphire crystal front and back and a decorated movement with an engraved Sinn rotor. The caliber is the automatic Sellita SW500, and the front crystal is domed for greater legibility. The satin-finished stainless steel case measures 38.5mm x 15mm thick, and it comes with a steel bracelet.
[toc-section heading=”Omega Speedmaster 38″]
Price: $6,500, Case Size: 38mm, Thickness: 17.43mm, Lug to Lug: 44.7mm, Crystal: Sapphire, Water Resistance: 100 meters, Movement: Automatic Master Chronometer Caliber 3302
The scaled-down, 38mm Speedmaster has a vintage-style boxed crystal and Omega’s signature mid-century Speedmaster-specific tachymeter scale: the “Dot Over Ninety” design. The new model features a dot on the index, placed above the 90 on the tachymeter scale, as per vintage models, which are highly collectible. The design changed in 1969, when Omega started to place the dot next to the 90.
[shoppable-product-slim handle=”speedmaster-chronograph-38mm-black-on-bracelet”]
[toc-section heading=”Lorca Model No. 2 Chronograph”]
Price: $2,750, Case Size: 37mm (38mm with bezel), Thickness: 14.1mm, Lug to Lug: 46mm, Crystal: Sapphire, Water Resistance: 100 meters, Movement: Sellita SW510 M manual wind
Although this watch measures 37mm x 11.6mm thick, the bezel overhangs the case slightly, bumping it to 38mm, and the high domed sapphire crystal increases the thickness to 14.1mm – it thus wears small, but reads big. The bezel has a distinctive fluted guilloché design, machined with raised numerals. The domed crystal, pump pushers, and Dauphine hands give it a mid-century vibe, as does the manual-winding movement, the Sellita SW510 M.
[toc-section heading=”Maen Skymaster 38 M6.1.1″]
Price: $1,924, Case Size: 38mm, Thickness: 13.4mm, Lug to Lug: 47mm, Crystal: Sapphire, Water Resistance: 100 meters, Movement: Sellita SW510 M b manual movement
The Skymaster 38 M6.1.1 is also driven by the Sellita SW510 Mb manual chronograph movement, with a 63-hour power reserve. The design is mid-century, with a box-domed sapphire crystal, pump pushers, a reverse panda dial with classic layout, and vintage-y X1 “Old Radium” Super-LumiNova. The 38 mm case is 316L stainless steel, with a matching bracelet and a ceramic bezel.
[toc-section heading=”Nivada Grenchen Autochron”] 
Price: $530 (quartz); $2,590 (automatic), Case Size: 38mm, Thickness: 15.2mm, Lug to Lug: 46.5mm, Crystal: Sapphire, Water Resistance: 200 meters, Movement: SR936SW quartz; Valjoux-7750-ETA automatic
This watch replicates a model created by the brand in the 1970s but never commercialized. There are automatic and mecha-quartz executions, designed with vintage-style lollipop hash marks. The automatic version, with double registers (60-minute counter and 12-hour totalizer) is driven by a Valjoux 7750 movement ($2,590), and the quartz, by the VK67, with a small seconds register, in an unusual dial layout with subdials at 6, 9 and 12 o’clock ($530). The steel cases are 38mm.
[toc-section heading=”Breitling Endurance Pro”]
Price: $3,550, Case Size: 38mm, Thickness: 12.1mm, Crystal: Sapphire, Water Resistance: 100 meters, Movement: Breitling 83
The 38mm Endurance Pro is Breitling’s casual, everyday, gender-neutral sports watch, with sporty rubber straps and color-matched bezel options: purple, pink, white, blue or red. The model is inspired by the Breitling Sprint, a colorful 1970s design with a pulsometer. The case is made of Breitlight, a proprietary polymer that is extremely light and highly durable. It contains a Breitling SuperQuartz movement that Breitling says is 10 times more accurate than regular quartz.
[toc-section heading=”Benrus Sky Chief”]
Price: $3,950, Case Size: 36mm, Thickness: 11.9mm, Lug to Lug: 42.5mm, Crystal: Sapphire, Water Resistance: 100 meters, Movement: Automatic ETA 2894
It’s rare to see a pilot’s watch under 40mm, since one of the characteristics of the genre is to design large indications on a large dial, even though modern pilots now use on-board instrumentation for navigation. This 36mm version is scaled to retain readability despite the busy tri-compax chronograph layout. The lacquered dials come in Cirrus White or Stratus Gray.
[toc-section heading=”Seagull Air Force Edition 1963″]
Price: $464, Case Size: 38mm, Thickness: 12.7mm, Lug to Lug: 47mm, Crystal: Sapphire, Water Resistance: 100 meters, Movement: Manually wound Seagull ST19
This 38mm chrono, with a 316L stainless steel case, contains the Seagull ST19 hand-wound movement with a 42-hour power reserve. It’s another midcentury-vintage design, with pump-style pushers and a military vibe. The original was created for the Chinese Liberation Army Air Force. It comes on a green textile NATO strap.
[toc-section heading=”Brew Metric”]
Price: $475, Case Size: 36mm, Thickness: 10.75mm, Lug to Lug: 41.5mm, Crystal: Sapphire, Water Resistance: 50 meters, Movement: Seiko V68 mecha-quartz
The retro dial on this two-register chronograph uniquely positions the 60-minute counter between 9 and 10 o’clock, on a subdial that separates increments of 10 seconds between orange-colored sections. Like the running seconds subdial at 6 o’clock, it is finished with circular grooving. The 36mm steel case is a 1970s-style cushion shape, with a thickness of only 10.75mm.
[toc-section heading=”Zenith Chronomaster Revival El Primero A384″]
Price: $10,000, Case Size: 37mm, Crystal: Sapphire, Water Resistance: 50 meters, Movement: Automatic El Primero Caliber 400
As a reissued version of Zenith’s 1969 El Primero, the A384 is sized in line with the proportions of the era: 37mm in diameter. The brown-toned subdials are designed to evoke the oxidized tropical dials of vintage watches from decades ago. Pump-style pushers add to the vintage aesthetic, as does the “old radium”-colored Super-LumiNova on the hands and markers. It contains the high-frequency El Primero 400, an updated version of the original movement.
[shoppable-product-slim handle=”chronomaster-revival-a384-37mm-white-brown-accents-on-bracelet”]
[toc-section heading=”Blancpain Air Command”]
Price: $22,700 ($26,000 on titanium bracelet), Case Size: 36.2mm, Thickness: 11.5mm, Crystal: Sapphire, Water Resistance: 30 meters, Movement: F188B automatic
This watch blasts the myth that chronographs and pilots’ watches need to be outsized to be legible. The 36.2mm case is titanium, which makes it not just smaller, but also lighter than average. The sunburst blue dial is matched by a blue ceramic bezel. An open caseback reveals the automatic Caliber F188B. It is water-resistant to 30 meters, which makes it mostly a land watch rather than a dive watch.
[toc-section heading=”Audemars Piguet Royal Oak Chronograph 38mm”]
Price: $43,000, Case Size: 38mm, Thickness: 11.1mm, Crystal: Sapphire, Water Resistance: 50 meters, Movement: Automatic AP Caliber 6401
This scaled-down, 38mm version of the Royal Oak is updated with a new movement, automatic Caliber 6401, with a reduced number of components. The movement is decorated, and this is the first Royal Oak Chronograph at these modest dimensions to have an open caseback. There are references in classic steel with a blue dial ($43,000); 18k pink gold with a gray dial ($84,500); and 18k pink gold with a sand dial and diamond bezel ($91,600).
