Top of the table: how the GPHG 2026 results reshaped the all-time rankings

Twenty prizes later, the Grand Prix d'Horlogerie de Genève's all-time table has a familiar leader, a new runner-up and two seven-prize clubs that got a lot more crowded.

At about five o'clock every Saturday during the football season, millions of people across Britain do exactly the same thing. They stop pretending to be interested in whatever they were doing and look at the league table. It doesn't matter whether your team won, lost or drew (or, in my experience, all three in the same month). What matters is where that result leaves you in the grand scheme of things.

You might rightly be wondering what this has to do with watches. The answer is that the Grand Prix d'Horlogerie de Genève has a league table of its own, although nobody ever prints it. Every prize awarded since 2001 is recorded in the GPHG Index archive, and on 7 November in Geneva the 26th edition added precisely 20 more of them. So, like any self-respecting football fan, I did the sums.

Same leader, bigger lead

Was Audemars Piguet already top of the table before this year? It was, and comfortably. Le Brassus went into the 2026 edition with 17 prizes, two clear of its nearest rivals, and it has led the all-time table outright every year since 2008. That makes 2026 its nineteenth consecutive edition at the top, a run Sir Alex Ferguson would have been proud of.

What 2026 changed was the size of the gap. With two watches from its 150th anniversary collection, Audemars Piguet collected two more prizes: the Calendar and Astronomy prize for the 150 Heritage and the Iconic Watch prize for the Royal Oak "Jumbo" RD#5. That takes it to 19 and stretches its lead to three. (It also took 98 watches to get there, which is a story I've told elsewhere.)

Piaget breaks the tie

Below the leader, the 2026 results tidied up a table that had become rather congested. Before the ceremony, Piaget and Van Cleef & Arpels were level on 15 prizes apiece. Piaget's Gemset prize for the Swinging Pebble takes it to 16 and second place on its own. Van Cleef & Arpels, which didn't enter a single watch this year, drops to third. Fifteen prizes and still no Aiguille d'Or, so the bridesmaid has now been nudged down the aisle as well.

Chopard was the other big mover in the top five. It was level with Voutilainen on 12 prizes and won two in 2026, the Time Only prize for the L.U.C 1860 and the Jewellery prize for the Mystery Nut. That puts it fourth on 14 and pushes Voutilainen, another absentee this year, down to fifth.

Climbing the ladder

The biggest climb anywhere near the top belongs to Ferdinand Berthoud, which entered two watches and won with both: the Tourbillon prize for the Chronomètre FB 2TV and the Chronometry prize for Naissance d'une Montre 3. That takes it from joint 20th to joint 13th, level with Breguet, F.P.Journe and Patek Philippe on seven prizes. It now has seven prizes from just eight watches entered, a strike rate that would put it top of my strike rate table by a distance if it had entered the two more watches needed to qualify.

Patek Philippe climbed two places too, which is all the more remarkable given that it hasn't entered a watch since 2007. Its seventh prize is the Special Jury prize for its Watch Art Grand Exhibition. Brands can choose not to enter the GPHG, as I pointed out when asking whether it really is the Oscars of watchmaking, but they can still be honoured by it.

Golden hands

The Aiguille d'Or table is far more stable, if only because the top prize is handed out once a year. F.P.Journe still leads with three, ahead of Audemars Piguet, Breguet, Greubel Forsey, Patek Philippe and Vacheron Constantin on two each.

The newcomer is Rexhep Rexhepi, who won the 2026 Aiguille d'Or with his Chronograph Flyback at the first time of asking under his own name. The archive counts brand names, so his two earlier prizes as Akrivia sit in a separate column. Add them together and he has three prizes from six watches, which isn't a bad return by anybody's standards.

The strike rate shuffle

Prizes per watch entered moved less, although it did move. MB&F still has the best strike rate of any brand with ten or more entries, but its SP One Platinum came away empty-handed, so it slips from 8 prizes in 13 watches (62 per cent) to 8 in 14 (57 per cent). Voutilainen stays on 50 per cent and F.P.Journe on 47 per cent, mainly because neither of them entered.

Across the whole field, the archive now holds 5,846 watches and 357 prizes credited to brands that have entered them. That gives a strike rate of 6.1 per cent, exactly where it stood before the ceremony. The jury, in other words, was no more generous this year than usual.

The relegation zone

Every league table has a bottom half, and 2026 had its share of brands who made the trip to Geneva and went home with nothing. IWC Schaffhausen entered six watches and won none, leaving it on one prize from 77 entries. Bulgari, TAG Heuer and Bovet 1822 each drew a blank from five. Bremont, which I featured among the comeback brands, now has 13 entries without a prize.

Two perfect records also went west. Vianney Halter and Berneron had each won with their only judged watch, and neither of their 2026 entries won. That leaves eight brands in the archive that have won with every watch they've entered: M.A.D. Editions and Petermann Bédat (two from two), the three one-shots and three 2026 debutants, Rexhep Rexhepi, Cleguer and Dominique Renaud, who each won with their first watch. Whether they become one-shots depends on whether they come back.

The happier side of the comeback story was Blancpain, which won the Mechanical Exception prize for its Grande Double Sonnerie on its return, and Daniel Roth, which won the Essential prize and now has three prizes in three years since its revival.

What the model made of it

I'd be failing in my duty if I didn't own up to how the GPHG Index prediction model fared. Its Aiguille d'Or model made Audemars Piguet favourite at 7.3 per cent and gave Rexhep Rexhepi just 0.6 per cent. The category model's top pick won its own category in three of the 14 categories (Daniel Roth, Blancpain and SpaceOne), and Rexhepi, its favourite in Chronograph, won the Aiguille d'Or instead, leaving the Chronograph prize to Parmigiani Fleurier's sixth-ranked Tonda PF Chronographe Mystérieux. The model relies heavily on pedigree, and pedigree is exactly what a brand name entering for the first time doesn't have.

Audemars Piguet has now been top of the GPHG table for 19 editions in a row, which is longer than most football managers last in a job. Same time next year!

Frequently asked questions

Which brand has won the most GPHG prizes?

Audemars Piguet, with 19 prizes after the 2026 edition, followed by Piaget with 16, Van Cleef & Arpels with 15 and Chopard with 14. Audemars Piguet won two prizes in 2026, the Calendar and Astronomy prize for the 150 Heritage and the Iconic Watch prize for the Royal Oak "Jumbo" RD#5.

Was Audemars Piguet already top of the GPHG table before 2026?

Yes. It went into the 2026 edition on 17 prizes, two ahead of Piaget and Van Cleef & Arpels, and has led the all-time table outright every year since 2008. The 2026 results stretched its lead to three prizes.

Who won the 2026 Aiguille d'Or?

Rexhep Rexhepi, with the Chronograph Flyback, on his first entry under his own name. He had previously won two prizes as Akrivia. F.P.Journe still holds the most Aiguilles d'Or, with three.

Which brands moved up the GPHG table in 2026?

Piaget moved from joint second to second on its own with 16 prizes, Chopard from joint fourth to fourth with 14, Patek Philippe from joint 15th to joint 13th with 7 and Ferdinand Berthoud from joint 20th to joint 13th with 7, after winning with both of its 2026 entries.

Which brands went home empty-handed from the 2026 GPHG?

Among the larger entrants, IWC Schaffhausen won nothing from six watches, and Bulgari, TAG Heuer, Bovet 1822 and Bremont nothing from five each. Vianney Halter and Berneron lost their perfect records.

Figures are from the GPHG Index archive as of 9 November 2026, after the 2026 results were announced on 7 November. Prize counts include special prizes credited to a brand. The full table for every brand is on the Brands page.