he Audemars Piguet brand boasts of a huge gallery of watches that truly define luxury. Meet someone who knows and loves watches, and they may even argue that AP watches are superior to other big names like Rolex and Patek Phillipe, and while others may be biased against this, they all agree on one thing – the Audemars Piguet has a reserved seat among the ‘Big Three’.
And AP watches can get very pricey, with some editions sitting around $50,000. The company is famed for making limited editions – the fewer the watches, the pricier they get and people who can afford them want to customize their watches so they are unique.
In this brawl of very deep pockets, the average Joe just doesn’t have a chance. With a good replica, however, you can have the closest thing to an authentic AP, without burning your account.
But the replica market is filled with so many options, you can easily get overwhelmed. Are there any good AP replica watches that are worth the money?
The Onola Luxury Watch
We did the searching for you and found the Onola luxury watch. It is a great replica of the authentic Audemars Piguet Royal Oak Offshore 42mm watch. And with the real thing around $40,000, the Onola replica is an unfair steal at $18 on AliExpress.
The cheap doesn’t mean it doesn’t perform. The Onola luxury men’s watch does a great job in mimicking a great part of the AP that without a closer look you may not be able to tell the difference.
The Onola replica is one of the few replicas that are modeled exactly after a real AP watch.
Key Features
The Onola replica comes with the signature metal case and silicone strap construction of the authentic AP luxury watch. It boasts of an excellent color match, identical push-button placements, and a brushed finish for the front, and a shiny finish on the side.
It comes with eight screws that hold the front face in place, a 42mm blue dial, and a three-hand functioning chronograph for the second, minute, and hour that actually works.The strap comes with a buckle closure and a strap loop. Another great feature on the Onola replica is that it comes with a rubber seal under the front face that the company claims makes it actually water-resistant. It also comes with luminescent hour and minute hands, and a date tracker in the dial.
The Onola replica is still a replica and some of its features will give it out to someone who knows AP watches really well. Firstly, it doesn’t come with a top-mounted bezel like on the authentic watch.
Secondly, the face screws on the authentic AP Royal Oak and on any AP watch for that matter are fitted exactly parallel to the crystal – an imaginary line can be drawn through the screw grooves on the authentic watch to form a circle. On the replica, they are not aligned this way.
A couple of other things that give it out are that the date tracker isn’t installed under the chronograph, it doesn’t come with a magnifying bubble over the date tracker, and the straps aren’t easily removed, like on the authentic watch.
It also doesn’t come with the ‘Audemar Piguet’ label. However, as far as replicas go, the Onola watch is an excellent buy for its ‘under $20’ price tag, and even if it does come with some of its flaws, they are sure forgivable. And don’t let a real-life AP fanatic have a close-up look or your cover’s blown!
For more awesome watches, check out Amazon!
